A citizen petition known as Article 2 passed with approximately 94 percent support during Town Meeting’s special session last night. After Moderator Deborah Brown revealed that vote, Town Meeting members and attendees broke out in a long and spirited applause.
The motion, which was originated by Lexington resident Carol Sacerdote, calls for the town to scale back the amount of land designated for multifamily dwellings under Article 34, which the Town passed in 2023 in response to the state’s MBTA Communities Act.
At the time, Lexington was lauded for being the first to comply with the state’s new zoning law and exceeding its requirements. The state’s housing secretary called Lexington the “poster child” for the law, which is intended to help alleviate the state’s housing crisis.
Article 2 decreases the amount of land designated for multifamily dwellings from 227 acres to approximately 90. Among other areas, the motion calls for removing Lexington Center from the multifamily overlay districts. The motion allows for the ten projects already in the town’s pipeline to continue, which collectively could bring approximately 1,100 new multifamily dwellings to town.
Sacerdote created Article 2 because she’s concerned that Lexington is hastily adding a lot of multifamily housing to the town, which she worries could put stress on services and infrastructure.
“The train has left the station, but we can keep it running at a reasonable pace,” Sacerdote said, arguing that her motion can help the town manage the influx of multifamily housing at a feasible rate.
Before the vote on Sacerdote’s motion, four Town Meeting members (Wendy Manz of Precinct 4, Betsey Weiss of Precinct 2, James Luker of Precinct 1, and Kunal Botla of Precinct 4) offered an amendment calling for Article 2 organizers to keep Lexington Center a multifamily overlay district.
“We’re simply eliminating the elimination of the Article 2 district, Lexington Center,” Manz said.
Many town leaders shared their support for more multifamily housing in Lexington Center.
“Of all the places to put mixed-use transit-oriented housing, the Center is the place,” Charles Hornig, a member of Lexington’s Planning Board, said.
Jill Hai, a member of the Select Board, argued that having more multifamily housing in the Center could reduce single-use transit, which is “something we often repeat in our sustainability goals,” she said.
But the amendment did not pass; only approximately 32 percent voted in favor.
As the night progressed, the size of the ‘yes’ line to share statements in support of Article 2 grew longer.
Gil Benghiat, a Lexington resident, argued the town “bit off more than it can chew” with Article 34.
Other residents worried that adding more housing could affect the town’s historical character.
“Look at our neighbor Concord and how beautifully they’ve kept the colonial flavor,” Lexington resident Janet Moran said, urging Town Meeting members to vote in favor of Article 2 so the town can “preserve its heritage” and “grow responsibly.”
Background
More multifamily housing will come to Lexington as a result of the MBTA Communities Act, which calls for Massachusetts’ 177 municipalities served by (or bordering municipalities served by) the MBTA to encourage the development of multifamily housing near transit corridors. After the Act was written into law, the state decided how much land each municipality should zone for new multifamily housing.
Massachusetts’ Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities, or EOHLC, decided Lexington should rezone at least 50 acres of land with capacity for a minimum of 1,231 new dwellings.
To comply with the MBTA Community’s Act, Lexington’s Planning Board drafted Article 34, which calls for the town to amend its zoning bylaw to allow for multifamily housing on over 227 acres of land in 12 districts. Town Meeting voted on that motion during its annual session in 2023. It passed with approximately 63 percent support.
With that land commitment, Lexington could potentially host up to 12,546 new dwelling units across 12 districts in town — approximately ten times as many units as the state’s original goal for the town.
But Sacerdote and many other residents grew concerned about the amount of land the town committed to building multifamily housing on. She and other petitioners created a citizen petition at the end of 2024 that called for the town to scale back the amount of land on which to build multifamily housing — that petition became Article 2.
Planning Board members Hornig and Melanie Thompson have worked with the Article 2 originators over the past few weeks to reach a give-and-take between what petitioners and the Planning Board envision for Lexington. After many hours of negotiating and hearing residents’ concerns during three public hearings — all of which were over five hours long — the group landed on the compromise that Town Meeting members voted on and passed last night.
Common sense prevailed. Thanks to the proponents of Article 2, and everyone who has supported it.
200 years ago one billion people on earth, today over eight billion and still increasing. Some years back our SJC ruled 5 acre zoning unlawful. Do the best you can to keep open spaces for future generations.
This is indicative of what is happening in Lexington right now. A very small number of elected people do not represent the majority views. A very small group of pro-development, pro-housing at all costs has hijacked our Town Meeting, Select Board, and Planning Board. They voted for financially destructive zoning while the majority was not engaged. As soon as the majority found out, all h*ll broke loose, requiring a citizens petition to fix this mess. Thankfully new voices that better represent the majority have joined Town Meeting this month. But we still need to clean house in many of the Boards and Committees that are not acting in the best interest of the residents.
DEI but NIMBY. Housing density reduces environmental impact but NIMBY.
Keep the space allocated for development. Slow the rate of approvals – it’s not hard.
I like the idea to slow the rate of approval – I wish we had done it with Article 34 two years ago. The projection by the proponents of Article 34 was something like 400-800 units in 4-10 years, so we could have capped the rate of approval to, say, 200 units a year, which would have been more than enough to accommodate the estimate from proponent. Using it as a benchmark, we have used 20+ years of quota in two years.
Some towns may be NIMBY, but for Lexington who wanted to do 10 times more than the state’s requirement, and even after scaling back, is still doing five times more, we have the opposite problem – we need to rein in our hero complex. It is admirable to want to do good and do more, but we have to survive first.
Even with Article 2, it simply says that this is the scope for now. It doesn’t mean we can’t do more after we get through this batch.
Issie Greenberg and Ronna Casper
Regarding scaling back multifamily zoning.
The forces of “reasonable” and “common sense” have won over the liberal “overly ambitious”, “too much, too soon” groups.
How much should we celebrate this “victory”?
Thankfully, the town did not vote multifamily dwellings totally out of existence, as have other towns in Massachusetts
But let’s not forget that Lexington is still a very affluent, very white town.
Multifamily zoning will bring many minority families into Lexington.
By locking these groups out of privileged communities such as ours, by using the town “character” as a reason to close the doors behind us, we do what previous generations have done to our parents and grandparents.
The obvious goal here is promoting diversity and inclusion by creating opportunities for less fortunate people.
While adding these muti-family units to Lexington’s 13,000 or so existing dwellings may be a challenge, we are perfectly capable of integrating these families into our community.
One of the major roads to wealth in this country is through generational ownership of real estate. By inadvertently locking out minority groups from wealthy towns such as ours, we make it very hard for minorities to achieve wealth in this country.
I believe that a majority of Lexington residents value diversity, fairness and equal opportunities for all people.
We can offer this to our new neighbors.
If not right now, then in the near future, we should expand, not contract multi family zoning
Issie Greenberg and Ronna Casper – I’m tired of hearing that Lexington zoning has been racist. To me, racism is the false belief that minorities can only afford multi-family housing. Let’s leave race out of this and focus on diverse housing options for diverse financial situations. Lexington is not still a very white town. Maybe in the circles you run in. Have you looked at the racial makeup of the Lexington public schools lately?
Lexington Public Schools Racial/Ethnic Composition:
White: 38.3%
Asian/Asian/Pacific Islander: 44.4%
Black: 4.1%
Hispanic/Latino: 5%
Two or more races: 8%
This is most representative of the newest residents moving to Lexington.
Ownership of real estate? You do realize that the majority of the new multi-family developments are rentals. The only ones building multi-generational wealth are the real estate investors that have taken advantage of Lexington’s naive planning board, select board and town meeting members that created and voted for Article 34.
Mr. Greenberg, Lexington is not a “very white town.” According to the U.S. Census Bureau, Lexington is 56.8% white—significantly less than the state of Massachusetts as a whole, which is 79% white. Lexington has never been more diverse or inclusive, and it’s important to note that not all minorities are less fortunate.
The goal of creating more housing should be to accommodate more people—regardless of their race—while complying with federal and state laws that prohibit discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex, familial status, disability, national origin, source of income, age, sexual orientation, gender identity, marital status, veteran or military status, and genetic information.
The majority of Lexington residents do value diversity. We are here, and we are diverse. What many of us do not support is the notion that our town must house an infinite number of less fortunate individuals or take on the responsibility of solving deeply rooted, generational economic challenges.
Mr. Greenberg, have you spent any time in our public schools in the past 10 years? Lexington is VERY diverse. Whites are practically a minority among families with school-age kids. That is wonderful and adds to the rich fabric of our town, but to say we need more diversity is not accurate. Perhaps you mean economic diversity? I support diversity, but I also believe that Lexington should retain its historical character, leafy quiet neighborhoods, and town feel, lest it turns into a Cambridge or Somerville. Thank you to the developers of Article 2, who drove a much-needed correction before it was too late.
Unfortunately the 1,100 units already being permitted and soon to be built, will be devastating to our landscape. This is an example of poor planning. This will go down in our History as a Huge mistake. Too little too late unfortunately.
Too late, the 90 acres is almost double the state limit and will surely overload the schools that are already overloaded as is.
Why is the development at the corner of Meriam and Edgewood not included in the count?
The Meriam/Edgewood project falls under §135-6.9 of the Zoning Bylaw (Special Residential Developments). It would not be possible to submit a permit application under the MBTA Community Zoning Bylaw because that location does not fall within those overlay districts.