Town Meeting granted the owner of 888 Great Plain Ave. the zoning changes needed to bring a project before the Planning Board that could allow a four-story mixed-use project at the the former Hillcrest Gardens site.
Jay Derenzo, who purchased the property in 2020 and has had intermittent discussions with the Planning Board since 2021, took the unconventional route of bringing the request to Town Meeting via a citizen’s petition.
Zoning articles typically are prepared by the Planning Board, but Derenzo and the board were not able to get in sync in terms of both substance and timing, leaving the former landscape nursery empty for nearly six years after 40 years as a downtown centerpiece.
“Mr. Derenzo opted to proceed with a citizen’s petition because he felt strongly about the use of the property and also was at a point where he needs to decide what to do with the property,” said George Giunta Jr., Derenzo’s attorney during his Town Meeting presentation on behalf of the petition.
Derenzo announced his intentions to the Planning Board in late 2025 and appeared before the board several times earlier this year to discuss the concept. He also held community meetings with abutters and other stakeholders, including nearby business owners.
In late March, the board voted to support the zoning needed to allow the mixed-use development after conducting a public hearing.
The parcel is currently zoned Single Residence B. To enable the project, the zoning map needed to be changed to remove that designation and extend both the Center Business District and the Needham Center Overlay District to encompass the parcel. The map change will allow the mixed-use of multi-family apartments over ground floor retail.
Derenzo’s preliminary plan calls for a mixed-use development with 26 residential apartment units in the three stories above three ground-floor retail spaces. This plan has been described as a placeholder that reflects the current preference but could be altered somewhat when the project is subject to the Planning Board’s special permit review process.
When it was presented at Town Meeting May 11, the Select Board and Finance Committee joined the Planning Board in recommending that the article be adopted. The zoning changes received a less-supportive response when it was opened to discussion.
That discussion lasted nearly an hour — the most time spent on any single article across the three days of Annual Town Meeting and Special Town Meeting. The opposition was based on both the substance of the changes and the fact that they arrived via the citizen’s petition route.
Precinct I member Moe Handel, a former Planning Board member, was the first to comment, saying “I rise in opposition to the citizen’s petition.”
“They have made piecemeal changes to our downtown zoning, which are consequential and that extend our commercial downtown further into a residential neighborhood by the citizen petition route and not through a deliberative and intensive public process,” he said.
“That is not how we should be making such important revisions to our downtown,” he added.
Two members who reside on nearby Warren Street, Rochelle Goldin from precinct F and Christopher Thomas from precinct G, both spoke at length of traffic and other motor vehicle impacts, especially due to the property’s driveway that fronts on Great Plain Avenue and would handle traffic to and from the property’s planned underground garage.
Thomas referred to a traffic study done by the developer which estimated more than 400 cars may cross that sidewalk daily. “That will disrupt traffic incredibly but more so, it will be dangerous, especially for our kids and grandkids.”
However, later in the discussion, another former Planning Board member, Jeanne McKnight, made reference to a current zoning bylaw that she says would not allow that driveway to be used as a means of egress to any below-ground parking.
The project also drew enthusiastic support from members Paula Dickerman from precinct J and Amanada Berman from precinct G. Both noted the project calls for 15% of the units to be designated as affordable, which they say the town needs, and also satisfies other town goals.
“We need quality housing, we need a vibrant downtown, we need more retail space,” said Berman, who is also a Needham Housing Authority Commissioner. “Let’s move this project forward.”
Berman was followed by Susan Welby from precinct G, who wanted to send the project in a totally different direction.
“I would like to refer these articles back to the Planning Board for further discussion,” she said. “Especially given they (the Planning Board) really want to look at the whole downtown zoning.”
“And I think it needs a lot more discussion and open meetings,” she added.
Another former Planning Board member, Paul Alpert from precinct C, brought the discussion to an end when he made a motion to bring the issue to a vote.
That led to a long sequence of votes as the zoning was expressed in three separate articles and Town Meeting first had to vote on the motions to refer each article to the Planning Board.
All three motions to refer were defeated and all three zoning articles ended up passing by comfortable voice-vote margins.
Save as PDF