Mayor Michael Nicholson has proposed that certain parcels of land on Route 140 towards Winchendon be rezoned from residential to commercial. Planning Board voted 3-2 not to recommend at recent meeting. Final Decision rests with City Council. Today, the Mayor stated, “If our population is going to grow, we have to grow with it.” He also detailed other successes of Gardner which we have covered in other articles.
Gardner MA Mayor Michael Nicholson in the Hotline Seat – April 15, 2023
Mayor Nicholson spoke about his “leave to withdraw” with respect to the 3 Zoning Change requests on the April 18th City Council calendar saying, “Because there’s very specific ways in which a zoning amendment has to be proposed. So what we’re doing is simply cleaning that up, taking it off the City Council agenda for now, and then seeing how it can be reproposed after we get some feedback from the public. ” According to the actual State law, worst case scenario is the Mayor needs signatures from 10 citizens of Gardner to make the zoning request. Others interpret the Mayor’s original request to be valid as he is a property owner in Gardner and all property owners are arguably affected by all Zoning changes which is one of the qualifying standards applying to change requests. For the actual applicable State Law you can read for yourself, CLICK HERE. —- City Council Agenda and packet for 4-18-23