Harwich Board of Appeals Continues 60-Unit Affordable Housing Review to May 7

HARWICH — April 23, 2026 — Harwich Board of Appeals presses Penrose LLC for parking and engineering revisions on a proposed 60-unit affordable housing complex. The board spent more than three hours April 23 examining peer-review findings from VHB engineer Frank DiPietro on the Chapter 40B application at 456 Queen Anne Road, with discussion centering on a proposed waiver from the town's 102-space parking requirement down to 76 — a count DiPietro's own tally of the site plan put at only 75. Board member Kenneth Dixon, citing an early-morning site visit to a comparable Penrose development in Wareham where 11 of 13 handicap spaces were occupied, declared: "If we don't increase parking in some capacity, I will not be supporting this project." Penrose representative Ryan Kierkoff said the company is in active talks with the Harwich Affordable Housing Trust about overflow parking on adjacent trust land, with the trust's board set to consider the matter at its May 11 meeting. Public commenter Tom Stapleton, a former 10-year ZBA member in Massachusetts, urged the board to condition any approval on expanding the project footprint to the full 13-acre trust parcel, arguing the current 5.4-acre design generates impervious surface at roughly 10 times the density appropriate for the Six Ponds Special District drinking-water recharge area. The case was continued unanimously to May 7, 2026.