Barre Planning Board orders new cannabis farm hearing after threefold procedural failure

BARRE -- June 9, 2020, Barre Planning Board votes to redo a legally defective cannabis special permit hearing, setting July 7 as the new date. Town Counsel Jim Baird identified three separate procedural failures in the board's earlier approval of a special permit for High Hawk Farm on Dot Road: the required two consecutive public notices were never published in the Barre Gazette, the April 21 Zoom hearing was conducted without a publicly accessible call-in link in violation of state emergency remote-meeting rules, and the members who adopted the permit conditions in May were not identical to those who voted for approval in April. The board's chair accepted responsibility for the Zoom-access failure, saying Central Massachusetts Regional Planning Commission had provided the platform but that he had not known to request a public link. The applicant said the delays, stretching from a February 4 filing date to at least August before a final Cannabis Control Commission license is now possible, have cost the operation an entire growing season.