MAPC Presents Planning Framework to Weston's New Unified Planning Committee

WESTON — September 27, 2023 — Weston's Unified Planning Committee received an introductory presentation from the Metropolitan Area Planning Council on the process of building a comprehensive community plan. Mark Racicott, a planner with MAPC — the regional planning agency serving 101 Greater Boston communities — outlined standard master plan elements required under Massachusetts General Law, including housing, land use, transportation, and open space, while noting that Weston's broader unified plan charge from the Select Board would also encompass education, governance, aging, and sustainability. Racicott cited the Town of Canton as a model, describing 19 mixed-use downtown redevelopment projects over 23 years that flowed from a single MAPC-assisted planning process. He warned that plans lacking a dedicated implementation committee "just sit there," and recommended sequencing ten years of action items for town meeting. A committee member noted that schools — responsible for roughly three-quarters of the town's budget — are absent from the statutory master plan framework, calling them "the big elephant" missing from the left-hand column of required topics.