Chapter 41

Section 81. Sections seventy-three to seventy-nine, inclusive, shall not authorize the taking of land nor authorize a town to lay out or construct any way which may be indicated on any plan until such way has been laid out as a highway; nor shall said sections render a town liabl…

Section 81A. Any city except Boston, and, except as hereinafter provided, any town may at any time establish a planning board hereunder. Every town not having any planning board shall, upon attaining a population of ten thousand, so establish a planning board under this section. …

Section 81AA. The board of appeals appointed under section eighty-one Z shall adopt rules not inconsistent with this section and sections eighty-one Y and eighty-one Z, for conducting its business and otherwise carrying out the purposes of said sections. Meetings of the board sha…

Section 81B. In any city or town in which a planning board is established under section eighty-one A, if any of the powers and duties of planning boards or boards of survey are being exercised and performed by a planning board established under section seventy or corresponding pr…

Section 81BB. Any person, whether or not previously a party to the proceedings, or any municipal officer or board, aggrieved by a decision of a board of appeals under section eighty-one Y, or by any decision of a planning board concerning a plan of a subdivision of land, or by th…

Section 81C. The planning board established under section eighty-one A shall from time to time make careful studies and when necessary prepare plans of the resources, possibilities and needs of the city or town, and, upon the completion of any such study, shall submit to the city…

Section 81CC. Planning boards and their officers and agents may, as far as they deem it necessary in carrying out the subdivision control law, enter upon any lands and there make examinations and surveys and place and maintain monuments and marks.

Section 81D. A planning board established in any city or town under section eighty-one A shall make a master plan of such city or town or such part or parts thereof as said board may deem advisable and from time to time may extend or perfect such plan. Such plan shall be a statem…

Section 81DD. The subdivision control law shall not abridge the powers of the city council, of the selectmen, or any other municipal officer, in regard to public ways in any manner except as herein provided, and shall not authorize the taking of land nor authorize a city or town …

Section 81E. Each city or town having a planning board established under section eighty-one A may, by action of its city council or town meeting adopt an official map, prepared under the direction of such planning board and showing the public ways and parks therein as theretofore…

Section 81EE. Every board having on the first day of January, nineteen hundred and fifty-four, powers of subdivision control shall, within sixty days thereafter transmit to the register of deeds and the recorder of the land court a statement stating that in the opinion of such bo…

Section 81F. A city or town so adopting an official map, by action of its city council or town meeting, may whenever and as often as it may deem it for the public interest, change or add to such map so as to place thereon lines and notations showing existing or proposed locations…

Section 81FF. So far as land which has not been registered in the land court is affected by the subdivision control law, recording of the plan of a subdivision in the registry of deeds before the subdivision control law was in effect in the city or town in which the subdivision w…

Section 81G. Sections eighty-one A to eighty-one J, inclusive, shall not abridge the powers of the city council or the selectmen or any other municipal officer in regard to public ways or parks in any manner except as provided therein, nor shall they authorize the taking of land …

Section 81GG. Any planning board having powers of subdivision control under corresponding provisions of earlier laws shall have all of the powers and be subject to all of the duties of a planning board with respect to subdivision control under sections eighty-one K to eighty-one …

Section 81H. Upon final action by the proper authorities in laying out, altering or relocating a public way, or in discontinuing the whole or any part thereof, or in establishing or enlarging a public park, or closing thereof in whole or in part, the lines and notations showing s…

Section 81I. In a city or town having a planning board established under section eighty-one A but which has not adopted an official map no public way shall be laid out, altered, relocated or discontinued, unless the proposed laying out, alteration, relocation or discontinuance ha…

Section 81J. A city or town which has a planning board under section eighty-one A may establish, in the manner provided for the laying out of city or town ways, the exterior lines of any way, the location of which has been approved under section eighty-one G or the subdivision co…

Section 81K. Sections eighty-one K to eighty-one GG, inclusive, shall be designated and may be known as ''the subdivision control law''. This designation shall, when apt, include corresponding provisions of earlier laws.

Section 81L. In construing the subdivision control law, the following words shall have the following meaning, unless a contrary intention clearly appears:— ''Applicant'' shall include an owner or his agent or representative, or his assigns. ''Certified by [or endorsed by] a plann…

Section 81M. The subdivision control law has been enacted for the purpose of protecting the safety, convenience and welfare of the inhabitants of the cities and towns in which it is, or may hereafter be, put in effect by regulating the laying out and construction of ways in subdi…

Section 81N. Except as provided in section eighty-one EE, the subdivision control law shall be in effect in every city, except Boston, and every town, which prior to the first day of January, nineteen hundred and fifty-four, established a planning board as defined in section eigh…

Section 81O. No person shall make a subdivision of any land in any city or town in which the subdivision control law is in effect unless he has first submitted to the planning board of such city or town for its approval a plan of such proposed subdivision, showing the lots into w…

Section 81P. Any person wishing to cause to be recorded a plan of land situated in a city or town in which the subdivision control law is in effect, who believes that his plan does not require approval under the subdivision control law, may submit his plan to the planning board o…

Section 81Q. After a public hearing, notice of the time and place of which, and of the subject matter, sufficient for identification, shall be published in a newspaper of general circulation in the city or town once in each of two successive weeks, the first publication to be not…

Section 81R. A planning board may in any particular case, where such action is in the public interest and not inconsistent with the intent and purpose of the subdivision control law, waive strict compliance with its rules and regulations, and with the frontage or access requireme…

Section 81S. In the case of a subdivision showing lots in a residential zone, any person, before submitting his definitive plan for approval, may submit to the planning board and to the board of health, a preliminary plan, and shall give written notice to the clerk of such city o…

Section 81T. Every person submitting a definitive plan of land to the planning board of a city or town for its approval or for a determination that approval is not required shall give written notice to the clerk of such city or town by delivery or by registered mail, postage prep…

Section 81U. When a definitive plan of a subdivision is submitted to the planning board, as provided in section eighty-one O, a copy thereof shall also be filed with the board of health or board or officer having like powers and duties. Such health board or officer shall, within …

Section 81V. In case of approval of a plan by action of the planning board, after the expiration of twenty days without notice of appeal to the superior court or the land court, or if appeal has been taken after the entry of a final decree of the court sustaining the approval of …

Section 81W. A planning board, on its own motion or on the petition of any person interested, shall have power to modify, amend or rescind its approval of a plan of a subdivision, or to require a change in a plan as a condition of its retaining the status of an approved plan. All…

Section 81X. No register of deeds shall record any plan showing a division of a tract of land into two or more lots, and ways, whether existing or proposed, providing access thereto, in a city or town in which the subdivision control law is in force unless (1) such plan bears an …

Section 81Y. In any city or town in which the subdivision control law is in effect, no public way shall be laid out, accepted or constructed, and no municipal service or improvement shall be constructed in a way within a subdivision, to serve the land therein, unless such way app…

Section 81Z. A city or town in which the subdivision control law is in effect shall, by ordinance or by-law, provide for a board of appeals, which shall have jurisdiction to issue a permit for the erection of a building under section eighty-one Y. Such board of appeals may be the…

Section 82. Cities and towns which accept this section or have accepted corresponding provisions of earlier laws may, except where their charters make special provisions therefor, establish art commissions in accordance with the two following sections. In cities such acceptance s…

Section 83. Within sixty days after the acceptance of the preceding section, the school committee, the board of trustees of the public library and the board of park commissioners, or the members of three similar boards designated by the town at the time of such acceptance, shall …

Section 84. In any town which has accepted section eighty-two or corresponding provisions of earlier laws, no municipal structure shall be erected, and no work of art or ornament or object of utility, except authorized structures of public service corporations and public watering…

Section 85. The mayor or the selectmen, on the written request of any person engaged in buying, selling or transporting goods or commodities which require weighing, surveying or measuring, shall appoint weighers, measurers or surveyors of such goods or commodities, who shall be s…

Section 86. All persons appointed under section eighty-five shall keep accurate records, in the form prescribed by the director of standards, of all weighings, measurements or surveys made by them, which shall at all reasonable times be open to inspection by said director and his…

Section 87. The two preceding sections shall not affect the provisions of law for the appointment of weighers, measurers or surveyors of particular commodities.

Section 87A. The director of standards, upon the written request of the colonel of state police, shall appoint any of those persons appointed under section ten of chapter twenty-two C as weighers and measurers of motor vehicles and trailers and of the loads of such vehicles and t…

Section 88. The mayor of each city, and the selectmen of each town, where salt water fish are landed from vessels, shall annually appoint a public weigher of fish, to hold office for one year from the time of his appointment and until his successor is appointed, who shall be swor…

Section 89. A public weigher of fish may appoint, subject to the approval of the mayor or the chairman of the selectmen, deputy weighers, for whose official conduct he shall be answerable, who shall be sworn, and from each of whom such weigher shall require a bond, with sureties,…

Section 9. If the town clerk, selectmen, assessors, treasurer, collector of taxes and school committee are voted for on one ballot, the moderator shall cause all such ballots, when canvassed and counted, and record thereof has been made, publicly to be enclosed in envelopes, whic…

Section 90. A weigher or any of his deputies who violates his oath of office shall be punished by a fine of not less than twenty-five nor more than one hundred dollars, and shall forfeit his office.

Section 90A. Whoever hinders, or obstructs, or in any way interferes with a public weigher of fish or any of his deputies, in the performance of their official duties, shall be punished by a fine of not more than fifty dollars.

Section 91. In a city in which the city council accepts this section, or has accepted corresponding provisions of earlier laws, constables shall be appointed by the mayor for terms not exceeding three years. The mayor may, with the consent of the board of aldermen, remove a const…

Section 91A. The selectmen in any town may from time to time appoint, for terms not exceeding three years, as many constables as they deem necessary.

Section 91B. Constables shall not be appointed by mayors or selectmen under section ninety-one or ninety-one A except as hereinafter provided. A person desiring to be appointed as aforesaid shall make a written application therefor to the appointing authority stating his reasons …

Section 92. A constable who has given bond to the town in a sum of not less than one thousand dollars, with sureties approved by the selectmen, conditioned for the faithful performance of his duties in the service of all civil processes committed to him, and has filed the same, w…