Sarah Scott

Department: Land Use
Email: [email protected]

Biography:

Sarah Scott joined MAPC in 2022 and is the Senior Regional Land Use and Historic Preservation Planner. As part of the Land Use team, she supports communities in shaping land use plans and policies that reflect local values, historic context, and long-term resilience. With a background in historic preservation and municipal planning, she brings an interdisciplinary approach to navigating the complexities of development, regulation, and community engagement. Sarah is particularly interested in how zoning can evolve to support more inclusive, sustainable, and historically sensitive places, and how greater public understanding of planning tools can deepen civic participation.

Before joining MAPC, Sarah was an Associate Zoning Planner for the City of Cambridge, MA. In her time with Cambridge, she developed zoning standards to align with the City’s climate resilience planning, staffed zoning advisory committees for Harvard and Central Square, reviewed major development projects, provided expertise to the Cambridge City Council and the Cambridge Planning Board, and spearheaded several initiatives to encourage greater public understanding of and engagement with the development process. Sarah has also worked with the National Park Service, the State of New Jersey, and the metro Philadelphia regional planning agency. In addition, she has served as an appointed member of the Frenchtown, NJ Planning and Zoning Board of Adjustment, and has volunteered with HistoriCorps to restore historic structures on public lands. She is currently an Alternate Member of the Watertown Planning Board.

Sarah is a graduate of Vassar College, where she majored in American Studies and French and Francophone Studies. She has an MCP with a focus on land use and environmental planning and an MSHP with a focus on preservation policy, both from the University of Pennsylvania. Sarah meets the Secretary of the Interior’s Professional Qualification Standards for Architectural History.

Areas of expertise: municipal zoning, historic preservation, land use policy analysis, sustainable development, equitable community engagement