​A community-driven comprehensive planning process, which is what Brookline by Design is advocating for, offers us a significant opportunity as a community to articulate our goals and vision for the future.  We have modern concerns, such as affordability, equity, sustainability and climate resiliency, which are not contemplated in our current regulations. In Brookline, our current status quo land use and development policies and processes do not address equity in any significant way, other than our attempts at inclusionary zoning, which increase the cost of market rate units by slightly subsidizing a few units in each project.   Many are advocating that we simply increase the allowable building sizes within our current zoning framework.  This may increase density but it would be haphazard with poor results. We need to harness the benefits of employing state of the art planning techniques and new, more nuanced zoning techniques to first build in the kind of regulations we should, such as fair housing standards, developer funded public realm improvements, healthy landscape standards to boost our climate resiliency, and good urban design to create welcoming and exciting places to name a few. We also must first understand the relationship between adding population and maintaining our per capita park and recreation space, school space, infrastructure, libraries, and town services, etc. Every resident’s well-being depends on it. With developer driven building, we are vulnerable to the effects of gentrification and displacement that are triggered by significant redevelopment.  There are plenty of examples in Brookline where we have seen demolition of older, lower-cost existing structures that are replaced with new uber-luxury housing built for very wealthy households.  We have no mechanism to protect residents of these older structures in our current by-laws. We have a lot to learn from the experience of Boston, where newer substantially unplanned areas such as the Seaport have been built with little to no concern for providing the elements that make a neighborhood supportive of family well-being, such as access to parks, recreation, public transportation and meeting a family’s daily needs within walking distance. Additionally, the developer-driven development in the Seaport has resulted in very little cultural or racial diversity.  Watch this video clip of former Councilwoman Lydia Edwards as she remarks on these facts. https://www.brooklinebydesign.com/post/density-doesn-t-mean-equity Boston has recently made an amendment to their Zoning Ordinance to include an innovative approach to manage the equity challenges around new development, which was championed by Councilwoman Edwards, called Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing.  You can read about it here.  http://www.bostonplans.org/housing/affirmatively-furthering-fair-housing-article-80 Managing the negative impacts of displacement and gentrification are just two of our current land use challenges that could be addressed if we undertook a more inclusive and community-driven planning effort. There are a great deal of innovative tools and techniques we could incorporate into our future land use regulations that could benefit the Town substantially in terms of addressing concerns such as environmental justice (access to nature and mitigating heat island), fair housing practices, equity of access to Town services and facilities and equity of access through transportation policy are just a few. Like most other professions and organizations, the practice of Urban Planning has been working to incorporate equity concerns into the process and policies of comprehensive planning. To begin with, great advances have been made to make the planning process more inclusive through tailored community engagement strategies aimed at dismantling barriers that prohibit meaningful participation.  The interview with Somerville Planner, Dan Bartman highlighted their community process that led to a highly successful plan called Somervsion that represents their future goals. Watch a presentation and interview with Dan Bartman here:  https://www.brooklinebydesign.com/post/somerville-by-design Island Press has published a ground breaking book on novel approaches to community engagement called “Dream, Play, Build: Hands on Community Engagement for Enduring Spaces and Places” by James Rojas and John Kamp, where the authors describe how they broke down barriers between the public and planning and design professionals to embrace the vision and creativity residents have about their community, enabling them to offer meaningful suggestions to build a better future.  The potential for Brookline to embrace and benefit from these techniques is great. In their book “The Comprehensive Plan: Sustainable, Resilient and Equitable Communities for the 21st Century” David Rouse, FAICP, ALSA, and Rocky Piro, PhD, FAICP, outline effective new strategies to incorporate planning for the ascendant issues modern communities are grappling with as we plan for tomorrow.  If we are not intentional in our vision, goals and desired outcomes, progress on equity and resiliency will not be made manifest in our built environment. This is why Brookline by Design exists and why we are calling on Brookline to rise to the challenge to come together to harness these tools for the benefit of all and to take back our power to manage our own destiny.