I was disappointed to learn of Susanne Smith Meyer’s retirement from the planning board. She has been an oasis of intellect in an otherwise desert of dysfunctionality on the planning board. I strongly concur with her observations on the importance of a master plan which is a compendium of individual components that serve as a blueprint for creating and amending zoning ordinances. Unfortunately, the city manager convinced the council to fund a revision of the zoning ordinance which has been going on for many years and is no where near completion. This backwards approach means when the city gets to addressing its master plan, the master plan will have to be revised to accommodate the zoning ordinance. This would make Concord unique as most communities do it in an orderly fashion.
Concord has too few acres zoned for manufacturing and light industry which is why rezoning Monitor Way is such a bad option. Manufacturing and light industry require minimum services. Housing on the other hand requires more city services than the property taxes collected on them pay for. It has been suggested that a TIF district be created to fund the required infrastructure for the Monitor Way development. If this were to go through, property tax payers would be absorbing all of the service costs of the new housing unit with no tax revenue to support them. This will be one of the issues facing the new city council, I will keep my fingers crossed that they sensibly deal with it.
Robert C. Washburn
Concord