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July 23, 2008 First Meeting of the Committee to study TDRs for the Wilton Planning Board

Calendar Name: 
Planning Board - TDR Committee
Date/Time of Meeting: 
07/23/2008 7:30pm
Case(s): 
PB-08-017-C - TDR Study Committee

This is the first meeting of the Planning Board's committee to study an ordinance to implement the Transfer of Development Rights.

Minutes for this Meeting:

Date:   Wednesday, July 23, 2008 

RE: Minutes:  TDR Committee Meeting #1 (Authorized by Planning Board on July 2, 2008) 

Present:  Jeff Kandt  Planning Board

            Alec McMartin  Planning Board

            Steve Wagner  NRPC

            Donald Sienkiewicz Resident/Developer 
 

Meeting began at 7:30 PM in the Town Hall Meeting Room – Legal notice was posted. 

Jeff Kandt opened the meeting and asked Donald to present his proposal and begin discussion of issues and ideas.  The proposal would create a Transfer of Development Rights ordinance to help meet the Master Plan goal of preservation of land by creating sending districts (Res Ag district) and receiving districts (Transit Village Overlay district).  Minimum lot size requirements could be increase in the sending district and increased density would be permitted in the receiving district.  An incentive is created to sell rights to develop land chosen to protect and those rights are then bought and used to build in a more suitable location at a higher density.  Along with the TDR ordinance, Accessory Dwelling Units (ADU) and amendment to the Cluster ordinance and regulation was proposed as related efforts.  A 12 page document was available to the public to provide more detail on the proposal.  Donald stated the proposed standards are place holders to stimulate discussion. 

Discussion continued and resources were identified to educate the committee and public on TDR.  Steve from NRPC would forward web-links to information he has been gathering on-line and try to identify funding sources to support this effort. Donald referenced a book on the subject and Jeff identified some NH examples to study.  It was agreed further education was necessary to proceed properly. 

A recommendation was made to invite some large land owners for input since some will be directly impacted.  Alec and Donald mentioned names for consideration: Fred and Kay Rodell, Randy Stein, and Mary and Steve McDunna.  Anyone from the public is welcome to participate however.  The committee is thinking they need to hold off on specific invitations until they meet again to better lay out a course of action and further discuss options and methods for a TDR ordinance. 

August 27th was set to hold the next committee meeting.  No decision has been made at this time whether to move forward or table the proposal.  Fact finding will continue and public interest and support needs to be gauged as well as that of the Planning Board.  The committee will eventually make a recommendation to the full Planning Board.  Draft ordinance language and/or a committee report will be presented. 

The meeting ended at 9:30 PM