[Massplanners] Registering Site Plan Review and Special Permit at Registry of Deeds?

[Star Atkeson]

Dear Planners,

We have always stamped the bottom of our Special Permits with "No permit is active until filed at the registry of deeds with certificate of no appeal."
We are amending a business's Site Plan review, and we had not written on the original that it must be registered at the registry of deeds, back in 2015- and are noticing that a few old Site Plan Reviews are missing this. In our zooming bylaws and PB Rules and Regs, it does not say a Special Permit or Site Plan review must be registered at the registry of deeds. It only shows up in our Site Plan review flow chart which was most likely copied from another town, and assumed a building permit was needed.

It has been hard to enforce businesses to register at the registry of deeds.

Are Site Plan Reviews or Special permits only to be registered at the registry of deeds if they are seeking a building permit?
We have a Site Plan review coming up for a diner, and the applicant is a renter. There won't be a building permit. In the past we would have asked him to register at the registry. Is this unnecessary?

Thank you!
Star Atkeson 
Secretary to Boards, Charlemont