Last week, Mayor Michelle Wu and the City of Boston Community Preservation Committee (CPC) announced their recommendation for the latest Community Preservation Act (CPA) funding round that includes funding for three East Boston projects.
With 52 projects totaling $27 million recommended for funding this round, Wu recommended Eastie receive approximately $317,000 for historic preservation and open space and recreation in the neighborhood.
“The Community Preservation Act helps us invest in our communities by empowering residents and local organizations to put funding to important priorities across our neighborhoods,” said Mayor Wu. “I am grateful to the Community Preservation Committee and all of the applicants for their commitment to expanding affordable housing, historic preservation and open space and recreation to benefit Bostonians across our city.”
If approved by the City Council, the three projects in Eastie that will be funded through CPA money will be the East Boston Bennington Street Cemetery, the Nantucket Lightship LV-112 and the 6 Chelsea Terrace Secret Garden.
Two of the projects, the East Boston Bennington Street Cemetery and the Nantucket Lightship LV-112 fall under the category of historic preservation CPA funding.
Wu recommended the Bennington Street Cemetery receive East Boston $67,000 to repair and repoint the historic cemetery’s cobblestone wall and fencing.
The Bennington Street Cemetery is one of the earliest planned open spaces in Eastie. Founded in 1838, its physical layout and gravemarkers reflect the growth and diversity that has characterized the neighborhood. The landfill projects of the 1830s and the shipping-associated industries attracted countless laborers to this area. The gravestones and monuments represent their numbers and ethnic backgrounds. Immigrant groups represented here were from Germany, Norway, Ireland, England, Scotland, and New Brunswick. One of the exceptional features of this cemetery is the number of epitaphs inscribed in a foreign language. For example, of the remaining legible stones, eleven have inscriptions written in German. In addition to detailing the growth of the immigrant community, the markers also recount the process of nation-building and the role East Bostonians played in it. Local participation in the Civil War is illustrated by the thirty-seven marble markers commemorating members of the Massachusetts Infantry, Navy, Cavalry, and Artillery. In addition, there is one free-standing G.A.R. Post 23 monument and two headstones commemorating World War I veterans.
Under historic preservation Wu also recommended the Nantucket Lightship LV-112 receive $250,000 to repair interior elements of the historic 1936 lightship critical to the museum vessel’s structural integrity.
Over the course of the pandemic the Nantucket underwent extensive repairs at the historic Fitzgerald Shipyard in Chelsea. After the comprehensive structural restoration the ship was retired to its home at the Boston Harbor Shipyard and Marina on Marginal Street in Eastie in 2021.
Restoration on the ship was inside the bow section and included rebuilding the anchor manger, the forward port and starboard ballast tanks, bulkheads, hull frames, lower forward floor frames, and various other structural sections throughout the ship including the mooring capstan on the bow weather deck. Also, more than a dozen sea-valves from the auxiliary engine room sea-chest were completely rebuilt, in addition to valves and piping associated with the ship trim and bilge pumping system.
It is estimated that approximately $2.3 million will be needed to virtually complete LV-112’s restoration and preservation.
Under the category of open space and recreation Wu recommended that $225,000 go to Eastie Farm’s 6 Chelsea Terrace Secret Garden project. The project will create recreational space, fund critical improvements to a blighted lot and make the space a functional community garden with seating and a public path.
Last year Eastie Farm received $332,400 in Grassroots and CPA funding that was spread across the farm’s sites on Summer Street and Meridian Street. The money was also used to expand the farm as part of a recent land conveyance on Chelsea Terrace from the City of Boston’s Grassroots Program.
The expansion to 6 Chelsea Terrace will also create a community gathering space and a geothermal greenhouse for growing food and engaging school children in experiential learning.
“With appreciation to the CPA staff, the Boston CPC is pleased to recommend 52 projects to Mayor Wu for funding consideration by the City Council under the leadership of Michael Flaherty, Council Committee Chair,” said Felicia Jacques, Chair of Community Preservation Committee. “This recommendation fully commits over 50% of funds to housing with the remaining funds supporting 42 historic preservation and open space projects. These projects address a variety of uses and a bounty of worthy community projects spanning the city in virtually every neighborhood.”
The CPA’s Community Preservation Fund was created following voters’ passage and adoption of the Community Preservation Act in November 2016. It is funded by a 1 percent property tax-based surcharge on residential and business property tax bills, which took effect in July 2017, and an annual state funding from the Massachusetts Community Preservation Trust Fund. The Mayor and Community Preservation Committee recommend funding use and the City Council must vote to approve.