During an often heated city council meeting, housing actually provided some harmony, as Cambridge officials presented a long-anticipated report on how to streamline the city’s permitting process.
While big policy changes like the multifamily housing ordinance relaxed many site requirements for residential buildings city-wide, developers could not build until they navigated a permitting quagmire convoluted enough to rank Cambridge dead last in regulatory efficiency by the Red Tape Index in its list of the top 500 most populous cities.
City Manager Yi-An Huang hinted that regulatory reform was on the horizon in an interview with Cambridge Day in April.
“This is definitely something that we are very focused on this term,” he said at the time. “If we want to see more housing production, where is there red tape? Where do we have, in particular, regulations that are adding a lot of cost and time, that aren’t adding a lot of social value?”
Positive reception
Early reactions to the work done by city hall were positive.
“I’m totally excited and jazzed to have seen this (report),” said Councillor Patty Nolan. “We are not a role model in this area, and I want us to be a role model as a city in this area.”
The Community Development Department (CDD) proposed a three-pronged approach: updating current requirements to make them clearer and more flexible, streamlining the process by which different departments review plans, and reducing errors by applicants.
Some of the city’s proposals would require new ordinance language that would have to go through city council. One permitting step the report suggests taking another look at the Demolition Delay Ordinance, which requires developers looking to tear down and replace a building more than 50 years old to submit a request to the Cambridge Historical Commission, which can block demolition for up to a year. The city also suggested updating certain environmental requirements for buildings in its review.
Some of the work that doesn’t require council approval is already underway by CDD.
“We’ve already started a lot of these efforts, we have multiple studies undergoing currently,” said Jen Caira, CDD Deputy Chief of Planning, referencing ongoing reviews to bike parking and inclusionary zoning requirements. In the works are FAQs and process guides to make the current permitting requirements clearer.
While councillors generally echoed Nolan’s enthusiasm, Councillor Cathie Zusy cautioned against moving too quickly. “We don’t want to fast-track permitting at the expense of a broader, holistic approach to city planning,” Zusy said.
Zusy also sponsored a policy order during Monday’s meeting that calls for better communication of the permitting process to all residents and would provide a single point of contact at the city for developers. The council adopted it unanimously, with Zusy saying “This wouldn’t require more public process, this would create a cleaner process.”
One petition filed, another shelved
The council received a new zoning petition from Michelle Lower, a vice president at developer Alexandria Real Estate Equities. If enacted, the petition would convert a 250,000 gross square feet of floorspace from a mixed-use zoning district into an industrial district in East Cambridge. To recoup the housing potential that could be lost by the transfer, the petition would also create a new affordable housing project at 161 First Street, once home to the Ashton Valve company.
Planning Board and Ordinance Committee meetings on the idea will be scheduled.
But while one zoning petition is just getting underway, a citizen proposal for a slate of far more sweeping changes was voted down unanimously.
The petition submitted by Cambridge resident Doug Brown in early June, would have significantly impacted affordable housing projects and cut some market-rate projects down to size as well. Some city councillors and officials decried the move, worrying it could delay projects that weren’t in compliance with what Brown had proposed. It was referred back to the council by the Planning Board and Ordinance Committees, both of which gave it a negative recommendation.
Before the vote, Councillor Timothy Flaherty attempted to use his charter right to move the agenda item to the council’s next meeting on September 14th.
Flaherty said he was concerned that if the council voted down an amendment from Brown’s petition that the Community Development Department happened to agree with in their own set of changes to the MFHO, it could be deemed a repetitive petition and delay its enactment. This concern was also raised during last month’s Ordinance Committee Meeting, but City Solicitor Megan Bayer said that result was unlikely.
Had the petition been moved it would have kept Brown’s amendments as de facto city law for another month and a half before the council could dispose of them.
Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui, acting on the advice of Bayer, said that Flaherty’s charter right couldn’t be exercised on an item that wasn’t new business before the council.
“With all due respect to the city solicitor, she’s not the final word on this,” Flaherty said.
“I am, because I’m the chair” Siddiqui said. “I think for now, we should go ahead and proceed to the vote.”
Flaherty, along with Councillor Cathie Zusy, had voted last month against giving Brown’s petition a negative recommendation in the Ordinance Committee meeting on the matter. Both voted with their fellow councillors to make it a unanimous thumbs down final vote.
This story was updated to clarify that the meeting was Monday and the name of the Planning Board.
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Cambridge ranks dead last nationally on permitting. That bureaucratic choke point is a direct driver of our high housing costs. Streamlining approvals, revisiting demolition delay, and clarifying requirements aren’t “fast‑tracking developers”. They’re basic good governance. If we want lower rents and less displacement, cutting red tape is not optional. It’s the precondition for a livable, inclusive Cambridge.