Larry Finnegan shares his views on Devens at a forum attended by approximately 45 Harvard residents on a rainy Saturday morning. (Photo by Lisa Aciukewicz)

Last Saturday, Sept. 27, approximately 45 citizens participated in a public forum hosted by Harvard’s Board of Selectmen and facilitated by MRPC (Montachusett Regional Planning Commission). The purpose of the forum was to solicit public input on the current draft (Sept. 16, 2008) of the Devens Disposition Success Criteria, the document that represents Harvard’s requirements in the process for disposition of Devens.

Harvard Selectman Chairman Leo Blair opened the meeting, saying that its objective of the meeting was “to identify those things that are most important to the residents of Harvard, irrespective of the disposition we may arrive at. By having this early in the process we will be able to share this with our colleagues from other stakeholder communities and the Devens Committee. They are all using the same process.”

Blair went on to say that “our hope is to use this as a starting point and a way to measure results as we get to the end of the process. Today we need your guidance to determine whether we are on the right track moving forward.”

Bob Biagi, MRPC’s lead facilitator, said that “this is step two” in the process, and that step one comprised input from Harvard’s boards and the public at three Board of Selectmen meetings beginning in July of this year.

At this point, the selectmen began drafting success criteria for negotiating with other stakeholders in the disposition process.

Biagi instructed participants to join one of five groups to provide input and comments and to add new criteria as appropriate. Participants were instructed to join the group in which they had most interest: education, community, environmental, economic, or administrative/transition.

Each group had an MRPC recorder who used large flip-chart pages to note comments and input on criteria; each group also had a selectman observing the discussion.

Toward the end of the discussion, participants were asked to prioritize their comments. One participant from each group then used these prioritized comments to report to the entire meeting on that group’s input, comments, and priorities.

MRPC will use the citizen-generated charts to write a report summarizing comments and additions from the public. This report will inform the next update of the selectmen’s Success Criteria document.

Glen Eaton, MRPC’s executive director, said that a draft of this report is targeted for November. Blair said that the selectmen will use notes from the forum to modify the current draft of the Success Criteria before the end of October.

When contacted after the meeting, Blair said that he was “not sure when the Board of Selectmen will bring any disposition scenario to Town Meeting.” He said further that he “would like it to be next April, but I can’t predict the process. One thing I can tell you,” he said, “is that we are not going to bring anything to the town until it is ready.”

The selectmen will take Harvard’s criteria to negotiations on scenarios with other stakeholders at JBOS (Joint Boards of Selectmen) meetings over the next months. JBOS includes selectmen from Harvard, Ayer, Shirley, and Devens Committee members.

These negotiations will determine which of the three scenarios—taking some, none, or all of Devens—will be decided by Harvard voters at a Special Town Meeting on Devens disposition.

Participants at the Saturday forum commented that they would like to see a baseline of “where Harvard is today” with respect to the criteria. Such a baseline could be used to measure which scenario is most appropriate for Harvard to pursue.

Common themes in group reports were concerns about process and communications and about housing caps and zoning issues at Devens, especially housing and zoning issues that affect education requirements.

In both group discussions and in comments to the larger meeting, many participants requested a stronger community voice in the process for forming criteria. One participant said, “Start the conversation at the citizen level as opposed to the JBOS level.”

Addressing the need for clarity of communication about the disposition process, one participant said, “Establish timeline milestones; make them well-advertised.”

Another participant added that “people don’t know how serious this is” and that he was “concerned about communications.” He asked for a “communications process that says there will be ‘this info’ at ‘this time.’”

Housing planning was a major concern at the meeting and group reports indicated that participants wanted planning information on types of housing as well as information on the impact of housing on taxes, schools, and the culture of the town.

A complete report on the findings of the meeting will be available from MRPC to JBOS members and members of the Harvard Selectmen sometime in November.