Town of Sutton 2004 Master Plan - Future Land Use Chapter
11/15/04 APPROVED Meeting Minutes, 7-9 pm
Submitted by Carol Williams
In attendance: Laura Scott, Carol Williams, Dan Sundquist, Bill Hallahan, Ken
Uzdanovich, Pam Perkins, Bo Quackenbos
Introductory items:
Participants were welcomed. Minutes from the last meeting, the agenda, and a draft
version of the Future Land Use chapter was distributed for review. Introductions were
made.
There was a discussion by Ken of a misunderstanding/misrepresentation of information
in the Natural Resources Chapter to the Planning Board by Laura. This was for a
different chapter, but was brought up at this meeting. Laura apologized for any
misunderstanding or inadvertent misrepresentation and encouraged everyone to review
meeting minutes thoroughly to be sure such things to not happen again. Laura said that
she reviewed her notes and meeting minutes for the Natural Resources Chapter and
would do so again.
Laura quickly reviewed the Master Plan process. The Planning Board is holding public
meetings, chapter by chapter, to “preliminarily” approve the chapters of the Master Plan.
In February of 2005, the Planning Board will meet to review and approve the entire plan.
The hope is to have a draft for review at the Town Meeting in March.
Laura reviewed the dates for the next 2 meetings of this subcommittee: December 6 and
December 27. She suggested that we may need another additional meeting as well. We
decided to wait and see if this becomes necessary. The Planning Board public hearing
for this chapter is currently scheduled for January 11, 2005. It will be part of the planning
board meeting.
We reviewed the minutes from the last meeting and with a couple of modifications, they
were accepted.
Review Draft Future Land Use Chapter:
This document became a lot thicker over the past few weeks – Laura has been busy.
First, we reviewed the “old” information (the part of the document we reviewed at the
10/25 meeting).
Overview of Master Plan Chapter Goals
Laura tried to boil down the most relevant information from each of the chapters and
include this to “set the stage” for the FLU chapter. Even with bulleted goal items, this
“introduction” seemed long and laborious. Discussion as to whether or not to include
such information was discussed. The committee decided, for now, to keep all of the
items as they are and later, when the FLU work is completed, a decision will be made as
to which information to keep and which would be omitted from this chapter. This decision
was based on the fact that keeping the key items from the other chapters close at hand
when doing our work will only help us with our decisions.
Laura will add information on the Historic and Cultural Resources Chapter and the
Community Facilities Chapter for the next meeting.
Regional Concerns and Pressures
Info will be added on the “ripple” effect from the Mt. Sunapee expansion.
Laura will follow-up to see if there is another housing organization, besides CATCH, that
would serve Sutton.
Overlay Zoning Districts
When we got to the “new information” in the FLU, one item of noteworthy discussion was
the Overlay Districts: Aquifer, Wetlands, and Kezar Lake Watershed. These Overlay
Districts were listed because they were recommended by the Natural Resources
Committee.
There was discussion whether to include maps in the master plan of these districts.
There was discussion about How this mapping would be done. How would we determine
the limits of such maps? What information would be used? It was decided not to create
any maps at this point in time.
Follow-up item: Dan S. will ask Leslie Enroth to provide more information to the
Committee on Kezar Lake, to enhance that section of the master plan.
Other Zoning Ordinance Provisions
We started to discuss Other Zoning Ordinance Provisions. Laura explained that all of
these ordinances are simply a menu from which Sutton may desire to pick. It is also not
a comprehensive list.
Carol stated that, at first glance, it may seem a little extreme to go from virtually none of
these type of ordinances to so many. Dan Sundquist explained that this committee may
recommend the ordinances, but in fact the planning board must vote whether each one
is actually recommended as part of the master plan or not.
There was a decision to not include the Accessory Buildings Ordinance, and Laura said
she would instead add a Temporary Storage Trailer Ordinance.
There was discussion about the Excavation ordinance and whether to keep this – if it is
needed. The Natural Resource Committee did not recommend one. No decision was
made to remove or keep it at the 11/15 meeting.
There was discussion about the Growth Management Ordinance. Laura will include
language about Triggers….i.e., growth has to be X (% growth for example) over a
period of X (a certain number of years) years, so that “normal” spikes in development
are not triggering the GMO.
There was discussion about impact fees. Laura explained that although it often sounds
like a good idea for a Town to adopt Impact Fees, there is a lot of administrative time
associated with them. Fees from each contributor must be kept in a separate account so
that it can be tracked, and if the money is not used for a capital improvement then the
money must be returned, with interest, to the contributor after 6 years. Usually larger
towns, like Bow and Concord, have these fees.
We did not have time to finish reviewing the potential Ordinances, nor did we begin
mapping. Laura stated that the first hour of the next meeting would be dedicated to
mapping.
The next meeting is scheduled for December 6, 2004 at 7 pm at the Town Hall.
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