Economic Development Committee

Wednesday 

April 6, 2022

6pm 

 

Brentwood Town Hall​

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AGENDA: 

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Minutes Approval

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UNH MBA Program Update

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Other Business

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Public Comment

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Minutes March 30, 2022

Attendance: Span, Aldred-Cheek, Rossman, Farrell, Morgan (virtual), Kizza, Finan, Greenwood

Approved previous minutes with 1 edit – broker instead of developer

UNH Interns:

• Met last week to go over some details

• Interested in starting to talk to property owners

  • We should give them a list of priority parcels (10-15 parcels

  • Committee members should go through their lists and pick out top 3 or 4

  • Possibly add a new tab on google doc?

  • Expressed interest in tractor supply – national chain, successful retail operation

    • Mentioned is interesting to them from an MBA perspective

    • Potential for ‘template’?

Broker Invitation:

• Andrew Ward with Collier international agreed to meet with us

  • Will put together a presentation

  • Familiar with 125 corridor

• Jon wondering should we try to bring in someone like Rob Healey?

  • Glen offered to reach out to him

Glen Greenwood discussion:

• RPC interested in seeing our survey results

• Encouraged member from this committee to join committee drafting master plan updates

• Glen will forward the questions the UNH students sent him

• Not a lot of prime wetlands on Rt 125 – good thing from a development standpoint

• 75% of parcels along 125 +/- have had their zoning amended to go to property boundary instead of former 500’

  • This type of amendment has historically been favorable at town mtg

• It isn’t considered spot zoning if you’re amending a zone that already exists

• It is possible to change all of the remaining properties

  • Laws have changed in recent years, resulting in a more involved process

  • Would have to go to town mtg

• Wetlands on map are defined by county soils map done in 80s

  • Done at 5-10 acre increments – not good for site specific planning

  • Invariably wetlands get bigger when you do a site specific soil survey

  • Wetlands are biggest constraint to development in town

• Wetland relocation is not encouraged at local level

  • At state level there is a process

    • Have to protect 10x the amount you impact

    • Town selects land to protect

    • If town has no list – state default is to select land within the same watershed (not always within same town)

• Key issues:

  • Unless town is willing to buy land, become a housing authority, and take land cost out of the equation, going to be difficult to make land affordable

  • Developers have told us the multi-family district in town doesn’t work

    • Need to change ordinance to increase density allowed

    • We don’t give any density bonus – just allow units closer together than 1 house on 2 acres

    • Hard to get buy-in from public for increased density – have tried and failed in town before

  • Current 2 acre requirement is a barrier for lower income families/ individuals

  • Can have a single family houses on any property in commercial zone

  • Mixed use: really common in communities that have a central business district

    • Brentwood doesn’t have one, unlikely without real changes

    • Could allow mixed use zoning – just would need to make sense – have housing near services people would want

    • This committee is interested in pursuing a town center type of project

      • There is a Town Center zone

  • Town is not using everything they own

    • Could be a great project

    • Could work with planning commission to get a map

    • There aren’t that many properties, and they are spread out

      • Potential for land swaps

      • Transfer of development rights – not common in NH, complicated

  • Water & sewer major barrier

    • Separation requirements between well & septic

    • Larger use wells have larger radius

    • Bringing in water from Epping could free up a lot of developable land

      • Will cost $

      • Epping has capacity

    • First step – reach out to a consultant like Wright Pierce to figure out what they recommend

      • Stef can take lead

    • Could have state reps or senators come and meet with us to discuss – should have a plan in place first

    • Stef will look into potential grants from NHDES website

    • https://www.des.nh.gov/sites/g/files/ehbemt341/files/documents/2020-01/pws-funding-resources.pdf

• Upcoming meetings:

  • Might be beneficial to talk to interns sooner rather than later

  • Keep to 1st & 3rd weds of the month

  • Needs to be in person to be an official meeting