WESTFIELD – At the Westfield Planning Board’s Feb. 16 meeting, the board opened a public hearing for a special permit for RC Retail for a proposed marijuana facility on Union Street before approving a change in ownership at Golf Acres.

To start the hearing, Bradford Moir explained Red Cardinal needed a special permit because of the location’s proximity to residential property.

“The special permit is needed because there is a rural residential zone across the street and a rural residential zone to the southeast. The special permit is needed because it is near the residential district line and 300 feet from a residence’s property line,” he said.

After the preliminary site plan was created by Haze Engineering, R Levesque Associates took over the site plan and Rob Levesque went through the changes to the new plan.

“Proposed is a 2,010-square-foot dispensary located perpendicular to Union Street with an L-shaped arrangement for parking. What we’ve done is we’ve upgraded to allow for traffic to move back and forth through the site freely without hitting a dead end. The rest of the site will remain lawn, but the site itself is not serviced by the sewer so there will be a septic system to the left of the plan,” he said.

One resident, Melissa Kielbasa, who said she had spoken to Red Cardinal about the project said she was concerned about the floodplain with a larger facility on it.

“We have plenty of pictures of that field underwater with a kayak in it. I know you are talking about that in terms of the floodplain, but I am concerned about putting another building in that flood plain, how it affects the water table, and the existing land that we have,” she said.

To account for the floodplain, Levesque explained that before construction an older building would be demolished to prevent a disruption.

“We totally understand your concern and we know that area floods pretty significantly. The solution over the years has been to compensate for displacement in the floodplain through compensatory storage. We do that by demolishing existing buildings that predate the flood study, which we plan to do here, or we can excavate land and recontour it so there is additional volume in the floodplain,” he said.

In order to make the necessary changes to the floodplain for the project, Levesque added that they also needed Conservation Commission approval.

Ultimately, the board agreed to continue the hearing to the next meeting.

During the meeting, the board later hosted a public hearing over the transfer of ownership for two special permits of Golf Acres, and Attorney Tricia Koss represented new owner Anthony Whitman for the hearing.

“The special permits had been previously issued for use as a recreational facility including the mini golf, driving range and batting cages along with the second permit for a mini, Indy style track on the property. Mr. Whitman is currently under contract to purchase the property and has intentions to restore the property and use it under the current conditions,” she said.

With little discussion, the board unanimously approved the ownership change.

The Westfield Planning Board next meets on March 2.