To the editor:

Much ado was made at this week’s Swampscott Select Board meeting by residents to voice objection to the Hawthorne site being turned into condos.  The likelihood of a “primarily condos” scenario was always extremely low given the tacit agreement made to Town Meeting members that this was to be a purchase for public access to the site and that none of the Select Board members appear to even want this outcome, but nevertheless, people understandably made clear that they want that in writing to leave no room for even a hint of the possibility.

Swampscott needs more as well as more accessible public open space. This is a major goal of the Swampscott Master Plan and fortunately also has widespread support from residents. Swampscott also needs more housing in order to stymie skyrocketing home prices/rents and tackle some of the more exclusionary actions the town has taken throughout our history. This is also a major goal in the Master Plan, but unfortunately does not have as much widespread support because some residents may be fearful of how changes can affect the things they love about the town. Regardless, it is still very much a clear need.

These two goals do not need to be in conflict with each other as we often make them out to be. They do need to balance each other though, and we do that through our zoning by-laws. When we reserve land for open space, the price to build housing everywhere else goes up, and so we need to allow for more dense housing and a wider diversity of housing to fit the nooks and crannies. We have two options available to us: 1) We can concentrate new housing and new commercial around our existing commercial areas (Vinnin Square, Humphrey Street), transportation center (Commuter Rail), our public open spaces (beaches and parks), and the corridors in between these popular places in order to tackle traffic and make infrastructure more efficient or 2) We can spread out new housing density more gently to all non-open space areas (the majority of the town), which while making density more uniform would increase the number of cars proportionate to the number of new people and cause more strain on infrastructure, but “neighborhood character” wouldn’t change much. Regardless of the option, increasing the town’s revenue sources through growth is the only thing that will allow us to enhance and expand our public open spaces. Unless we want to cut more school staff of course.

Therefore, while I love the passion people display for protecting and expanding our town’s open spaces, I hope we can also use that passion to turn around and demand equal changes to our zoning by-laws to make our town’s use of housing spaces more efficient and accessible so we stop being overly exclusive about who gets to live in our town and enjoy all of the natural benefits we have to offer.

Aaron Berdofe

Swampscott