PROVINCETOWN — Town meetings here follow a fairly standard recipe — articles that fund town government at the beginning, housing measures in the middle, zoning articles at the end. It takes only 10 voters’ signatures to add a petitioned article to the warrant, however, and this year there are four: one on gender-inclusive restrooms in town-owned buildings, two on the regulation of building materials, and one that would cap the number of short-term rental licenses in town at 1,000.
Two more articles are the result of a nonbinding petition at last year’s town meeting that aimed to cap at three the number of hotels in town that any one person or corporation could own. This year’s Article 34, sponsored by the planning board, would expand the town’s formula business bylaw to include hotels, while Article 27, sponsored by the select board, would put the three-hotels limit in the town’s general bylaws.
Finally, what was described as a petitioned article at a select board meeting two weeks ago — a ban on hemorrhagic rodenticides that can also kill pets and wildlife — is now sponsored by the animal welfare committee and appears as Article 25.
Gender-Inclusive Restrooms
Article 20 is a nonbinding resolution that directs the select board to adopt gender-inclusive standards for all public bathrooms in town-owned buildings.
The state’s most recent building codes already direct towns to have gender-inclusive restrooms in new buildings — Provincetown’s new police station, for example, includes only single-stall bathrooms for people of all genders.
Eight people spoke at the Feb. 24 select board meeting — and 13 more on March 10 — asking that existing bathrooms in town-owned buildings be retrofitted to the state guidelines.
Jamie Elizabeth Grasso, who introduced the petition on Feb. 24, said, “I’m embarrassed to be standing in front of you and essentially asking for a hall pass” for the bathroom. “I’m 46 years old, a former U.S. Marine, a budding architect, a resident of Provincetown, and I can’t use a restroom in my own town without worry.”
The state guidelines call for partitions between stalls that go all the way to the floor, Grasso told the Independent, along with signs on each stall that show whether they contain a toilet, a urinal, or both. Where possible, exterior doors between bathrooms and hallways are removed completely, as in many schools and airports, so that a call for help can be heard outside the bathroom.
“There are 700 proposed laws in the states right now that would make it illegal to be transgender — many of them say that a person using the ‘wrong gender’ restroom can be arrested,” said Grasso. When restrooms are gender-neutral there is no “wrong gender,” and the possibility of being challenged by a bystander or authority figure disappears, he said.
The select board decided on March 10 to establish a working group to advise it on next steps; the group will include Assistant Town Manager Dan Riviello, DEI Director Donna Walker, DPW Project Manager Braden Witt, and two transgender or nonbinary community members.
“We’ve heard you, and we will take action on this as soon as we can,” said board member John Golden.
Short-Term Rentals
Article 23, a petitioned article from finance committee member Doug Cliggott, would cap the number of short-term rental certificates the town can issue at 1,000.
Town Manager Alex Morse and Riviello recently told the finance committee that there are currently about 950 certificates; Cliggott said he wanted to set the cap a bit over the current number.
“In the last 33 years, we’ve increased the number of housing units in town by more than 700, yet the number of units occupied year-round is slightly lower than in the 2000 census,” said Cliggott. “That’s despite the Harbor Hill apartments and other housing projects” that were built in that time, he said.
“I’m not sure how much more freshwater capacity we can count on, and I’m not convinced it’s financially or environmentally possible to just build, build, build our way out of the housing crisis,” Cliggott said. Limiting the number of short-term rentals could mean that “five to seven years from now, when there’s generational changes in ownership, it could influence the new owners” to consider year-round options rather than short-term rentals.
Cliggott’s petition was turned in just before the March 7 deadline, and the select board did not discuss it at its March 10 meeting. The town’s existing bylaws on short-term rentals, passed in October 2023, limit rental certificates to two per owner and require corporations that hold rental certificates to disclose their owners’ identities.
Building Materials
Jonathan Sinaiko sponsored two petitioned articles on the warrant this year: Article 21 would require plastic trim used on the outside of buildings to be cut indoors, and Article 22 would allow fire-resistant materials such as fiber cement siding and artificial slate shingles in the historic district. Both measures are nonbinding resolutions.
Sinaiko said he had been a volunteer firefighter for more than 30 years and that he had seen spot fires spread around town during the Whaler’s Wharf fire in 1998.
“There were 10 other fires that started from Whaler’s Wharf, including one on the roof of the Unitarian Universalist church and one on Monument Hill,” said Sinaiko. “There were embers in the air as big as softballs — I thought the whole town could burn down.”
The fires that have devastated Los Angeles and Oakland, Calif. could happen here, Sinaiko said, adding that “Truro is not dependable for mutual aid. I understand historic values, but the fire issue is a major risk.”
Plastic siding, meanwhile, is not fire-resistant, and plastic particles spread everywhere when it is cut outdoors, Sinaiko said. “The dust is gross, it sticks to everything, and they’re cutting it right on Commercial Street in the East End.”
Hotel Articles
Article 34 would amend the town’s formula business bylaw to control the appearance and marketing of chain hotels.
On Feb. 24, Brent Daly, a sponsor of last year’s petitioned article on hotel ownership, told the select board that the marketing of hotels and their underlying ownership were important but distinct issues.
“The town voted last year for the government to look into the issue of consolidated hotel ownership,” Daly said.
Article 27 was subsequently added to the warrant; it would prohibit any “person or other legal entity” from owning or operating more than three hotels, motels, or bed-and-breakfasts in town.
