Lincoln selectmen seat planning director search committee, approve $15,000 traffic study

LINCOLN — September 14, 2015 — Lincoln Select Board launches search for new planning director after Chris Riley's departure for Billerica. Board Chair Noah Eckhouse, with Selectmen Peter Braun and Renel Fredrickson, voted unanimously to form a six-member search committee with one seat each from the Select Board, Planning Board, Conservation Commission, Zoning Board of Appeals, Personnel Board and Town Administrator Tim Higgins. Planning Board Chair Margaret Olson and member Lynn DeLisi pressed for two planning seats, citing the position's heavy planning load; Eckhouse refused, warning against undoing a decade of land-use de-siloing — "I'm really worried that … we have a dozen people and it becomes unwieldy." Separately, the board awarded the campus master plan contract at $69,750 and added $15,000 in supplemental traffic-study work, split evenly between leftover community-center-study funds and the school's SBAC account. New growth this year hit $287,000, nearly triple the five-year average.