A warrant article to allow an electronic sign on the Burlington Town Common received a mixed vote from the Planning Board recently, with four voting in favor and two voting against the proposed change.
“I think it’ll be a great upgrade for the common, for the town, allow for some more important messages,” said Planning Board Member Jessica Sutherland, who voted in favor of the article. “I think this is a good vehicle for us to get messages out to the town.”
“This is a last-minute work in progress,” Planning Board Chair Bill Gaffney, who voted against the article, told representatives from the Select Board and the Town Administration. “You came before us last year with this, and you came before us [again] with the same thing, it hadn’t been touched. Now you’re squeezed into a couple of weeks here. This should have been happening in the year that you had.”
The Select Board first introduced an article for an electronic sign in January of 2023, but Town Meeting postponed it due to concerns about driver safety and how the sign would be deployed. Assistant Town Administrator John Danizio said the administration had worked to address those concerns in the updated warrant article.
“As we continue to work on it, we got more feedback from the Zoning Bylaw Review Committee, that needs to be implemented in some way, and as we’re working through before Town Meeting, the Select Board is finalizing a use policy. They’ve also got a draft of that, they’ve got a framework for operations or safe use of the actual sign, as in what can go on it, what kinds of text, and sizes, from the traffic safety officer in town,” he said.
The proposal would allow for one electronic sign to be placed at the corner of Cambridge St. and Bedford St. on the Town Common, where informal banners advertising town events currently hang. The sign would be approximately 4 feet by 8 feet, with a peaked roof designed to look like the roof of Town Hall.
The 4-2 vote is a recommendation that Town Meeting Members will use to inform their decision-making at September’s meeting.