Residents Contest Additional Parking Spaces for Cameron Senior Center

A community field off Pleasant Street might soon become a concrete parking lot at the request of Westford’s Cameron Senior Center.  

The Senior Center asked the town for an additional 28-space parking lot. In the proposed plan, parking spots would overtake the baseball field, but leave the basketball court intact.

Neighbors say children and families enjoy that area daily.

The current lot, with 58 spaces, is too small to make room for the 2,000 seniors who regularly make use of the center’s aerobics, line dancing and live music, said Joanne Sheehan, the center’s director of elder services.

“Seniors are saying, ‘If we can’t get a [parking] spot, we’re not going to come here,’” Sheehan said, adding that the seniors cannot park on the grass in the winter.

Sheehan documented 19 dates since January during which she saw seniors, and at times she, did not have a place to park.

About 10 residents stood up at Tuesday’s Board of Selectmen meeting to voice their love for the open space, which is owned by the town, close to their homes.

“There is absolutely no demonstrated need for an expansion of the parking lot,” said Cheryl Kolodziej, who also said she and her husband Stan have been watching the parking lot and don’t see it fill that often. “I hope you will put up a webcam and watch every day as we’ve been doing.”

At 23,000 square feet, the Cameron Senior Center has an inadequate amount of parking by town standards. Westford’s zoning laws require one parking space for every 200 square feet of a building. A feasibility study in 2009 recommended the center have 92 parking spaces.

Selectman Andrea Peraner-Sweet said the center has a history of asking the town to release the land to allow for building and additional parking. About three years ago, the town, residents and the senior center made a compromise and allowed for paving and construction on a small portion of the field.

“At that point in time, the planning board was pretty clear… that it was not going to be receptive to further expansion into the backyards of the folks who live there,” Peraner-Sweet said.

Resident Paul Rosenfield said the field is home to a fox, bluebirds and nature that he enjoys observing.

“The cars, if they need to, they park there in the grass. That’s fine,” Rosenfield said. “[The grassy area with a baseball field and also a basketball court] is multipurpose. It benefits everybody, and it’s not an eyesore. It’s nice.”

The board referred the matter to the Northern Middlesex Council of Governments in a 4-1 vote in search of a compromise or solution. Selectman Valerie Wormell voted against the measure.