Comprehensive Plan Slated For Select Board Review

ORLEANS – The planning board is on track to present a final version of the town’s new local comprehensive plan to the select board later this month.

The board has spent the last two years working to revise the existing plan, which was last updated in 2006. On Dec. 10, the board held a public presentation on a draft of the new plan, which was first posted on the town website in October, and took public comments from residents in attendance and online. 

Planning board Chair John Ostman called the plan, which is designed to be updated every 20 years, a long range look at “where the town wants to go and why” into the year 2050. The planning board worked alongside the firm Tighe and Bond to develop the plan, a process that involved gathering public input and information through visioning workshops and a community survey that Ostman said garnered 569 responses. 

The board also consulted with other town boards and committees to see how many of the goals outlined in the existing comprehensive plan have been achieved, and what other areas still need work.

“That information plus the visioning workshops plus the responses from the survey has given us so much good raw material to build the plan that has been online now since the beginning of October,” Ostman said.

George Meservey, the town’s director of planning and community development, said that approximately 80 percent of the goals and initiatives outlined in the existing plan have been met. 

“Compared to many communities, this town is very proactive in using its comprehensive plan,” he said.

The new 230-page draft plan outlines a series of new goals and objectives, among them protection of the town’s natural resources and environment, the creation of “diverse, year-round intergenerational housing options,” support for a “healthy, year-round local economy” and investments in infrastructure, clean energy and "recreational, social and cultural opportunities,” according to the presentation.

A timetable presented at the Dec. 10 meeting calls for a final draft of the new comprehensive plan to be prepared for the select board by the end of the month. That would be followed by another public hearing held by the planning board on the final plan in February. From there, an article will be prepared for the annual town meeting in May seeking formal adoption of the new plan, which would then be subject to review by the Cape Cod Commission in June.

Meservey said a system for evaluating the plan’s performance will also be put in place by the planning board, likely sometime after the new plan is adopted.

Orleans resident Mark Berson said that the new plan should help the town move away from “reactive, volunteer-driven decisions” toward “data-informed planning.” He also said the local economy could be broadened by supporting a “knowledge economy” centered on research that can attract engineers and startup companies to town.

“Think about developing something other than another restaurant, something other than just the plain old vanilla stuff,” he said.

Berson also noted that the draft plan needs more information on the role artificial intelligence, or AI, will have in shaping the town in the years to come, noting that planning, zoning, budgeting and governance of local schools can be impacted by gains in the rapidly developing technology.

Ostman said while not singled out in the new comprehensive plan, a series of strategic plans for the town for administrative and community services are being developed that take AI into consideration.

“There’s a lot of AI in tactical use in that plan as it’s starting to form,” he said.

Robert Rich of Orleans called the draft plan an “impressive document” that was “beautifully done.” But he suggested that a section referencing adoption of a specialized energy code be amended to reflect the town’s disinterest in doing so, citing the recent vote against its adoption at the special town meeting in October.

Jamie Balliett, who chairs the Snow Library board of trustees, spoke for the board in advocating that the plan include more specific references to the library and its importance in town as the trustees continue to work toward the construction of a new building. He noted that approximately 100,000 people visit the library annually, including an increased number of people who have been opting to work remotely from the facility over the past decade instead of working from home.

“And we really feel like that amount of traffic really helps commercial activity in the downtown core,” he said. He also argued for the plan to include more detail about the library’s Marion Craine Gallery and makerspace on the lower level. Figures regarding what a new library is projected to cost also should be updated in the plan, he argued.

“How do I delicately say that Snow Library is an important facility in the community and important to the local economy?” Meservey said. “But if we feature ‘library,’ we better feature 20 other businesses or institutions. So we want to find the right level here.”

Ostman asked that the comments made during the Dec. 10 meeting be incorporated into the plan ahead of the board’s next meeting on Jan. 13.

A draft of the plan is available on the town’s website on the planning and community development landing page.