AMHERST — Revisions to the town’s zoning bylaws should make it easier for restaurants, bars and nightclubs to operate in Amherst, according to municipal planners.

The Town Council on Monday approved a series of changes to sections of the bylaws on Dec. 22 following an extended review by the town’s Planning Department of best practices and favorable recommendations from the Planning Board and the Community Resources Committee.

“This is something to help businesses stay in business, expand, and to help attract businesses to Amherst,” Senior Planner Nate Malloy told councilors at its Dec. 12 meeting.

The idea of the first adjustments to the food and drink establishments rules in about 20 years is to make the process of permitting easier for staff, applicants and town boards and committees.

Malloy said the town drew lessons from what is happening on the ground, including during the pandemic when many restaurants and cafes turned to outdoor dining options, and special permit conditions set over the years by the Zoning Board of Appeals.

Only the zoning districts in downtown and village centers where businesses can locate will be affected by the changes.

A major adjustment comes to Article 3, the use regulations chart, where categories are being reclassified and renamed.

There, food and drink establishments will no longer be divided into three categories, Class I, a restaurant and cafe closing before 11:30 p.m., Class II, a restaurant or bar open until after 11:30 p.m. and Class III, a drive-up restaurant.

They will instead be reclassified into four categories, with those considered having the most impact requiring a special permit, and others a site plan review. Restaurants, cafes and bars with food will be handled under site plan review, with the other three categories — bar with no food, nightclub and establishment with more than 200 patrons — requiring a special permit.

District 4 Councilor Pam Rooney, who serves on the Community Resources Committee, told her colleagues she was worried that abutter notifications are being eliminated. But the Board of License Commissioners will hold hearings and notify abutters when there is a change of operation and any change in the service of alcohol.

“I am pretty comfortable that the Board of License Commissioners, as well as special permits for many of these uses, will be a safeguard that we need,” Rooney said.

Malloy said the changes are seen as being friendly to businesses, with some owners worried that a special permit requirement comes with a risk of having an application denied, rather than a use that is allowed by right.

Other changes will allow outdoor dining to be done year-round, rather than just seasonally, at the option of a business, and that live and prerecorded music can be an allowed accessory use, based on permission from the building commissioner.

Aspects of this are taken from Article 14, an emergency temporary zoning order put in place in Amherst that allowed for administrative approval, by the building commissioner, of business operations.

Among permits issued through that emergency article were for The Drake, the downtown performance venue, the expansion of The Spoke bar, and the opening of Garcia’s and Mexcalito restaurants.

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