SAUGUS — The Planning Board was scheduled to review multiple Town Meeting articles Thursday night, including Article 40, Article 45, and Article 46 on the agenda.

Article 40 was briefly discussed, but the Board agreed that it did not relate to the zoning bylaws and was intended only to establish a Committee, so the Board moved to refer the article back to the maker.

The Board then moved to Article 45 after a brief recess, an article sponsored by Selectmen Chair Debra Panetta and Selectman Michael Serino.

The article would amend Article III – Definitions, Section 3.1 General of the zoning bylaws. It would add the definition Motor Vehicle Sales – Class II License Requirements & Limit.

The article sets a limit on the number of Class II licenses townwide to 13, meaning only 13 businesses could acquire and sell second-hand motor vehicles.

Serino explained that right now the town has 22 of these businesses, including the ones on Route 1.

“People don’t want them in their neighborhood, but the other issue is these can be located on any commercial piece of property in town, whether it’s existing gas stations, Cliftondale Square, or Lincoln Avenue… Any piece of commercial property. We felt that 22 used car lots are enough,” Serino said.

He noted that this wouldn’t affect any current businesses in town.

Serino then spoke about the value of these properties.

“Hamilton Street alone has five. I looked at the values, not of the land but of the buildings, because the land, if you put a new house on it… or another commercial piece of property, the land value is the land value… But I looked at the buildings themselves,” he said.

A property on Hamilton Street was assessed at $210,000, and another on the same street was assessed at $95,000.

“We’re really not getting any significant tax value out of these places either. And people just don’t want them in their neighborhood. And I think 22 is enough in the town,” he said.

Board members had some confusion with the verbiage of the article, as it states only 13 licenses can be had townwide, but as a whole, there were 22 used car lots. Serino and Panetta explained that the 13 licenses were specific to the town, not to Route 1.

Serino also explained that, under zoning enacted in 2015, new used car dealerships are banned on Route 1, and the ones currently there were grandfathered in, meaning no new used car dealerships could be opened there.

Panetta agreed that 22 used-car dealerships were enough in town.

“As Selectman Serino said, it’s usually a gas station… Where we get into some difficulty is they’ll say ‘We’re only going to park the cars along the side,’ and it’s not true. They’ll park them in the front (or) they’ll park them on the side… It’s very difficult to enforce things like this,” she said.

The Board unanimously agreed to recommend the article for Town Meeting.

Article 46 was to amend Article III – Definitions, Section 3.1 General by adding a new definition under 3.1 Auto Showrooms & Lots.

It stated that Auto Showrooms and Lots “shall mean the use of any building, land area, or other premises for the storage/display and sale of new and/or used motor vehicles,” and was also sponsored by Panetta and Serino.

“It defines where these cars can be sold and on what lots,” he said, noting that people were trying to sell the cars online to get around zoning bylaws set by the town. “It’s pretty basic, but I felt we probably needed it.”

The Board unanimously agreed to recommend the article.