Wellesley Annual Town Meeting ends: RIO motion sparks lively housing debate, falls short of votes

April 16, 2025

A citizen petition seeking to amend a controversial zoning bylaw was the main event on the sixth and final night of Wellesley Annual Town Meeting. The motion under Article 42 narrowly failed to get the required two-thirds vote needed to pass on Tuesday night at the middle school, but did spark a broader town effort to reform the residential incentive overlay (RIO) bylaw (see Wellesley Media recording).

The vote was 123 for the motion, and 79 against—so 10 votes short of passing (see how Town Meeting members voted).

It wasn’t for lack of trying on the part of the resident who brought forth Article 42 and many who did support an effort to return the RIO zoning bylaw to its original state from 1998. But those against the article, and in favor of other possible ways to revise the planning tool, also made strong cases during a Town Meeting segment that lasted for some two-and-a-half hours. The discussion, which included voices of some three dozen residents, was civil despite strong feelings about the issue from different sides.

article 42
The proposed changed under Article 42 is the underlined sentence at the end.

Peter Welburn, a Town Meeting member and lifelong Wellesley resident, culminated his efforts for RIO change via the citizen petition route at Town Meeting after numerous previous presentations before the Advisory Committee (which vets Town Meeting articles), the Planning Board, and Select Board. Welburn said he was compelled to bring the citizen petition forward based on requests over the past couple of years from people, some of whom he met at neighborhood meetings and other housing meetings in town, to refocus the RIO bylaw away from allowing multifamily housing in single- and general residence districts. The bylaw allows development of 24 units per acre.

“When the RIO was originally proposed in 1998, the intent was to really encourage denser residential development in commercial areas,” Welburn said. As he explained, the town opened up RIOs to all districts in 2019 as it negotiated with developers of a couple of proposed 40B projects widely seen as overreaches considering their locations.

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His citizen petition did not attempt to overturn changes to the bylaw introduced in 2019, but rather focused on the districts where the overlay could apply. “I was really just trying to respond to the feedback I got from residents, and that feedback was about one thing: Location, location, location,” said Welburn, who lives near the site of a proposed condo development in the Cliff Estate area that did not pan out last year in the face of neighborhood and town opposition. Welburn described the proposal as recommending a strategic change for the town, rather than having Town Meeting debate one RIO development proposal after another, as it has done over the past year. He also argued that Wellesley has been quite supportive of housing development, including through its MBTA Communities compliance and meeting the state’s threshold on affordable housing stock.

Welburn said he’s supportive of a Planning Board-led effort to create a RIO task force, though contended there was no need to put off the changes proposed under Article 42 before that task force gets going.

Tom Taylor, chair of the Planning Board, followed Welburn to the podium and opened by saying: “At its most basic level, we agree that the RIO bylaw needs to be thoughtfully reviewed, improved, updated as an important zoning tool that has saved the town twice before. We don’t believe Article 42 is a change that is a net benefit to the town.” The change would be overkill in restricting RIOs to too few districts, he said, including potential developable areas such as Barton Road and Morton Circle, where Wellesley has older public housing complexes.

Taylor went on to say that Town Meeting has already shown an ability to discern what it considers to be good vs. bad RIO plans. The Planning Board also agrees with those who spoke at the past Special Town Meeting about waiting on RIO changes until the Strategic Housing Plan is completed.

“As a town, we are nowhere near consensus on this topic, and I would argue that looking at the bylaw with a group of dedicated citizens [via the RIO task force] is a better way to achieve useful change that the town will buy into,” Taylor said. The goal is to produce results from the task force in time for Annual Town Meeting next year, but he acknowledged this is an aggressive timeline.

Town Meeting members and other Wellesley residents spoke for and against Article 42.

Town Meeting member Ann-Mara Lanza, an active housing advocate, praised the opportunity to discuss this matter in a public forum. She voiced opposition for the article, in part because removing a tool from the table could hamper efforts to address the various housing needs in town, whether for seniors, new families, or first responders. “Each time we discuss a housing tool there’s always the prediction that that particular tool will result in a flood of unmanageable new housing,” she said, but pointed to this not materializing, such as with accessory dwelling units and RIOs.

Another opponent of Article 42, Phyllis Theermann, spoke on behalf of the grassroots Sustainable Wellesley group and cited the need for more multifamily housing to help the town achieve its sustainability goals. “Denser housing uses less materials, and is much more energy efficient than single-family housing…,” she said. “This citizen petition limits the ability of Town Meeting to consider future sustainable housing options.”

Lina Musayev acknowledged the concerns about change in neighborhoods that come with new developments. “I’m not asking us to give up what we love about our neighborhoods. I’m asking us to ask how we can improve them, make us better. If we believe in equity, and I know we do because we passed an anti-racism and anti-bias resolution as a town… if we believe in climate sustainability, if we believe in opportunity, then we have to make room for more homes, for more neighbors. And yes, some change…”

In describing her opposition to the citizen petition, Leda Eizenberg also pointed to what the town could gain by diversifying its housing stock. “I do think one of the ways we decrease demand is to increase supply,” she said.

Among those speaking in support of Article 42 was Ann Rappaport, who described it as providing a “much needed pause” to possible RIO developments, especially those that come to Town Meeting without development agreements. As it is, the RIO bylaw “tends to seem like a blank check to me,” she said.

Several members referenced the current bylaw allowing developers to lead the process; some vilified “greedy developers,” though also acknowledged developers need to charge a lot for housing given how much land costs.

Town Meeting member Tad Heuer, a zoning and land use attorney, supported Article 42 and reminded fellow members that the expanded RIO zoning bylaw was a defensive reaction to hostile 40Bs. “The purpose of zoning is to provide deliberative certainty in land use, both to those who want to build and to those who are already there. It is not meant to be deployed on a property by property basis. That is literally why we call it zoning… because it creates zones,” he said.

Gig Babson said she supported Article 42 and that the most important factor was the quantum of vote, which has changed since the original RIO bylaw emerged. As verified by town counsel, a majority vote now applies, per statute, when a motion would make multifamily housing development easier; the two-third threshold applies to motions that would make building multifamily housing harder. “That’s the most important point of why I believe we should support this [main motion to amend the bylaw]. That things have changed, not by our doing, but by the state’s doing, and that will allow the imposition of a RIO wherever it is in town by a majority vote. It’s much easier to get a majority vote than a two-thirds vote,” she said.

Town Meeting member Roy Switzler also supported Article 42, and aired concerns about how bringing multifamily developments to single-residence districts could hurt property values. “I don’t want to see Wellesley become a Newton or Brookline,” he said, adding that as a longtime real estate broker, he has told clients that anything built next to a single-family home other than another single-family home reduces home values.

With Article 42 failing to pass, it’s on to the RIO task force, which will will include town officials as well as members of the public.

While there was no formal opportunity for Article 42 proponent Welburn to weigh in on the voting results at the meeting, we followed up with him.

“I was blown away by the way Wellesley Town Meeting members came together to debate RIO reform last night.  It was a master class in civic engagement – not just for the Town, but for the entire country,” Welburn said. “With passion, respect, and clarity, the community took a major step forward on RIO reform.  A 61 percent vote for change makes one thing clear—momentum is building to update the RIO Bylaw.”

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