It wasn't a good omen for Lincoln's defenseless fawns and does.  Last week's Conservation Commission meeting was the first to be held in the Hartwell Multi-Purpose Room since the commission announced restrictive dog-walking regulations at Mt. Misery.

Then, commission members merely demanded that dogs be leashed.  This time, the topic was hunting deer with bows and arrows on town conservation land.   They were seeking resident input on whether or not the practice should be permitted. 

Considering that Bambi's life was on the line, the meeting was thinly attended.   One of the commission's co-chairmen wasn't able to attend.  He was off trekking in Nepal, presumably without his bow and arrows.  The other co-chairman was present, but his comments and those of other commission members made it clear that Bambi's fate hangs in the balance of a committee split opinion.

Supported by Conservation Commission Administrator Tom Gumbart and some of the commission members, arguments for allowing deer hunting go something like this: 1) the deer carry ticks which cause Lyme Disease, 2) the deer can cause accidents when they recklessly run across busy roads, in front of speeding cars, without first looking both ways, and 3) the deer graze and nibble on Lincoln's vegetables, ornamental shrubs and other landscape plantings without first paying for them at prevailing salad bar rates.  

Gumbart began the meeting by highlighting the deers' faults (see above), then extolling the solution: kill 'em.  If you think that solution is too Draconian, don't worry.  In an effort to level the playing fields, firearms won't be allowed.  Only bows and arrows.  And it's not like bands of armed hunters will be roaming the woods.  Rather, hunters will be required to shin their way up trees and take aim from elevated deer stands.  And they wouldn't be out there all day long.  Mostly at dawn and dusk, when the deer are active.

Sudbury now allows deer hunting on conservation land and, according to Gumbart, it has received no negative feedback on the practice, at least not from Sudbury's human population.  Yet therein lies the problem with the argument to allow deer hunting on Lincoln's conservation land: all the data and evidence used to support that argument is purely anecdotal.  

There is no data showing that Lincoln's deer population is too large, nor even that it is growing.  Gumbart guesstimated that Lincoln has 16-20 deer per square mile (equal to between 232-291 deer), but nobody knows for sure.  He'd prefer to cull the herd down to 6-8 deer per square mile (a maximum of 116 deer), but nobody's been tagging them and nobody's taking a census.  I walk in the woods almost every day, sometimes early in the morning, sometimes towards dusk.  If there are almost 300 deer roaming Lincoln how come I rarely see them?

The commission pointed out that these dastardly deer also eat the understory, the foliage used by ground-nesting birds.  But there is no evidence that these birds have been left homeless. It's a similar argument to that used on unleashed dogs (that they used to trample that same understory). Will Lincoln's ground-nesting birds ever be safe?

Regarding public safety, the commission admitted it had no hard data on the number of deer-caused traffic accidents and no idea whether or not the problem has worsened over the last few years.  And, while deer surely carry ticks, there must be a gazillion of them lurking under the fallen leaves.  Every time I walk my frisky puppy on Lincoln's trails he attracts them by the dozen without bumping into any deer.  

And what about the killing method?  Can there be anything more cruel and painful than being hit by an arrow?  Especially when the arrow only wounds the animal. Gumbart acknowledged this when he said of the practice, "it's not painless, but it's part of hunting." But, with an arrow, the deer ultimately die by bleeding to death.  That rarely happens instantaneously, even with the truest of shots. 

The commission promised the implementation of a hunter education program and other safeguards, but I would be very nervous walking my dog, which has a rather bushy white tail, on town conservation land, knowing that there could be 30, 40 or even 50 armed people at any given time, as there are in Sudbury, lurking in the trees above.

Many more steps can be taken before reaching the drastic decision to hunt Bambi.  Real data should be collected; deer birth control methods should be explored; and the commission should be required to prove to Town Meeting's satisfaction that bow hunting is the most effective means of deer control.

My cat was eaten by a coyote, but I don't think we should hunt those pet predators.  Beavers have flooded the wetlands surrounding me, but I don't advocate killing those buck-toothed pests.  Canadian Geese poop in our drinking water supply and yet we don't blast them out of the sky. Why pick on Bambi? 


 

The last study of Lincoln traffic issues by a selectmen-appointed committee took place in 2000, nearly eight years ago. That committee was headed by North Lincoln resident Kajaz Babroudi.  For a variety of reasons (such as the will of the selectmen to approve them) only a small fraction of its recommendations were ever adopted. 

The previous traffic-related subcommittee met fifteen years earlier, in 1985.  That one was headed by former selectman John Caswell.   In fact, traffic study groups have been meeting every decade or two for a very long time.

It's a little known factoid that the first traffic study committee, which met in 1842, found that there were two many horse-drawn vehicles, particularly large pickle carts, on town roads.  Lincoln was a cucumber-growing agricultural epicenter back then.  On Sundays, Bedford Road became a veritable parking lot of horses and buggies as folks all drove over to the Brooks Tavern at the same time to watch the Patriots (the real Patriots) play on a hand-cranked television.  Ben Franklin had yet to invent electricity. 

To ease congestion (and dust) that buggy traffic committee recommended paving town roads with asphalt as soon as somebody invented it.  Had they gone with the then pricier alternative, and laid cobblestones all over town, Lincoln would be way quainter today, and no less bumpy.  But I digress....

The 2000 traffic committee studied the problems extensively (conclusion: too many cars driving too fast), collecting volumes of data on road design, traffic counts, demographics and other related topics.  Its 132-page report recommended potential solutions.  However, most were not implemented.  Now selectman Sara Mattes is pushing her colleagues to appoint yet another traffic study subcommittee.  What gives?

It seems selectman Mattes has been attending some scary regional planning and development meetings.  She's learned, to her horror, that development is taking place all along Rt. 128.   A gazillion square feet of new commercial space is being built or planned on either side of the highway, from Rt. 20 all the way up to Rt. 3, with that darn Waltham a particular hotbed of activity.  

There's another bazillion square feet of commercial and residential space planned for up and down and all around Trapelo Road, through Waltham (them again), Lexington and Belmont.  All this development, according to Mattes, will generate tens of thousands of car-trips per day, many of which will be commuters passing through Lincoln, east to west and north to south.

Mattes told her colleagues that she wants the nascent traffic study group to "take a long and hard look at mitigation" strategies.  She wants to know "what tools are in the toolbox" when it comes to mitigating traffic.  If that's her goal, perhaps she need look no further than the 2000 report.  But wait, Sara was a selectman at that time.  Has she had a change of heart?

The selectmen approved only three of the 2000 committee's least controversial recommendations.  They hired a traffic enforcement officer.  They added the Lincoln Road stop sign in the center of town and they approved speed bumps at two locations along Bedford and Lincoln Roads.  Of those "improvements," does anyone think the extra police officer is fully dedicated to traffic enforcement any longer?  And I can picture only the Lincoln Road speed bump, which is about an eighth of an inch thick.  What happened to the one on Bedford Road? 

And what happened to the rest of the 2000 traffic study committee's recommendations?  That group had recommended installing a four-way stop sign at the busy Lincoln and Codman Road intersection.  It had suggested narrowing Lincoln Road to the minimal allowable width between Tower and Todd Pond Roads and adding a sidewalk alongside that stretch.  It also wanted to narrow Lincoln Road from the railroad crossing to St. Joseph's Church in the South Lincoln business district, paving that section with cobblestones. 

The committee recommended both narrowing and adding a dozen raised crosswalks to Rt. 117, Rt. 126, Trapelo, Bedford and Codman Roads. Perhaps the coups de grace were the two proposed traffic lights, one for Rt. 117 at Drumlin Farm, the other for Trapelo Road at the Winter Street/Page Road intersection.

More signage and more enforcement. Narrowing roads, adding stop signs, stop lights, rumble strips and raised intersections. Installing speed bumps, humps and tables.  Those are the proven ways to mitigate traffic.  Taking those steps will slow Lincoln traffic to a crawl, driving commuters to other routes.  Unfortunately, those changes will also make living in Lincoln unbearable, unless you never leave the house.   That's the tradeoff.  And that's likely to be the new traffic committee's conclusions as well.


 

It's been over a decade in the making, and it still has to be built. Nevertheless, Monday's groundbreaking ceremony for the reconstruction and expansion of the Lincoln Mall was a festive occasion, full of hope, with nary a discouraging word (other than mine). 

All the Selectmen were there, as well as representatives of the Planning Board and the Zoning Board of Appeals, the two regulatory boards that have been responsible, at one time or another, for the project's approval.  Postal Service and Donelans representatives attended and many posed for pictures, shovel in hands.

 

When people asked me what I was doing there, I reminded them that the groundbreaking wouldn't be occurring that day without me.  That's right, I explained.  Without me, the project would have been built three years ago.  That cracked people up.

By the time you read this, the backhoes may have laid waste to the existing parking area as the construction company reconfigures the entrances and begins the site work.  Soon the year-long $6 million construction project will begin in earnest and the Mall owner and shopkeepers are hoping that Lincolnites will continue to patronize the place.  But will we?

Lincoln librarians report that since the library's main entrance was closed for walkway repairs, business has been down.  Particularly among Lincoln's seniors.  Despite the library's best efforts, the side entrance requires walking on the grass, there are stairs, and it is all unfamiliar, temporary and not well lit.  Now try to imagine how seniors will be able to shop at the Mall when the parking lot is torn up and the snow begins to fall?  Maybe Donelans will deliver.

With the Mall in a state of flux, Lincolnites will have to cope, adapt or move.  Let's consider some of the options that don't require relocation.

Postal necessities - Imagine it's the holiday season and you've been up all night baking fruitcakes.  You just loaded a case of those lead weights into the back of your minivan to take to the post office and mail to distant family members.  Unfortunately, you discover when you get there that the only available parking space is at the rear of the commuter lot.

You know that lugging fruitcakes that far will put you in traction for two weeks suffering from a severe sciatic condition.  On the other hand, you want to get them out of your car before you hit a pothole on Lincoln's roads.  With all that extra weight in the back, you're afraid your rear axle will fall off.   What can you do?
 

Luckily, the extremely quaint Lincoln Center Post Office, in the Old Town Hall Building, remains open despite ongoing US Postal Service attempts to close it.  Its window is manned by a live employee from 10 am to noon, Monday through Friday.  Simply exit the mall parking area and drive carefully down Lincoln Road.  Watch out for the speed bump.  You should be able to park right in front of the entrance to this satellite branch.  You'll only have to haul that carton twenty feet to the counter.  Your lumbar region will thank you.

Food necessities - Much of the Mall's future success hinges on what Donelans does with its expanded space.  Right now, it's facing competition from all directions.  If parking remains problematic and Donelans doesn't improve markedly, will Lincolnites develop new habits and never return? 

Those living west of Lincoln Road already trek to Verrill's Farm in Concord for its super-fresh veggies, superior processed foods and country farm stand ambience.  Its much bigger competitor, Wilson Farms in Lexington, attracts those east side Lincolnites with easy access to Rt. 2 or Rt. 2A. 

When it comes to supermarket shopping, many Lincolnites living south of Rt. 117 meander over to Omni Foods in Weston Center.  You can always run into neighbors in those narrow aisles.  A few east-siders schlep to the Super Something in Lexington, but most Lincolnites look to Concord.

A few years back, the 3-S Pharmacy across from the Mall filled prescriptions and carried some of the same health & beauty aids as Donelans (at an even more astronomical price).  Now, most Lincolnites fill prescriptions at the CVS in Concord and then walk across the parking lot to the Crosby's Star Market.  Hmmm, a shopping center with plenty of parking and large stores that fill basic needs and are close to each other.  What a concept!

Many questions remain about the Lincoln Mall.  Will a restaurateur be found for the new building?  If not, how about a small pharmacy?  Will the RLF be able to recoup its $6 million investment?  That's the big question.

One thing is for certain, it will take more than a facelift and an expansion to ensure that Lincoln's commercial center remains vital.  For the Mall to remain strong, Donelans must succeed.  For Donelans to succeed it must aim higher than the Crosby Star level.  It must strive to achieve an even more exalted plateau.  Lincolnites deserve at least the Sudbury Farms gold standard, complete with a sushi bar.  Don't you agree?

At what point does a "Taj Mahal" structure morph into a mere trophy home?  Did town officials wring their hands over large home proposals when John Codman and John Pierce proposed their "trophy homes" in previous centuries?  How many decibels does it take until your mega hurts? And how can rejection lead to acceptance?

These are some of the random Zen koans I meditated upon last week as I sat through two of the most boring meetings of all-time.   This was particularly distressing because the agenda items facing the Planning Board and the Zoning Board of Appeals (ZBA) were both sure-fire issues that had once delivered histrionics. 

It was only reasonable to expect fireworks as the Planning Board revisited the Kingsley Brooks proposal to build a house on land abutting Minute Man National Historical Park.  The original house proposal had been strongly opposed by the National Park and soundly rejected by the Planning Board last year. 

Its vedic design, as espoused by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi, featured an imposing two-story facade and a tall roof. This had led to Planning Board concerns that the house would be converted to a "Peace Palace," one of thousands the Maharishi wants to build worldwide.  It is the Maharishi's organization that owns the land the house would sit on, and Brooks is the organization's Regional Director.

That large, two-story Taj Mahal-like structure would have loomed over the park and been plainly visible from key tourist sites.  The Planning Board tried to steer the applicant toward a less obtrusive design to no avail.  Once rejected, the applicant appealed in Land Court, and then withdrew the suit.  Now they were back with their lawyer, always a good sign of possible confrontation.

But it wasn't to be.  The Brooks contingent stepped forward with a much more reasonable proposal.  The two-story fortress look is gone, replaced by an almost modest 4000 square foot home featuring one-story wings and a two-story center section.  They've toned down the exterior facade and roofing materials and lowered the roofline so that the house promises to be significantly less visible from the park. Set on a one-acre site, the new proposal eliminates the "Taj Mahal" feel and represents a home that is more in harmony with its neighbors. 

Recognizing the compromise made by the design changes, the Planning Board offered friendly suggestions for tweaking the design.  Even Nancy Nelson, Superintendent of the National Park, was hard-pressed to come up with any substantial objections.  While not quite at the love-fest level, there clearly was agreement and a definite lack of acrimony at this meeting. What a disappointment!

The next night the ZBA agenda featured the ongoing saga of Omnipoint's efforts to bother, annoy and worry residents in the Concord Road area.  First, its cell tower carrier was rejected by Town Meeting when it tried to locate a tower at the gas station on Rt. 126.  Now Omnipoint has persuaded the owner of Red Rail Farm, a horse boarding operation at the end of a cul-de-sac off of Old Concord Road to put one on his property.  If approved, it would sit on the edge and loom over the estate's large horse pasture, now conservation land, and one of the most bucolic scenes in Lincoln.  Embattled neighbors whose homes face out on the pasture are rightfully fighting this proposal tooth and nail.

This is the third ZBA meeting on this issue and it has forced former chairman Pam Green to delay her retirement from the board.  I had missed the two previous meetings and had high hopes that the controversy would continue, but it turned out to be an even bigger snooze-apalooza. 

By this meeting, the board and the applicant's attorney were down to poring over coverage charts and other extremely technical coverage data.  These questions revolved around decibel levels or megahertz and required an electrical engineering degree to understand. The meeting droned on for over two hours like that.  I stopped taking notes after ten minutes. 

Previously, a board would request data from an applicant and then have to rely upon that applicant to interpret it.  This time, the ZBA has hired a technical consultant to guide it through the process and it is documenting its case very carefully. 

The ZBA consultant provided alternative interpretations of Omnipoint's data and questioned its conclusions.  He suggested that the board could increase the cell tower height at the Public Safety Building to accommodate Omnipoint, while requiring Omnipoint to install micro-cells that would sit on top of telephone poles along Rt. 126. 
Such a solution would solve the coverage problem and be way less obtrusive.  But it will only come about if the ZBA rejects Omnipoint's application. 

The lesson learned from the Planning Board experience is that if a town board doesn't think a proposal is in the town's best interest, then the board must cite valid reasons to reject it and be willing to stand by its decision. Or, as a Zen master might say, "Acceptance can only be achieved through rejection."


 

Before we look back at what, if anything, happened in Lincoln this summer, let's take a look ahead at the Bemis Lecture Series' exciting fall schedule.  Everybody have their calendars out? 

The season kicks off on Sunday, September 23 (just a little over two weeks from today) with a special guest lecture by Dan Shaughnessy.  Dan is an award-winning columnist for the Boston Globe and the author of several sports books, including The Curse of the Bambino, a best-selling classic now in its twenty-first printing. Dan has been voted one of America’s top ten sports columnists by Associated Press Sports Editors seven times and named Massachusetts Sportswriter of the Year. He has appeared on numerous radio and television programs, including Good Morning America, The Today Show, Nightline, NPR, ESPN, HBO, and many others. Dan lives in Newton where, for 13 years he served as a METCO host parent to a boy who became his second son.

He's got a new book, Senior Year: A Father, a Son, and High School Baseball.  It's a heartfelt, humorous chronicle of his son's senior year in high school, a critical time in any young life and especially in the relationship between a father and son. Dan will read from his new book and answer all your sports questions.  Want to know if the Red Sox will win the World Series?  If the Patriots will go to the Super Bowl?  How good the Celtics will be this year?  Don't miss Dan's lecture at 3 pm at Bemis Hall.  Admission is free.

Actor, director and musician Rene Lewis will appear on Sunday, October 22. Rene has performed with national and regional performance groups and throughout Europe, India and the Bahamas and he has appeared in countless theaters and clubs in the US, including Stand-Up New York and Caroline's on Broadway.

And, on Sunday, December 2 peacemaker, human rights activist and author John Prendergast will speak as part of a weekend of activities celebrating the Lincoln-Sudan
connection.  The Bemis trustees never rest.  We're always looking for new lectures to host. So stay tuned.

Now, if you were away all summer and are just returning to Lincoln from that second home on Nantucket, that villa in Tuscany or that shack with an outhouse on that lake in Maine, perhaps you're wondering what you missed.  Did your property taxes go up while you were away?  Has the Lincoln Mall been rebuilt yet?  Is Lee's Bridge finished already?

Well, you've come to the right place to find out.  Or you could pore through that gigundo stack of Lincoln Journals that piled up along with all that junk mail during your absence.

The answers to the above questions are maybe, no and no.  Construction has yet to commence on the Mall and Lee's Bridge isn't finished simply because it's not yet 2050, the year they should be done at the current pace.  The only variable would be the property tax question, and we'll have to wait for next month's tax bills to figure that out.

So, what did happen around here this summer?  In a word, nothing.  The big zip, nada.  The selectmen were away and didn't meet most of July and all of August.  The various subcommittees that make up the Long Range Planning Committee rarely met this summer or, if they did, neglected to post their meetings.  It looks like that Long Range Master Plan might take a little longer. 

The Planning Board met religiously, but frequently in executive session, so that its members could negotiate with the Rural Land Foundation, owner of the Lincoln Mall.  An agreement has been hammered out, freeing the RLF to begin construction or to come up with new reasons why not. 

That was the Planning Board's primary issue over the summer, though the project some members worried would become the Maharishi's Peace Palace is back on their agenda for the fall.  There's a new Water Commissioner, Penny Billings, but no news on the water front.  The schools start back up this week without a new driveway to Sandy Pond Road and sans astro-turf covered playing fields.  How will they survive?

Many houses sporting 'For Sale' signs when you left in June or July still have them on their lawns.  And most of the potholes are right where you left 'em.

Some things have changed a little.  The giant crevice (e.g.- super-pothole) that cars encounter when trying to enter the Mt. Misery parking lot has grown even deeper and wider.  If it gets any larger it's likely to attract spelunkers.  The former 3-S Building had a facelift and is looking quite spiffy.  The gas station on Rt. 117 went out of business for awhile but has reopened as Best Buy Gas, with the lowest prices in Lincoln.

 

All in all, summer here was quieter than in Lake Woebegone.  So, to set your mind at ease, you missed next to nothing if you were away, because not much happened.  And isn't that what we all love about living in Lincoln? 


 

As we careen towards Labor Day and the beginning of the new school year, why not take a look at this summer's crop of Hollywood films?  Did I say 'Hollywood'?  I meant to say 'Lincoln films,' because without our plot lines, Hollywood wouldn't have been able to make some of these stinkers. 

That's right, not every Lincoln-based movie is both a huge hit and critically acclaimed.  In fact, many of them suck (can you say that in the Lincoln Journal?).  Here are some recent movies that haven't done so well, critically, or otherwise:  

Rush Hour 3 - It's the story of what happens when a family from Lincoln decides to move west of Rt. 495 to get a bigger bang for their housing buck. What happens?  Nothing.  The parent/breadwinners spend three hours each day stuck in traffic just trying to get through Acton and Concord to and from their jobs in Boston.  Wait until 2025 when construction finally gets started on Rt. 2.

No Reservations - It's a romantic comedy about a sous chef and a pastry chef who combine forces and open a new bistro-style restaurant in Lincoln.  Availing themselves of the town's beer and wine license, they stock the wine cellar with rare reds and whites, only to learn that the local clientele is more interested in browns (coca-cola and coffee), a grilled cheese for the kids, and a long-time sit-n-schmooze with friends.

Underdog - When an accident occurs at a secret high-tech animal research lab in a secluded corner of a nearby Air Force Base, a little beagle is endowed with serious superpowers, including the ability to fly and to speak like a Shakespearean actor.  This unlikely caped crusader vows to protect the beleaguered dogs of Lincoln when an unscrupulous developer offers to buy Mt. Misery and build a huge casino resort there.

I Know Who Killed Me - Many critics have already anointed this the worst movie of the year, and there still are four months to go.  The main problem was trying to tell the story of the Lincoln Mall's demise with Lindsay Lohan playing the mall.  Not the best casting decision.  And whose idea was it to make the Planning Board look like the evil bad guys?  That was just plain wrong.  No wonder this horrible horror movie tanked.

Daddy Day Camp - This un-wacky comedy took a good Lincoln idea and messed it up, leading to its box office failure. Based on almost-true events occurring every day at the Codman Pool, this comedy was originally called, Au Pair Day Camp, about two ditzy au pairs who take over a day camp and turn it into a pre-teen fashion modeling school.  But neither Paris nor Nicole were available for the starring roles.  Instead, they found some guys to pretend they're fathers.  Lincoln fathers running a day camp?  What would happen to their high tech start-up companies?  They should have stayed with the au pairs concept.

I Now Pronounce You Chuck and Larry - When a younger, less experienced DPW employee is promoted to Foreman, two more experienced workers join forces and get married in a lovely ceremony at the Pierce House.  They then both sue the town for not getting the promotion, claiming sex and gender discrimination. 

Stardust - This sci-fi/fantasy movie is set in the village of Lincoln, where the stone walls were built hundreds of years ago to keep the villagers safe from the strange, supernatural realm (Waltham) that lies just beyond.  A smitten young man promises the prettiest girl in the village that he will venture out and return with a fallen star for her.  Little does he know that the falling star is really a Jet Blue flight on approach to Logan.  Follow his adventures as he makes it on the Mass Pike and through the Ted Williams Tunnel without anything falling on him.

Reading it now, you can see why some of these movies didn't do so well.  I guess not every Lincoln story can be an Academy Award winner.


 

August is usually considered a slow month here.  Most Lincolnites seem to be fleeing to the Vineyard, to Tuscany or other exotic spots. But the perception isn't always accurate.  In fact, this town can be busy in August.  Frequently, it's the year's biggest month when it comes to calamities. 

You remember the Goose Poopies crisis of the summer of 1998, don't you?  Town officials went into panic mode when the Department of Environmental Protection dropped a regulatory bomb on the Water Department.  All because of some poor water quality readings caused by an influx of Canadian Geese on Flint's Pond, the town's water supply. 

Fears abounded that the town would have to join the regional Massachusetts Water Resources Authority (MWRA), build a new treatment plant and erect a chain link fence around the pond.  A townwide ad hoc committee was formed to manage the issue and negotiations with the DEP were hot and heavy that August. In the end, only the treatment plant has been required so far, and that turned out to be a good thing.  I haven't had a glass of green water since it was built.

Then there was the school budget crisis of 2001, which burst on the scene that summer and played out through August.  It seems the Business Manager had overspent the school's budget by almost half a million dollars, and an equal amount of expenses had already been budgeted in the upcoming year, resulting in double the problem.  That fiscal snafu cost the Business Manager and the Superintendent their jobs, and resulted the following year in the ballot box loss of a School Committee member seeking reelection.  And all because of a measly million bucks.

It should be noted that both those events played out in public, with numerous meetings for all to attend.  In contrast, this summer's mini-crisis--the impasse between the Planning Board and the Rural Land Foundation, leading to the RLF's Land Court appeal of the Planning Board's Special Permit, has been much a more quiet, more private affair. 

Since the lawsuit was filed the Planning Board has met regularly in executive session to discuss the issue, and the RLF trustees always meet privately.  So, unlike past crises, everything is happening behind the scenes this time.  However, sources close to the negotiations report that it appears that an agreement could be reached in the next week or so...or the deal could be dead. 

As reported in this paper a few weeks ago, the major obstacle appears to be the issue of "second-generation" tenant approval.  The RLF has balked at a key provision of the Special Permit requiring Planning Board approval of major changes in use of key tenant spaces, like Donelans.  If that store should close and another grocer can't be found, the RLF wants to be able to rent that space to anyone, including an office tenant.  The Planning Board wants to be able to approve that change, and to possibly reject it.

Conversations with RLF trustees reveal that this has been a real stumbling block for them, not merely an excuse to scrap the project, as some (including yours truly) have speculated.  No developer would accept such terms, one pointed out to me.  [I had to remind that trustee that no other developer would have received Town Meeting approval for the expansion or obtained a liquor license for a non-existent restaurant, but I digress.]

It was confirmed that lawyers for both sides met in the last two weeks.  What if the RLF's lawyers concur with the Planning Board's lawyers (that the RLF's appeal is weak) and counsel the trustees to settle?  What will the RLF decide to do?  That appears to be the current status, with the Planning Board remaining steadfast in its town protection role, and waiting for the RLF to take the next step. 

RLF trustees haven't met as a board since deciding to go to court, but they are due for a meeting shortly.  Will they accept the Planning Board's oversight role?  Or will they dig in their heels and put the kibosh on the project.  Don't go anywhere; we may learn the outcome before August is out.


 

We Lincolnites must be a very generous lot.  Well, not me, I'm a curmudgeon. But many of you, it would seem, are generous enough to volunteer your time and donate your money to a wide variety of causes.  And I do mean a wide variety. 

At last count, according to Guidestar (www.guidestar.org), a comprehensive on-line database of non-profit organizations, there are a whopping 92 such groups registered in Lincoln.  Contrast that with Sudbury which, with three times the population, has 126 non-profits.  Or consider Weston which has twice our population yet only 159 registered non-profits.  Lexington (287) has three times the non-profits Lincoln has, but it also has five times the population. 

You can speculate as to why, but those statistics indicate that Lincoln is the per capita Home of the Non-Profits, at least among its surrounding towns.  Some think it's because the annual fee for a Lincoln post office box has historically been much cheaper.  Higher postal box fees in neighboring towns could be driving penny-pinching non-profits to Lincoln to pick up their junk mail and catalogues.

Lincoln's open spaces could be another lure for some non-profit groups.  In fact, that's some groups' raison d'etre.  For instance, there's the Rural Land Foundation, which is committed to preserving all open spaces except the Lincoln Mall's parking lot, and the Walden Woods Project, dedicated to preserving the memory of Don Henley, whoops...I mean, Henry David Thoreau. 

Lincoln's struggle to maintain its agrarian past is represented on this list by such well-known organizations as the Grange, the Food Project, Codman Community Farms and the Massachusetts Audubon Society's Drumlin Farm.  But what about the Noah's Farm Educational Foundation, the Lincoln Community Herb Project or the Lincoln Garden Club?  Are they agrarian too?

Non-profit groups are also known as 501(c)3 groups because of their tax status.  Such groups can run roughshod over local zoning bylaws if they serve an educational or religious purpose. Last year, a Waltham church and a Sudbury private school wanted to expand into Lincoln residential neighborhoods. Both faced strong neighborhood opposition and ended up choosing paths of lesser resistance.  But, beware; there are plenty of similar groups already in Lincoln. 

The Carroll School and its neighbor, LoveLane Therapeutic Horseback Riding Program already share property along Baker Bridge Road.  But what about Magic Garden, Lincoln Nursery School and LEAP, the after-school program?  They all have non-profit status, as does the PTA and the Lincoln School Foundation.  Could any of them have designs on Lincoln's residential neighborhoods?  If so, they could use the same law firm the RLF hired to pursue its legal action against the Planning Board.  It's one of the best.  

Many of Lincoln's non-profits have an international aspect to them, probably reflecting the global social concerns of many Lincolnites.  There's the Sudanese Education Fund and the Friends of Sudan, the Friends of Zimbabwe, Central American Relief, the Armenian Health Alliance, the Bolivian Street Children Foundation, the Japanese American Citizens League and an international economic development group called Conservation through Alleviation International.  That's a tongue-twister. I'm glad I don't have to answer their phones.

The diversity of special interest non-profits in Lincoln is staggering.  Pet-specific Lincoln organizations include the New England Old English Sheepdog Rescue and the Bay State Basenji Club.  It must be because of all the leash-free dog-walking trails. You want arts?  There's the semi-defunct Lincoln Players and the Foundation for Chinese Performing Arts. One music-lover formed the MusicAmerica Trust, dedicated to preserving the traditions of American music.

Those organizations with interests rooted in more liquid matters include the PBS offshoot, Ocean Alliance, and To The Water Ltd., a swimming and water recreation public charity. And there's Beerz, run by Lincoln resident, "Doctor Beer."  He offers educational beer-tasting seminars and I know the Bemis Trustees would like to host such an event...purely for educational purposes, of course.

That's just the tip of the non-profit iceberg.  There are many even more obscure groups whose purposes aren't clear.  However, if any of them offer grants for needy local columnists, they should get in touch.


 

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