Business View Civil & Municipal Apr-2023

171 CIVIL AND MUNICIPAL VOLUME 4, ISSUE 4 AMESBURY, MA To do so, the I AMesbury task force came up with eight different elements that affect their city to make up their master plan. Those elements are open space and recreation, learning and education, arts and culture, mobility, infrastructure, economic development, housing, and municipal operations. They’re looking at each of those elements under three lenses: equity, health, and resilience and sustainability. “We’re using the eight elements and three lenses with lots of community engagement from stakeholders about what matters to make sure our government is aligned with their priorities,” Gove explains. “We want to make sure our departments, committees, and commissions are serving the community in a way that’s helping us reach our goals.” While the visioning process is still underway, the fruits of the city’s labor are starting to blossom. When it comes to economic development, Amesbury has some exciting new prospects on the horizon. Amesbury is on the hunt for new industry and is looking to fill 6.7 acres of surplus land, the site of a former truck stop that has been vacant since the early 2000s. The city has been working with the Merrimack Valley Planning Commission for the past 15 years to conduct environmental assessments on the property. Now that the land has been deemed safe for development, they’re looking to put it back on the tax roll. “As we went through the public process of understanding what could go on this property, we thought about emerging industries and we explored what would make the most sense in this space and we engaged the public in this exploration,” says Angela Cleveland, Amesbury’s Director of Community and Economic Development. The site is limited by an adjacent solar field and a nearby residential neighborhood, but it comes