A. What’s This
Document?
You are holding in your hands the cumulative effort of hundreds of people who thought seriously and conscientiously about the future of our town. Massachusetts General Laws requires each city and town to have a Master Plan that includes an assessment of the community’s current situation, consideration of the trends it is experiencing, documentation of the community’s desired future, and action steps that will guide the community toward that desired future.
Early in the process of complying with this requirement, it became clear that we would be involved in something that would be much more than simply “another report to satisfy some bureaucracy and then sit on a bookshelf.” As more and more people spoke of their hopes for our town and what it means to them and to their children, we decided that we were not writing a Master Plan, but rather, we were writing a Community Plan. It became our constant reminder that this effort had to be based on the input of the whole community, with consideration of more than just numbers and maps, and that preserving our sense of community was more important than planning exactly where the next sewer line would go.
The Community Plan now expresses where Belchertown is, where we want it to go, and what steps we need to take to get there. But, this is just the beginning. The Community Plan is a living document that should be used by every elected and appointed town official to guide the decisions of our town. It will be formally reviewed and revised every five years.
It is possible that the effort was in vain and the plan is ignored. To make sure this Community Plan serves its intended purpose of being a policy guide through the future, the first recommendations are:
§ Consider the priorities of the Community Plan in developing the town budget for town meeting approval.
§ Urge each department, board, commission, and committee to annually develop a five-year programming plan that will include estimated costs and funding sources.
§ Have each department’s, board’s, commission’s, and committee’s annual report include progress on implementing the Community Plan and target actions for coming year.
§ Four years after the adoption of this plan, and every five years thereafter, reconvene the Community Plan Steering Committee for a comprehensive update of the Community Plan.
We call on each Belchertown citizen to help ensure that this work is not ignored. Every citizen needs to help remind our town officials and department heads to use this plan as their guide. This Community Plan is Our Community Plan.
Belchertown’s
2002 Community Plan emerged from a four-year, inclusive, citizen-conducted
effort. The genesis of this project was
a group of interested citizens and town officials who realized the need for
comprehensive planning, and who formed a “Land Use Study Committee” in 1997
upon the hiring of a town planner. In
1998, the planning department hired a University of Massachusetts graduate
student, Jennifer Phelan, to do a build-out analysis and research similar towns
in Massachusetts with master plans.
This was the first formal work toward the completion of this Belchertown
Community Plan.
In 1999, the Planning Board made the process official by convening a Master Plan Steering Committee composed of Jim Barry, Tibby Chase, Carmine Angeloni, Jay Whelihan, Steve Rose, Mark Lindhult, and Jay Rossi. The committee began with a review of studies that had already been conducted for the community. This review was documented in a fall 1999 report, Existing Studies of Town of Belchertown Resources, by Matthew N. Steinberg, also a graduate assistant at the University of Massachusetts. In his summary of this overview, Mr. Steinberg commented on themes that would continue through the subsequent years of planning effort[1]:
By the spring of 2000, a community-wide survey had been conducted and results compiled. Dave Loomis, a University of Massachusetts forestry and wildlife professor and professional survey consultant, donated his time and expertise to the design and tabulation of the 2002 Community Survey. The results of that scientifically designed and statistically valid survey are a detailed database that will continue to provide guidance regarding townspeople and their perceptions of Belchertown. One key finding from the survey was that while a large proportion of townspeople valued Belchertown’s “rural” character, there was also a desire for amenities and conveniences that are not typical of truly rural communities. Much of subsequent deliberations centered around what we in Belchertown mean by “rural”, and how we can maintain the rural attributes that are important as we accommodate changes.
In June, 2000, the Board of Selectmen appointed the
newly constituted Master Plan Steering Committee, whose task was to develop and
distribute a Request for Proposals for consulting assistance to Belchertown’s
process of public participation, and to recommend a choice of consultant to the
Board of Selectmen. Steering Committee
members were Jim Barry [Chair], Joe Gilman, and Tibby Chase [each representing
the Planning Board], Barbara Schaffer-Bacon [School Committee], Rob Rizzo
[Conservation Commission], Ron Aponte [Selectmen], Gail Gramarossa [Board of
Health], plus citizens-at-large Mark Lindhult, and Bill Cary. Jeanne Armstrong of LandUse, Incorporated,
was selected to work with the community’s 2000 – 2001 public participation
phase. The Steering Committee launched
the fall 2000 – Spring 2001 effort with a highly successful booth at the
Belchertown Community Fair. Over 200
people stopped by to make comments, ask questions, and stick a pin in a
Belchertown map representing where they live.
Picking up where the survey had left off, this phase worked through two
public forums to draft a consensus-based statement of growth management goals
and objectives, and to agree on the next most fruitful steps for the community
planning effort. This phase culminated
with the May 2001 Town Meeting receiving and endorsing the Statement of Goals
and Objectives that are the heart of the Belchertown Community Plan.
In the fall of 2001 began the phase of drafting the
Community Plan document itself. In
October, a workshop of town officials provided input regarding the aspects of
change and conservation that officials felt needed to be addressed by the
Community Plan. The Steering Committee
continued these deliberations by attending subsequent meetings of boards and
commissions. Simultaneously, a team of
volunteer “scribes” took on the task of working from the Statement of Goals and
Objectives to compile information, draft analysis, and list potential action
steps for each element of the Community Plan.
The scribes were Tibby Chase, Chair [Land Use], Julie Peck [Housing],
Cliff McCarthy [Historical and Cultural Resources], Shannon and George Synan
[Economic Development], Bill Cary [Natural Resources], Paula Davitt [Open Space
and Recreation], Jim Barry [Services and Facilities], Doug Albertson
[Circulation and Transportation], and Gail Gramarossa [Health and Human
Services]. Consultant Jeanne Armstrong
gave some assistance to the scribes and helped compile the Implementation
Element. Based upon conversations with
local officials and upon the work of the scribes, the Steering Committee
convened the Spring 2002 Community Plan Forum, which gained input from the
community regarding which potential action strategies seemed most appropriate
for implementing the Community Plan.
At the spring 2002 Community Plan forum, townspeople
considered the action steps that could move Belchertown toward achieving the
community’s desired future. The
Conceptual Land Use Plan and Implementation Actions outlined in this plan are
based upon the guidance received at that forum.
The 2002 Belchertown Community Plan is a consensus-based
document that has been shaped by all this broad input. In coming years, even as we begin to
implement the Plan, we expect to continue deliberating issues and seeking
agreement on further actions. Future
updates of the Community Plan will record the new levels of agreement that are
reached by the community.
C.
References
Phelan,
Jennifer, Master Plan Development Summary of Towns Comparable to
Belchertown, Massachusetts, December 21, 1998.
LandUse,
Incorporated, Community Plan Project: Implications of Input Received from
the Community, November 7, 2000.
LandUse, Incorporated, Community
Plan Project Spring 2002 Community Forum: Summery of Input From Discussion
Groups & Transcription of Notes from Discussion Groups, March
28, 2002.
Loomis,
David, Joseph Boyle, Thomas Devaney, Ryan Pierce, Rebecca Sozanski, Belchertown
Master Plan Survey Results, Spring 2000 [tabulations and
cross-tabulations].
Steinberg,
Matthew, Belchertown Master Plan: Executive Summary, Fall 1999.
Steinberg,
Matthew N., Existing Studies of Town of Belchertown Resources, Fall
1999.