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ATTLEBORO - The city council narrowly approved a rezoning over neighborhood objection Tuesday that will allow a residential section of North Main Street to be used for businesses in a vote two councilors called one of the toughest they ever took.

Councilors Bill Bowles and Brian Kirby said they had difficulty supporting the rezoning because neighbors in the area near Holden Street were overwhelmingly against it. However, the councilors thought it best for the city as a whole.

For Kirby, the vote was extra tough because he lives in the neighborhood. He could could have cast the decisive no vote, but hesitated and then voted for the rezoning.

He said later he was undecided right up to the last minute.

"I started off with the neighbors. That's my neighborhood," he said during the debate a the council meeting at city hall. He said he liked the idea of preserving an old home at 204 North Main St., which the developer has agreed to do, but was also troubled by the way the preservation would be accomplished through a deed restriction.

On the other hand, he said, the deed restriction is a way of "thinking out of the box" to accomplish a goal.

In addition to neighborhood opposition, the planning board had voted 8-0 to recommend against the rezoning.

Neighbors were displeased by the outcome.

"I'm disappointed," Tom Garvey of Upland Road said after the vote. "The neighbors don't want a business."

Garvey said there is a concern that the rezoning will lead to more business encroachment into the neighborhood.

The vote was actually overwhelmingly in favor of the rezoning, 9-2. However, nine votes was the minimum the measure needed for approval because it was a rezoning with abutters filing legal objections, requiring three-fourths of the council to vote in the affirmative, Council President Frank Cook said.

Cook and zoning committee Chairman Bill Bergevine were the dissenting votes.

Cook, who represents the neighborhood as the Ward 3 councilor, said he sees his job as representing the views of constituents and the constituents were against the rezoning, he said in explaining his vote.

"I don't like it when elected officials ignore the will of the people," he said. But, most councilors said the plan by Orion Realty to maintain the house at 204 North Main St. and turn it into a business was a good one for the city as whole.

Councilor Peter Blais said the deed restriction will protect the neighborhood for 199 years while maintaining the home will help preserve the beautification of one of the city's "gateway" roads entering Attleboro.

"All it takes is for the 11 of us to show enough backbone and not worry about personal agendas," he said.

Councilor Kim Allard, who is nursing a foot injury, came to the council meeting just long enough to vote on the rezoning.

She said Attleboro is sometimes accused of not being business friendly and the rezoning is one way to promote a local business.