Planning Board OKs Ellis Road animal permit

Planning Board · Meeting of October 21, 2026

SOUTHBRIDGE — The Southbridge Planning Board closed a hearing and approved a special permit amendment for an animal-boarding operation at 16 Ellis Road. The amendment, tied to an application from Kate Johnson on the five-acre property, lets the site keep more animals after board members found "no neighbors were present to argue against it." Members discussed adding donkeys but worried the animals "can be very loud," and explicitly ruled out pigs on the property. The board also continued a three-year rewrite of the town's zoning bylaw covering mixed-use and open-space development standards, and separately discussed unresolved enforcement questions around food trucks, including a prior case involving a vendor named George Chenier, with one member asking "how do you enforce it?" of unpermitted operators.

In the full story:

• Public Hearing: Special Permit Amendment, 16 Ellis Road
• Zoning Bylaw Rewrite: Open Space Development and Mixed-Use Provisions
• Food Truck Zoning: Enforcement Questions
• Who Was There
• Organizations And Documents Referenced
• The complete report: 1,632 words

Source: the Planning Board meeting of October 21, 2026, reported from the official video recording and transcript.

Checked against the record: before publication this article was automatically compared with the meeting transcript.