Photo by James Sanna | Banker & Tradesman Staff
Mayor Michelle Wu laid out specifics about the advent of a new Boston Planning & Development Agency, including goals of accelerating approvals while emphasizing affordability, coastal resilience and equity.
The mayor also issued an executive order Monday alongside a home rule petition to restructure the BPDA seeks to “amplify community representation” in the agency’s permitting role, while adding predictability for developers and residents alike.
One specific charge for BPDA staff in that order is “creating a path” toward as-of-right approval of accessory dwelling units, a strategy favored by housing advocates as a simple way to increase supply by legalizing apartments in existing homes.
Wu also submitted an request to the Boston City Council to extend the city’s 12 remaining urban renewal plans. The proposed legislation would retain the city’s power to enforce certain requirements on urban renewal properties, such as affordable housing and open space, while giving it new powers to require climate change infrastructure.
Wu’s focus on coastal resiliency also includes creation of a new BPDA team which will “act immediately” to protect the waterfront from sea level rise. The plans include potential “creative financing mechanisms” to pay for flood control projects.
In 2020, the Boston Green Ribbon Commission recommended that Boston create a District for Resiliency Improvements (DRI) by 2023 that would have the power to borrow money to pay for flood control projects that have been estimated as multi-billion-dollar undertakings.
BPDA-owned properties – which include the Charlestown Navy Yard and South Boston’s Raymond L. Flynn Marine Park – will be included in the resiliency plans.
Wu campaigned partly on a platform of BPDA reform, and as a city councilor painted the agency as an out-of-touch bureaucracy beholden to developers and pending proposals at the expense of good long-range planning.
The first step will be completion of ongoing planning studies including Downtown and Charlestown, followed by the first citywide rezoning since the 1960s. Some BPDA staffers will be reassigned to a new City Planning and Design Department under BPDA Chief Arthur Jemison.
Without giving specific steps, the executive order seeks to streamline the Article 80 permitting process for developments. Changes will be recommended by an advisory committee charged with working out details of how to improve the permitting process while emphasizing coastal resiliency, affordability and equity.
Major projects can take years to gain even partial approvals, including periodic meetings of impact advisory groups appointed to provide community input on a specific proposal. The first phase of the Suffolk Downs redevelopment was approved after nearly three years of meetings.
A new BPDA team will be dedicated to simplify and update the citywide zoning code, and recommend major amendments. It is not immediately clear when that team will be launched, but Wu’s Monday order directs planning for that to take part during the preparation of the city’s fiscal year 2024 budget, which starts July 1. Wu said in her State of the City speech Jan. 25 that rezoning efforts would begin along the city’s commercial corridors and in its squares.
