Marion Town Planner Gil Hilario offered an “early Christmas present” to the Planning Board on December 16, when he notified board members that Marion had been awarded a $27,750 grant from the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA).
“We’ve been awarded a Hazard Mitigation grant from FEMA,” Hilario said, noting that he had applied for the grant in 2018 and only just received word of the award. “It’s extremely important. It’s recommended that towns create or update a Hazard Mitigation Plan every five years or so. Marion’s is 15 to 20 years old.”
A Hazard Mitigation Plan is a town-wide risk assessment that identifies buildings and resources at risk of storm or disaster damage and puts forward a plan to mitigate those risks.
“It also opens up three grant opportunities,” Hilario mentioned. “With a Hazard Mitigation Plan, we can apply for pre-disaster mitigation for stormwater surges and culvert repair. We can also apply for floodwater mitigations.
“If a resident was having substantial flooding issues, we could apply on their behalf,” he continued. “We would also be eligible for funding in the event that Marion was hit by a presidentially-declared ‘federal disaster.’”
None of the funding, Hilario noted, is available without a current Hazard Mitigation Plan in place.
The last declared federal disaster in Massachusetts occurred between March 2-3, 2018. Plymouth County, among other counties, was pummeled by severe winter storms and flooding. A total of $12.7 million dollars in FEMA aid was made available to the affected counties.
“The award was excellent. We’ll be able to hire a good consultant to create a good Hazard Mitigation Plan,” Hilario told board members. “I think the Department of Public Works could also really benefit from this for areas of flooding or culverts that need repairing and maintaining.”
Planning Board member Eileen Marum praised Hilario for his efforts.
“You’ve got everything. I thank you for all your efforts and time in this; this is so important for Marion. Thank you, this is excellent,” she said.
Also during the meeting, Marion resident Sherman Briggs came to the open comment section of the meeting armed with concerns; he suggested that Planning Board members reconsider its current affordable housing bylaw.
Briggs pointed out that affordable housing units are taxed at a lower rate than market-rate units. The state mandates that 10 percent of all housing in any Massachusetts town be affordable housing. As new market-rate units spring up in Marion, the town will need to construct more affordable housing in order to keep the 10 percent requirement.
Briggs pointed out that Marion, with little land left to develop, will in the future be unable to collect a large portion of market-rate taxes if further affordable housing construction is required.
Planning Board member Andrew Daniel said he could see Briggs’ point.
“Once we get to 10 percent, why are we putting more regulation on something we didn’t have to?” he asked. “If we have a project that could have more market-rate houses, but we’re required to include affordable housing, we’re hurting ourselves by not adding in units taxed at a higher value.”
Planning Board Chairman Will Saltonstall considered Briggs’ comments, saying, “If [Briggs’ proposed condominium complex on Spring Street] goes ahead and pushes us over 10 percent affordable housing in town,” he mused, “should the bylaw then be revisited and looked at differently?”
“I would love the flexibility,” said Daniel. “I feel like we might be over-regulating ourselves and therefore hurting positive growth in town.”
“We shouldn’t lose any more of the little land we have to 40B tax rates,” said Briggs. “We should be bringing in new growth and higher taxes on the little land we have.”
“We’ve reached the state target and that’s a good thing,” Hilario said. “We’re one of the first to do it, and now we have the opportunity to revisit what direction we want to go next.”
Ultimately, Planning Board members decided to pursue a joint meeting with the Marion Affordable Housing Trust in order to discuss Briggs’ concerns in further detail.
The next Planning Board meeting will be on January 6 at 5:00 pm at the Marion Town House. The meeting will be held early to accommodate the Route 6 Planning Meeting that will be held by SRPEDD on the same night.
Marion Planning Board
By Andrea Ray