Stephen Palmer, Stormwater Amendments Come to Town Meeting

October 20, 2025
• Town Meeting members will vote on eleven articles at Special Town Meeting, which starts Oct. 20.

Special Town Meeting begins Monday, Oct. 20 at 7:30 p.m., when members will consider paying for a plan to transition Stephen Palmer Apartments, changes to dog licensing, updates to the town’s stormwater bylaw and more.

Stephen Palmer

Just before Town Meeting convenes, the Select Board voted 4-1 to sign an agreement with Stephen Palmer Associates, who manage the 28-unit apartment building on Pickering Street. That agreement states that tenants of the building would need to vacate by Oct. 31, 2026.

Town Meeting members will decide whether or not to appropriate $385,000 toward that agreement from the town’s reserve fund. An amendment to the FY26 operating budget, in a separate article, would permit the town to do so, should the preceding article pass.

For those impacted, the town would separately plan to provide up to $10,000 to help tenants relocate.

While residents’ current leases would be honored, many expressed frustration about that timeline. The town’s 50-year ground lease with the company expires in May 2027, and some tenants feel they should have until then, an additional six months, to stay in their homes.

For more insight into the decision and Select Board discussion, read our coverage here.

Dog Kennels and Licensing

Ollie’s Law, signed by Gov. Maura Healey in September 2024, modified the state’s kennel license requirements. Needham’s current bylaw makes no mention of kennel licensing, prompting Town Clerk Louise Miller to add language to existing dog regulations.

Speaking at a Select Board meeting last month, Miller said the new kennel regulation prompted her to examine the town’s dog licensing policies.

The warrant article, should it pass, would grant Miller — alongside the Needham Police Department — the authority to issue enforcement fees. Failure to annually license or vaccinate your pet (including dogs, cats and ferrets) against rabies each carries a $50 penalty, but the bylaw amendments would double that to $100 for each offense.

The current licensing period starts Jan. 1 and ends April 30, which means “we have months of dogs that aren’t currently licensed,” Miller told the board. She proposed starting the license renewal process Dec. 1 so dogs are licensed again in the new year.

Unlicensed dogs can’t stay at a kennel and can’t use the Needham Dog Park. It costs $20 to license neutered and spayed dogs and $25 to license intact dogs, and a late fee would carry up to the same price, Miller said last month. There are no late fees currently.

“The ability to levy late fees as proposed in the changes to Article 4 before fines are issued would allow the magnitude of the fee to be more commensurate with the cost of the license and would streamline the administrative work both in the Town Clerk’s Office and the Police Department,” a note on the warrant article states.

There are about 3,400 dogs in Needham, Miller said, and her office issues about 400 fines. Some dogs have gone unlicensed “for years,” Miller told the Select Board in September.

For kennels who do not apply for a license, the town would issue $500 for the first offense and $1,000 for every offense after that. Private and commercial kennels must both apply for a license.

Children’s Hospital Work

Boston Children’s Hospital plans to open a Needham location on Jan. 21, 2026, and ahead of that date, Special Town Meeting will vote to fund two separate articles concerning the property.

The first is improvements to wastewater inflow and infiltration at the cost of $132,000. That’s the amount the hospital must pay to Needham’s Inflow and Infiltration Program, and it’s a rate of $8 per gallon that must be removed from the sewer system.

The second is a $25,000 allocation of funds for intersection improvement analyses. After residents expressed concerns about traffic volume due to the hospital, the town would conduct a roadway safety audit and a traffic signal warrant analysis at Kendrick Street and Fourth Avenue.

“Safety and operational issues have been identified at this intersection,” the warrant states.

The hospital will offer pediatric specialty services and ambulatory surgical services, according to its website. It is located at 360 First Ave.

Stormwater Bylaw Amendments

Over the past couple years, the town has experienced severe rain events that flooded streets and damaged properties. Under proposed changes to the town’s stormwater bylaw, the town aims to address several factors.

“The updates are intended to reduce pollution from stormwater runoff into the Charles River, help manage the quantity of water flow from subjected activities, promote the long-term maintenance of stormwater systems, and ensure compliance with State and Federal water quality requirements, including the Town’s National Pollutant Discharge Elimination System (NPDES) permit under the Clean Water Act and Municipal Separate Storm Sewer System (MS4),” a note on the warrant article states.

Needham’s Stormwater ByLaw Working Group worked to draft changes in an effort to improve run-off and drainage issues across town.

If passed, the bylaw would extend to “all existing activities” as opposed to just new construction, building additions of a certain size and projects requiring Planning Board approval. There would also be increased enforcement ability by the Department of Public Works and a responsibility for property owners to maintain and have routine inspections of stormwater systems.

The Select Board previously removed MBTA quiet zone construction funding from the warrant, due to a lack of sufficient information to move it forward. The board also removed an article pertaining to a feasibility study for a culvert at the Commuter Rail crossing at the Needham Golf Club.