HADLEY — Denser housing developments in apartment-style buildings, with the units reserved for people age 55 and over, will be allowed along Route 9, after residents supported revisions to the original senior overlay district at annual Town Meeting Thursday.

In a session largely devoid of controversy, residents approved all 27 articles, including a $22.76 million operating budget for fiscal year 2026, spending to renovate the steeple at the First Congregational Church at 102 Middle St. and money for permanently protecting more than 40 acres of agricultural land.

With the Parmar family proposing a 55-and-over development in a hotel-like building at the Hadley Village Barn shops site, new rules are in place for the Central Overlay District, running along Route 9 from the Coolidge Bridge. The zoning change was OK’d by a 160-5 vote, surpassing the two-thirds majority needed.

Planning Board Chairman James Maksimoski said such developments could bring good tax revenue to the town with a limited drain on town services.

Though denser projects, Planning Board Clerk William Dwyer said these would still be on a Hadley scale, limited to three stories, and families and college students would be prohibited.

“This is all senior housing, it is not open to the public as a whole,” Dwyer said.

No changes were made for the rules in the Rural Overlay District, centered on North Maple Street, that was created last fall.

Budget and spending

The $22.76 million budget, which is $791,416, or 3.6%, above the current year’s $21.97 million budget, was approved with little discussion.

At the beginning of the meeting, Select Board Chairwoman Molly Keegan referenced remarks she made at Town Meeting in 2017 about concerns of hitting a “financial wall,” which eight years later may require a Proposition 2½ tax-cap override to meet obligations. “Tonight we just want you to know we think the wall may be here,” Keegan said.

Even so, the spending plan, as adopted, preserves all current staffing across the town and schools for the first three months of the new fiscal year.

“Personnel remains the same,” said interim Town Administrator Michael Mason, observing that the “deep cuts” were made in expense lines.

A “Band-Aid budget” is how Finance Committee Chairwoman Amy Fyden characterized it. “This year was not pretty. It was probably the most difficult budget we’ve had to deal with,” Fyden said.

“We did the best we could with what we have,” said Linda Sanderson, the town treasurer, who is instrumental in putting together the budget and removed $200,000 that would have gone toward the town’s Other Post Employment Benefits liability.

Over the rest of the spring and summer, both the Select Board and Finance Committee, working with Mason and Sanderson, expect to refine the budget in preparation for an override vote. An aspect that may help reduce this need are adoption of an increased local options meals tax and local options occupancy tax. The local meals tax would go up from .75% to 1% and the rooms tax would rise by 1% from 6% to 7%. Both passed easily, meals tax 163-2 and 164-1, but are contingent on legislative action.

Select Board member Amy Parsons explained that these would mean a significant amount of revenue, with meals adding $400,000 a year and the hotels $1.7 million, and would be generated by those visiting town. “It’s pretty important for us to do this,” Parsons said.

The largest of the $621,627 in Community Preservation Act spending is $350,000 for the church steeple.

Kurt Betchick of Frallo Drive said the church will kick in $50,000 for the work on the building, built in 1808 on West Street and moved to its current site in 1841.

Historical Commission member Irene Costello said the church is an important structure for town center.

“It’s a hallmark of this town,” said Allan Zuchowski of West Street, who noted the steeple is leaning and a gust of wind might topple it on the neighboring Town Hall, eliciting laughter when he said he doesn’t linger when he has business at the municipal building. “I go in and I get out quick,” Zuchowski said.

Another $150,000 from CPA will go to replace 80 exterior doors at Golden Court, supplementing $600,000 from other sources, including state money; along with $72,000 to replace the back fence, on the north side, at the Old Hadley Cemetery; $6,500 to build an enclosure to display the historic bell from the North Hadley Village Hall outside the North Hadley fire station at 304 River Drive; and $2,200 to preserve the Hadley Historical Society’s 1663 Quanquan Mortgage and the 1676 John Crowe Estate Deed, documents that led to the settlement of Hadley.

A combination of $81,855 from CPA and the Transfer of Development Rights accounts will permanently protect 42.75 acres of farmland, adding to the 3,800 or so acres already in the state’s Agricultural Preservation Restriction program.

Town Report

The meeting began with the dedication of the Annual Town Report to Margaret L. “Peg” Tudryn, who died in March, and the recognition of former Select Board member John Allen with the W. Fred Oakley Award for community service.

A graduate of Hopkins Academy in 1954 and Smith College in 1958, Tudryn spent 35 years as an educator at Hopkins Junior High, Hopkins Academy and Northampton High, and also was a longtime member of the town’s Historical Commission and Long Range Planning Committee. Keegan said Tudryn was “a passionate and devoted educator, public servant and leader who we miss dearly.”

Allen’s tenure on the Select Board was from 1985 to 1991. Allen is currently serving on the Form of Government Committee and held elective office again two years ago on the Hadley Housing Authority.

“His love for this town and community are evident in his work and passion for local governance,” Keegan said.

At the end of the meeting, as they were leaving the cafetorium at Hopkins Academy, some residents commented on the brevity of the meeting, which concluded about 15 minutes short of the two-hour mark, possibly marking the shortest Town Meeting in 25 or more years.

Scott Merzbach can be reached at smerzbach@gazettenet.com.