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Marblehead’s revised multifamily zoning proposal has cleared a key state review, with housing officials finding no conflicts with regulations — a development that comes days after the Massachusetts attorney general sued the town for failing to comply with the state’s MBTA Communities Law.
“We worked very hard with a lot of different groups to come up with a plan that is not only compliant, but passable at Town Meeting,” said Planning Board member Marc J. Liebman. “And if this is not that plan, we don’t know what is.”
Liebman, who has led the Planning Board’s MBTA zoning work, said the proposal was shaped by input from competing factions in town.
The Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities notified Marblehead planning director Brendan Callahan in a Feb. 5 letter that the town’s proposed 3A Multi-family Overlay District contained no items in conflict with state requirements. The letter, signed by undersecretary Caroline “Chris” Kluchman, said adoption of the proposed district would put Marblehead “in a good position for compliance.”
Select Board chair Dan Fox credited the work of Liebman and Callahan in securing the favorable review and said the revised plan addressed neighborhood concerns that doomed an earlier proposal.
“This is the result of a lot of hard work and coordination,” Fox said. “This compliance model takes into consideration the concerns of residents in regards to traffic and congestion in certain areas.”
Fox called the review a first step and expressed optimism that voters would support the plan at the May Town Meeting.
“I am confident that citizens can get behind this plan and we can move on from the 3A controversy that has consumed this town,” Fox said. “We look forward to sharing the details of the plan with the town.”
Liebman said he was not advocating for a particular outcome at Town Meeting but that he considered his work on the proposal complete.
“I just wanted to do the job, complete the task at hand,” Liebman said. “And now it’s up to every person to do what they want, and whatever happens happens. The responsibility is now in the hands of the voters.”
The favorable review arrives less than a week after Attorney General Andrea Joy Campbell filed a civil action Jan. 29 in Suffolk Superior Court against Marblehead and eight other municipalities, seeking to compel compliance with Section 3A of Chapter 40A of state law.
The statute requires cities and towns served by the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority to create at least one zoning district where multifamily housing is permitted as of right, without requiring special permits.
“Massachusetts has a housing crisis, and our Commonwealth is unaffordable,” Campbell said in a statement announcing the lawsuit. “While bringing a lawsuit is never my first choice, courts have consistently ruled that compliance with this law is mandatory, and the urgency of our housing shortage compels me to act.”
The lawsuit and the state review cap a turbulent year for Marblehead’s MBTA zoning efforts. Town Meeting voters approved an initial overlay district on May 6, 2025, by a vote of 951-759, but a citizen-initiated referendum two months later overturned the bylaw 3,642-3,297. The attorney general’s office had set a July 14, 2025, deadline for the town to have a compliant district in place.
“Unfortunately we knew this lawsuit was on the horizon when the majority of the town voted down 3A in the referendum,” Fox said. “The AG has been very clear that she would pursue this avenue if towns did not comply.”
The Planning Board voted Jan. 13 to place a revised MBTA Communities zoning article on the Town Meeting warrant. The new proposal centers the required multifamily housing district on 32 acres of Tedesco Country Club rather than the residential neighborhoods that generated opposition to the earlier plan. Marblehead, classified as an adjacent community with 8,965 existing housing units, must create capacity for at least 897 multifamily units on a minimum of 27 acres at a density of at least 15 units per acre.
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Kluchman cautioned that the pre-adoption review does not guarantee a final compliance determination and encouraged officials to review existing zoning for any provisions that could affect the overlay district. The MBTA Communities Law, signed by former Gov. Charlie Baker in January 2021, applies to 177 cities and towns; 165 have already come into compliance.
In addition to Marblehead, the towns named in the lawsuit are Dracut, East Bridgewater, Halifax, Holden, Middleton, Tewksbury, Wilmington and Winthrop. Public information sessions on the revised zoning proposal are expected in late March ahead of Town Meeting.
