Spreadsheet Election

Last week we covered the candidates for the Planning Board.  It was a pleasure to read their ideas on what the town should look like over the next several years.  Especially Ms. Mahoney and Mr. Ramos, who gave thoughtful and creative answers to these questions.

Now we turn to the Board of Selectmen, who are not nearly as warm and fuzzy on the issues the town faces.  As you’ll see, I tried to keep the conversation on soft quality-of-life issues, but it didn’t work.  Instead the answers were rigid and centered on that standby political recession gem — money.

Money issues are very important, but it’s a real shame that they have dominated this campaign.  I’m not even sure everyone considers money to be the headliner in this election.  Consider the Lowell Sun’s summary of the BATV debate.  Notice that the Planning Board’s comments on the growth issues (such as the Zombie Mall) lead the article and take up three-quarters of the column space.

And before you go any further, read an in-depth look at the debate by Rick.

Taxes are like the weather: everybody talks about it, but nobody ever does anything about it.  Paul Marasco points out that our taxes have gone up 75% since 2000.  That’s a lot, but the BOS sets the tax rates, and BOS candidates always promise to limit taxes during the campaign.  But each year since 2000 the BOS has voted to raise taxes to the maximum allowed by Prop 2 1/2.  And TM?  Amid a deep recession, TM cut exactly $0 from the budget last Spring.  So where has all this talking about taxes gotten us?

I have a reminder for everyone running for office this year:

We do not live in a spreadsheet

A town is a collection of places, people, and ideas.  Not columns on a ledger.  Who among us can get excited about the guy who is going to move the right numbers to right cells in an Excel file?  I don’t know, but I can tell you that the grand opening of the new library ten years ago made a lot of people smile.  That is what making life better is all about.

Before we get to Q and A part of this post, I want to spend some time on Bob Acccomando.  Bob flatly refused to answer my questions, which I sent to all three candidates by e-mail.  He wanted his response to be “in my own words, not edited or taken out of context.”  I assured him I would simply paste his answers — written by him in his own words — into my column and not altered in any way.  But that did not satisfy him.

So where does Bob stand on growth, zoning upgrades, public infrastructure, and the like?  For a sitting Selectman, he says very little.  Last year, he was the only of the five BOS members to address TM 0 times.  He does not have a campaign web site.  Do we guess?

I’ve had the opportunity of having a pair of pleasant conversations with Bob.  Before the roof started leaking in earnest, I patronized his dry cleaning business at the Mall.  I asked him about the condition of the Mall and he spoke positively about his landlord, saying that RD Management is responsive to tenants and that improvements were being made to the place. I asked him about what came next, after the building’s useful life was over, and he was vague and disinterested.  My impression is that he likes his current space and that was enough for him.

Bob is a nice man with a good heart.  Is that enough to make a good Selectman in a town of 40,000 people with a very diverse set of needs?  You decide.  But since you’re asking me, I can’t support someone who wouldn’t participate in an interview.

So then we are left with two men, both with impressive resumes.

Dave Gagliardi

Looking at his bio, you’ll see that he’s served on just about every town committee there is, including the 2003 Master Plan (more on this later).  Most notably, he has served on the Finance Committee since 1998.  When you read through his web site’s Questions page, you’ll find that he places a heavy focus on his committee experience.

Paul Marasco

In contrast to Dave’s recent hard-numbers finance committee experience, Paul served as chairman of the Planning Board.  While the outspoken Bob Casey made all the headlines during the grinding Home Depot process, Paul ably presided over testy public meetings.  He also cast the deciding ‘no’ vote on the HD permit — despite the predicable lawsuit.  It was a signature act of leadership in a town that needs more guts at the helm.

And now to my questions:

Q: In 2009, then-Town Manager Bill Williams embarrassed his employer by saying publicly that Billerica lacks “curb appeal.”  Two years later, how much improvement has there been?

DG: Given the state of the economy, it is not really all that surprising that there hasn’t been much improvement. I wouldn’t expect there to be sweeping changes anytime soon. As far as the curb appeal comment, truth be told, Billerica like most cities and towns does have its warts. If you drive up Boston Road you see a mix of business and residential and some are not all that pretty to look at. This is not a recent occurrence. Some of those buildings date as far back as the 1800’s.

Dave didn’t understand what Williams meant by curb appeal.  He was looking at the town with the critical eye of a Realtor, something all Billerica elected people should do.  Mr. Williams lived about a mile away from Town Hall and would often walk to work through the town center.  If you’ve ever taken this walk, you know what he saw.  We’ve all driven through the center thousands of times, but you see new things when you walk it, which almost no one has done.  You see long stretches of beaten down dirt rather can concrete sidewalk.  You see street without curbing, trash, dirt, and rubble along the road.  You see, smell, and hear the cars and trucks charging by.  Before you get to the historic center, you see unattractive, cinder block buildings and strip malls flagged with towering ’70s-era signs on the street, engulfed by cratered, empty, treeless parking lot.  And you will likely not encounter a single human being on foot.  That’s the lack of appeal Mr. Williams was talking about.  Not the 19th century buildings in the historic center — those are beautiful even if they need a little repainting.

It’s going to take quite a comprehensive effort to change things.

Aha!  Now we are getting somewhere.  Does this mean Mr. Gagliardi is open to change?  Is he willing to take a leadership role?  We’ll see in his other answers.

Let’s also bring in some content from Dave’s own web site, where he asks himself about the Zombie Mall:

What would you suggest we do about the Mall property?

There have been more than enough suggestions from just about everyone you talk to about what would be best for that property. I think that maybe the time has come to reach out to the Mall owner and ask him what he sees for the future of his property instead of telling him what we think he should do. Then we need to ask what the Town can do to help facilitate that end. I realize that this won’t be easy because of the obvious bad blood that exists between the Town and the Mall owner; however I believe that nothing is going to happen until we attempt to mend some fences. It’s important for both parties to understand that neither benefits from the situation that exists now and a cooperative effort is needed to make things happen. To illustrate this point we need to look no further than Wilmington. On Route 38 the shopping plaza on one side of the street was refurbished. A new plaza was built on the other side and is now fully occupied in a very bad economy. The street was also redesigned to improve traffic flow. I am not suggesting that something of that grand of scale be done in Billerica but I am saying that this is an example of what can be achieved when the Town and the business community work cooperatively and together toward a goal that benefits both.

So, which is it, Dave?  Billerica couldn’t grow because of the economy and Wilmington could?  You can’t have it both ways.  If the recession, and not something Billerica leadership has done wrong, has prevented growth here, then how did Wilmington do it?

Second, Dave talks about meeting with the Mall owners asking what they want.  He should talk to his Town Manager.  I did. Mr. Curran has already met with the management company.  In brief, RD Management has no intention of going before the Planning Board, and therefore will not make any real improvements to the property.  It’s not about mending fences.  It’s about business.  They need a financial incentive to invest in (or someone else to invest if they want to sell) their property.  The answer lies in the citizen’s hands, now.  Are we willing to make changes?  Will Mr. Gagliardi support the Town Manager in his plan to improve this property and others in the center or work against him?

Third, of all places to give as an example of growth, why would you pick Route 38 in Wilmington?  This ugly stretch of Main Street has exploded into a collection of 24-hour drug stores, strip malls, and fast food joints.  It is suburban sprawl at its worst — an orgy of retail-only land use spewing out traffic at a high rate.  Remember when Sonic opened up?  They had to pay 2 police details for three weeks to handle all the cars coming in and out.  The street had to be redesigned to improve traffic flow because of all the extra trips it had to absorb.  At full retail build-out, even 4 lanes won’t be enough.  Anyone who drives it (as I do, to access the train station) knows that it’s very unsafe because there are no left-turn lanes.  Additionally, the gleaming new sidewalks are empty because the area is to car-dominated to be comfortable to walk, and Wilmington is on the hook to maintain an asset no one uses.

Why not talk about Reading, which also grew during the recession, but did so in a much more manageable and pleasant way?

Paul said this:

PM: I do not agree with the Ex Town Manager’s position that Billerica lacked curb appeal.  As a member of the Planning Board for 10 years I never heard comments such as that to businesses wanting to invest in our Town. Billerica has always been well positioned in the region for two reasons: geographical ease of access and financial incentives.  Geographically Billerica has great access from many directions.  There is a local Tax Incentive Financing program and a DOR Tax Credit Program that will assist businesses financially to move to Billerica.  The Town Manager was not here long enough to understand the issues Billerica faces, of which curb appeal was not one.

Look, I realize it’s political suicide to say that your town is ugly.  I leaned that the hard way, and it cost Bill Williams his job.  But to say that Billerica does not face a curb appeal problem?  Even Mr. Gagliardi admitted our town has “its warts.”

Second, the geographical advantage argument does not wash.  Every town has access to at least one freeway.  Mr. Curran pointed out to me that Woburn (the city for which he was once mayor) has direct access to I-93 and 128.  Chelmsford has Route 3 and 495.  They, along with a lot of other towns in the region, beat us in that regard.  As far as financial incentives, fair enough.  But when you have to pay a company to come here (which is another way of looking at a tax break) you can’t say we attract those companies because Billerica is awesome.

Finally, the reason why you won’t hear Billerica businesses complain about curb appeal is because it’s not smart money to put down the community you’re counting on for your income.  Ask the business who have already left or who chose another place over Billerica and you will get a more candid answer.

The first step to improving yourself is admitting that you need to improve.

Q: Over the past five years, has the pace of land development along Boston Road been too fast or too slow?  What type of growth is appropriate over the next five years?

PM: You cannot measure the pace of growth.  There are many economic factors that Influence growth.  The type of growth that is appropriate is growth that lowers the residential real estate taxes, creates local jobs, respects and preserves our quality of life and heritage.

OK, Paul did mention quality of life.  That’s good.  But why did he pass on an opportunity to talk about Smart Growth, which is the third of his three goals?  Puzzling.

DG: I wouldn’t say it has been fast or slow. Again, I wouldn’t expect to see much in the way of development right now. The type of growth depends on how the available land is zoned.

Bingo!  Dave had a different approach in his web site Mall answer (see above), where he said we should talk to the landowner.  But we citizens have complete power over our own zoning code, and therefore the general direction, scale, and location of future growth.  Why are we so afraid to use that power?

Some of the signs on the empty parcels I have seen for sale say “commercially zoned.” It would be up to the ZBA or Planning Board to apply the law to those parcels. Anyone wishing to change the zoning on those parcels would need to sell the idea to Town Meeting which can be a daunting task.

You’re telling me?

Q: A set of plans to fix the roads around the Town Common was drafted in 2002 and is collecting dust in the Town Engineer’s office.  What specific action would to take to advance this project?

DG: I was in favor of that project, and wanted to see it move forward, but the money was just not available to get the project going. I still believe that something should be done but I would guess that a ten year old plan may need some updating. There would need to be money available to do that and a reasonable expectation that money for such a project also be available before we could begin to move forward again.

There is no money.  If we want state money, we have to get on the Transportation Improvement Plan (TIP) and wait.  And we won’t catch a whiff of the construction cash until we have a completed set of design plans, which we don’t have either.  The Town Manager’s opinion is that this money must come from new development in the center.  You can see the chicken/egg problem developing.

PM: The Town Center is a fragile environment.  As past member of the planning board for over 10 years and currently a member of the Board of Selectman, I have recently taken action to approve our current Town Manager to move forward on a peer to peer review of the Town’s Center traffic solution. These peers are Officials have solved similar problems they faced in their Town Centers.  This would be current, solution based alternatives to compare to our existing plans on file.  Any plan that dates as far back as 2002 and was not acted upon should have a comparison to real time information.

Paul was nice enough to meet with me at the center recently and we talked about this issue.  He is very interested in improving the roads around Town Common, and we shared some ideas.  Getting a design done as soon as possible, which will take at least a year of public process, is very important, and Paul understands that.

Q Billerica has done a good job of drawing mid-sized and large employers. Now how can we attract new small businesses?

PM: Control Town spending and the effect will lower the real estate taxes for both the Residents and the Businesses.  The affordability factors will then attract small businesses to Town.  The Towns that are going to survive this Recession/depression are the ones that are affordable to live and work in.

Yes, businesses like low taxes.  But they also like to site themselves in vibrant communities, ones that put a lot of effort into looking nice.  Retail businesses love foot traffic.  So, sure, let’s work on keeping the commercial tax rate low.  But that’s not all we have to do.  And remember, towns with the lowest residential tax rates have one of two things in common — either crappy services or a big commercial tax base.  Which do you pick?

DG: Actually I think the Town has done a pretty good job with small business. As I drive around looking at our little strip malls, I find that most are full or near full. Our biggest problem right now is filling the large empty commercial/industrial buildings in town. That is going to be the biggest challenge in the immediate future.

Disagree.  Dave’s answer suggests we don’t need any new small businesses.  Full?  Huh?  Doesn’t every community on Planet Earth actively foster small business growth?  No argument that we have a ton of empty industrial space, but is that really our biggest challenge?  Make the town a place that small businesses can’t wait to get into, and the rest will follow.

Q: If elected, will you speak in favor of the town center mixed use zoning articles on the Town Meeting floor?

DG: I wasn’t in favor of the mixed use plan the four times it was presented for various reasons.

It doesn’t bother me that Dave (or anyone else) doesn’t support mixed use.  But there’s no reason that he has to mention “the four times it was presented.”  That fact is irrelevant to its merit.  It’s also not accurate.  Mixed use has been presented only twice to TM (Spring and Fall of 2009).  (The articles appeared on prior warrants but were withdrawn before the meetings opened, which is common with complex articles.)

More importantly, the tone of this sentence suggests Dave is annoyed that we are still talking about it.  Instead of talking about a way to bring the pro and con sides together, he sounds like he wants it to all go away so we can just go back to talking about cutting taxes.  Politics, not people.

One of the biggest is that I don’t find the need for that type of development in our center.

Thousands of Billerica taxpayers do.  Not sure how someone who has spent years on committees doesn’t “find the need” that 65% of Town Meeting does?  How many empty parking spaces will it take for him to see the need?  Another 500?  A thousand?  What about when he was sitting on the Master Plan committee, the one that called for mixed use zoning in the center?  Did he see the need then and has changed his mind since?

I know that the Town Manager plans to propose a different type of plan and I will be open to considering it but I will have to be convinced that the need is there and it will be a significant benefit to the town.

Significant benefit?  What is the cost of upgrading our zoning code?  That would be $0.  That means that even a tiny benefit would make it worth doing.

Personally, I would rather see the effort and expense put toward the redesign of the center. I think before you can consider a zoning change we should look at a redesign.

By “redesign of the center,” I think he means the road improvement project, and as mentioned previously, the money for that will not be available without new growth.  Stalemate.

Paul says:

PM: I am in favor of the mixed use zoning articles if it can be clearly demonstrated that the Center will be safe for pedestrians.

Another missed opportunity to talk about Smart Growth.  Thought he would distinguish himself from his opponents but supporting new zoning, which a majority of citizens want.  Too bad.

I will not sacrifice safety of our children and the residents for any reason.   We need to improve the unsafe pedestrian, traffic and parking environment that we currently face.

OK, so we all agree we need to fix the roads, but no one has said how.  My suggestion is to run both planning processes (the zoning and the road improvements) at the same time — right now.  Then when the first developer comes knocking, we will have a finished road plan drawn, and the mitigation package can pay to build it.

In summary, we’ve have plenty of tax talk and a little tepid language about growth from the BOS candidates.  Nowhere near the vision imagination we heard in the PB interview.  Still, these three men can each serve competently on the board.  Hopefully the soft and fuzzy feelings will set in after the election.  Maybe then they can put the spreadsheets to the side and can help us build dreams.

The election is April 2.  Polls are open from 8am to 8pm.

Halifax and Figures

I read a letter to the editor over the weekend that made me realize something very important about Billerica.

The letter was artfully written by Ellen Snoeyenbos of Halifax in response to a story the Globe ran about how residents of her town rarely move anywhere else.  In a town where 88% of its residents are born in Massachusetts, it’s easy to settle into the “townie” attitude about outsiders.  But somehow Halifax isn’t that way.  Here is the last paragraph of her letter:

We joined the 250th birthday committee in 1984, and from then on, people greeted us as family. When you invest time and energy in a community, the community includes you. If you attend town meeting for a while, you become a townie. Getting involved in town activities wherever you live means you never have to go bowling alone.

Halifax: a place where it doesn’t matter where you were born, or how long ago you moved there — if you care about the community, you are one of them.  That sounds nice, doesn’t it?

Are “new” people in Billerica treated the same by life-long residents?

Billerica may have money problems, infrastructure problems, water and sewer problems, and yes, a curb appeal problem.  But most importantly, we have a people problem.  As long as new residents are called “blow-ins” rather than “neighbors,” and until newcomers are seen as assets instead of threats, we are going to go nowhere as a town.  When any group claims ownership of the town’s present, past, and future, we will be locked in a never-ending struggle between airing new ideas and squashing them.

Ms. Snoeyenbos, in the final phrase of her last sentence, refers to the excellent book by Robert D. Putnam in which he shows that community is quickly eroding in America.  It’s a cautionary tale for the dinosaur town of Billerica, a 26-square mile T-Rex that is in danger of collapsing under its own weight.  Case in point: we are going to get a dismal 15% voter turnout again in the April election, and a dozen or so seats in Town Meeting are going to remain empty on May 1.  Our political landscape is the realm of protective, territorial alpha dogs.  If you want in, you better bring an army.

 

 

 

 

Recession Lite

You won’t find better news satire than The Onion.  Their writers fear nothing and they go after everything.  Another thing I like: often they say things I’m thinking and they do a much better job than I ever could.

Take today’s headline, for example:

Consumers Say Recession Changed Way They Blow Paycheck On Crap

Can’t turn around without someone talking about how the recession has made our lives miserable.  Here at home, people running for office blame the recession slow growth.  Some say it’s the worst since the Great Depression.

Let’s have some perspective, shall we?  Unemployment during the Great Depression was 25%.  In many households, there was no food at all.  Today?  Amid the countless layoffs and foreclosures the cable, internet, and cell phone bills are getting paid and there are still two cars in the driveway.  I’ll allow the Great Depression comparisons when there are hundreds of people standing in a Walmart parking lot waiting for a loaf of bread.  In 2011, a recession means we have to think a little harder on how much we spend on crap.

Interview with Planning Board Candidates

Each year I try to interview all of the people running for Planning Board and Board of Selectmen.  I ask about quality of life issues, especially growth, land use, etc.  Below are the responses each candidate sent by e-mail, completely unedited.  I have not corrected for grammar, spelling, or anything else.  (Exception: Ms. Flemming’s answers were in all caps and I thought that might annoy you.)

The candidates are Marti Mahoney (incumbent), Al Ramos, and Patricia Fleming.

Q: The Master Plan will be 10 years old in 2013, which traditionally is when they are rewritten. How should the new Plan differ from the old one?

MM: I do not think it should differ too much except to bring changes to the plan that would encompass differences from the past ten yrs. We must consider the new technology, the towns landscape for businesses and residents.  A lot of time and effort went into the Master Plan with great input from the residents and so many great ideas in the plan have never seen the light of day.  I wish our town would use it more as the guideline it is!

PF: In 2013 when it is time to review the master plan, I beleive the selectman are the ones in charge  of the master plan, if they form a committee to review the plan they will appoint the people. I do believe changes will be made to keep up with current times in Billerica we have made some changes in a decade and an updated town master plan to help the people of Billerica and the businesses will be needed.

AR: The current Master Plan is a well thought out 435 page comprehensive document that should be used as the base for any revision that is done. The current plan needs to be updated on things like the amount of affordable housing that our town currently has. The plan states that at the time we had 1.6% affordable and I believe we are now very close to the 10% goal that the town has.

Q: Is it important to create a consistent look for all new buildings constructed in the town center, to be modeled after existing historic structures around the Common?

AR: Yes, it is very important to create a consistent look for all buildings constructed in the town center. We should do everything that we can to preserve, restore and protect our town’s historical, cultural and natural resources.

MM: YES very important

PF: If new buildings are constructed in the center of town, zoning rules should be in place before any construction start, like the total high of the buildings if the mixed used ever is approved and yes to be consistent with the historic structures is important.

Q: Have 40B projects helped or hurt the town?

PF: You can answer that question both ways yes it has helped and yes it has hurt the town , first  the state is the offical authority for 40b project every town and city has to comply to this law set by the state. Billerica has been trying to meet the goal set by the state for years. We just had a question on the ballot to either keep 40b or stop them, keeping them won the votes. I believe the question should have been put on the ballot to read vote to keep 40b as the law states or— keep 40b but make changes in the law to accommodate each city or town, if the ballot question was written with a thought to make changes in the law instead of a direct yes or no Billerica would have been able to control the 40b’s entering our town.

AR: 40B developments are one of the most exploitive and destructive laws that I am aware of. As the Vice Chairman of the 40B Audit Committee I saw first hand how developers reap huge profits and the town bears all of the structural tax costs.  We, as a community should contest 40B developments as they help only the developers at a substantial cost in services that we all have to pay.

MM: Hurt our town

I’m going to jump in here.  Chapter 40B brought us, most recently, the Aspen Apartments proposal.  Hideous.  There is a clear division between the candidates on this.  Ms. Flemming is right — the state does want us to have affordable housing.  But it does not require us to approve every project that uses the 40B sledgehammer.  Flemming, as a member of the Zoning Board of of appeals, supported Aspen and other 40B projects.  On the other hand, Ramos has been outspoken in opposition to 40B.

Q: At 30 acres, the Billerica Mall parcel is a big opportunity for Billerica. What would you like to see built there over the next ten years or so?

MM: I would like to see stores, bank, garden, restaurant, park, few residential condo’s or town houses mixed with stores. Many, many
malls have redefined themselves with new tenants, new building
designs etc to appeal to today’s shoppers.

AR:  I would like to follow the guidance of the Master Plan which states that we should encourage the growth of small shops within existing retail space, rather than focusing on large users.  Shops and the foods and services they render should be in keeping with the character of the Town.  I would also be open to having mixed development consisting of housing and commercial development.

PF: The Billerica mall has been the topic of the town for sometime know I would love to see new stores filling the empty space. The Billerica mall is privately owned and the owners of the mall are the ones in charge of rentals. The mall is now under construction and new stores are coming to town soon.

In just a few sentences, Mahoney and Ramos demonstrate their imagination.  Quietly, they are both capable of the sort of spiritual leadership I have been talking about.  Flemming is of course correct that the Mall is owned by a private entity, but she doesn’t seem to understand that we citizens can shape the future of grown via the zoning code.  It’s reason we have a zoning code.  And a Planning Board, for that matter.

Q:  How about at the vacant Iversen Ford site?

AR: I do not have a lot of information on the site but would recommend creating a committee to study various uses to include using it as a department of public works site for storage and vehicle maintenance.

MM: Retail store, public works dept. Have not thought too much on this site.

PF: The answer is the same as the mall Iverson ford is privately owned property also and yes I would love to see a new business in the vacant property. If maybe the town could work with new business coming into town instead of being negative about them, we might have more applications to fill these spaces. That is one subject I will adress if elected to the planning board.

Public works would be perfect at the Iversen site, wouldn’t it?

Who do you want on your Planning Board?  The election is April 2.

 

 

 

 

Center Visioning: A Rebranding

As I mentioned yesterday, I had a very pleasant meeting with John Curran, our Town Manager.  The Assistant Town Manager, Cathleen O’Dea, was also there.  Let me say straight off that I have complained in this space in the past that Mr. Curran had not been as accessible as his predecessor, Bill Williams.  However, Friday’s meeting proved otherwise.  Although Mr. Curran is not wild about e-mail, he was tremendous with me at the meeting.  He heard my ideas, gave his own without talking down to me, appreciated my own level of knowledge, and respected my emotional investment (as resident, activist, etc.).

I’ve told you before we are lucky to have him.  He is Billerica’s spiritual leader right now.  This should be an elected person, but until we elect someone who can be a spiritual leader, Mr. Curran is filling that role nicely.

I always feel at ease talking with staff.  Maybe that’s because they have no emotional attachment to the issue at hand, which means the conversation stays in the technical arena.  That means you can disagree on particular points without anyone getting upset or offended.  Not so when you talk to elected people, who usually have a huge bias before any conversation starts.  Often, they have their mind made up and they spend most of their speaking turn trying to make you feel stupid about your position.

Anyway, let me share with you a little but about what I learned Friday.

The Rebranding of Mixed Use

I’m sure it was not on purpose, but the well-worn phrases “mixed use” and “overlay district” have been replaced by “town center visioning.”  This is good news, since everyone has made up their minds about the first two.  If we are going to improve the center, we are going to need a lot more open minds in Town Meeting this time around, and calling it a “visioning” this year will help a little bit.

NMCOG will hold an open public meeting on Thursday, March 31 at 7pm at Town Hall.  On the agenda is a SWOT analysis.  That stands for Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, and Threats.  This is a reasonably objective way to define the problems in our center, stripping most of the emotion and bias from the process, which I like.

Yes, a mixed use overlay district is part of the solution, but this time it’s not the headline.

The Zombie Stirs

You have heard me say in this space that I wanted town leadership to meet with the Zombie Mall’s caretaker, NYC-based RD Management.  As it turns out, the Town Manager already has.

According to Mr. Curran, the land management company is spooked by our Planning Board.  This shouldn’t surprise anyone.  A few years ago they tried to get a permit to build 350,000 square feet of retail anchored by Home Depot on the 30-acre site, and after over two years (and nearly $1 million in my estimation), they were denied.  They aren’t super excited to appear before the PB again.

What does this mean for the short-term future of the Mall?  Any improvements RD Management makes will be of the variety that don’t need PB approval.  What does that include?  Not much.  They will have to stay within the existing building footprint.  Essentially, cosmetic stuff on the inside of the Mall, nothing to the 12-acre bituminous wasteland they call a parking lot.

There are new tenants on the way.  Planet Fitness is confirmed.  Additionally, a discounter — Big Lots, maybe — is in the works.  These are downscale tenants.  (And rather redundant, wouldn’t you say?  I think the Dollar Tree and KMart would agree.)

Here is the punch line.  RD Management is planning a facade improvement on the entire building.  And not just a paint job.

Facade improvements are most common in urban areas, often with public sector help.  The Boston Main Streets program is a tremendously successful example.  With financial assistance, businesses can spruce up their storefronts with new windows, awnings, signs, graffiti removal, etc.  When a block is more inviting, it attracts more foot traffic and more business.

Back in heart of suburban sprawl, Mr. Curran told me the RD Management is planning to transform the Mall’s front to look like an old New England town center.

It was all I could do to stifle a laugh.  But he was serious.  There is a rendering of the plan, which he didn’t have on hand.  I will try to obtain a copy and share it with you.  But I’m not sure I can imagine a 35-high pretend colonial styling slapped on the Zombie’s face.  Reminds me of the fake town at the end of Blazing Saddles.  Fooled those bad guys, but I like to think we’re a little smarter than that.

I’ve never heard of this sort of facade improvement ever done on a strip mall so old and decrepit.

So is this good news?  As you know, I beleive the best course of action for this property is for RD Management to get away from Billerica and sell the land to a developer.  If that is their plan, why invest this money that they would not make back in a sale?  It may mean we are stuck with the Zombie for at least the short term.

Mr. Curran asked the New Yorkers what he could do to help them develop the property.  Raise the value of the land by giving them more zoning options, perhaps?

Their reply: they “don’t understand” mixed use.  Strange, considering their company has already completed a mixed use development in Brooklyn.  Also, how does a land management company stay in business without being aware of trends in land use?

Hard to figure what’s really going on behind the scenes.  But I promise you this: their tune will change when we give them a new zoning option.

Coming on Wednesday:  my complete interview with the candidates for Planning Board.

 

Town Center Stage

Billerica’s town center will be in the spotlight this year.  The Town Manager, with the help of NMCOG, is aggressively pushing for a zoning upgrade.  And there is a faint but noticeable interest in fixing the roads around the Town Common.

I had the opportunity to meet with Town Manager John Curran on Friday and BOS member (and reelction candidate) Paul Marasco on Saturday.  As time allows, I will be posting all week on what I learned from those conversations.

In the meantime, here are the important points:

1.  Billerica Center Visioning Session.  Our regional planing agency, the North Middlesex Council of Governments (NMCOG), will be hosting a open public meeting on Thursday, March 31 at 7pm at Town Hall.  Jay Donovan of NMCOG will talk about growth, land use planning, zoning, mixed use, and everything else relating to the future of the center.  If you have been reading this blob and/or reading my stuff in the Minuteman, you know this kind of leadership is exactly what we have been waiting for.  If you are in town that night, please attend this meeting to show your support and learn what’s happening.  Also, to eat — there will be free food.  At least come for the free food.

2.  The town election is on April 2.  Where do the candidates stand on these issues?  I have interviewed the candidates for the Board of Selectmen and the Planning Board.  Those interviews will appear in the paper over the next 2 Thursdays and here on the blob.  Tease: not all six candidates support the efforts to improve the town center.

3. There is activity at the Billerica Mall.  Snow loads didn’t squash the building, so the Zombie continues to walk the Earth.  And to my surprise, the Mall’s owner, NYC-based RD Management, is bringing in in some new tenants and is proposing an improvement you won’t believe.  But…

4. There is no real long-term improvement planned for the Mall parcel.  They are afraid of the Planning Board after Home Depot was repelled, so they will not do anything that requires the PB’s approval.  That means they will stay within the footprint of the original building, forever.  They also say they are not interested in mixed use because they “don’t understand it.”

5. Town center roads.  Boston Road between Town Hall and the Mall driveway (through the Common area) belongs to the town, as opposed to the state.  I am trying to get a push going to start a public process to agree on a new design as soon as possible.  There is no construction money available now, but new growth in the town center could pay for it.

Stay tuned to this channel all week.