I’m Gregory Guertin, Smithfield’s new director of community planning and economic development. My work lives where land use, housing, streets, infrastructure, and local business meet. I began my professional career here, carried it across southern New England, and came home to raise my family in this community.

This column will look at how places such as ours grow and adapt. It will be plainspoken, practical, and regional in scope. Smithfield will often appear because it is close at hand, but the lessons will be relevant to our neighbors.

A word about ground rules: Planning does not sit outside the law. The topics I cover will sit within the bounds of Rhode Island general laws, the town charter, and locally adopted ordinances and plans. Where rules are strict, I will say so. Where they l

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