Historic Commissions Form Ad Hoc Committee To Preserve Historic Houses On West Side Of North Pleasant Street

Report On The Meeting Of The Local Historic District Commission (June 14, 2021)

The meeting was held via Zoom and was recorded.

Present
Commissioners: Jennifer Taub (Chair), Peggy Schwartz, Karin Winter, Bruce Coldham, Greta Wilcox, Jim Lumley

Staff: Ben Breger (Planning Department) 

The Local Historic District Commission (LHDC) approved a Certificate of Appropriateness for a garage extension at 60 Fearing Street with the condition that the final design of the doors be brought back to it for approval. In the best of times, the Commission would have continued the hearing, but these times are not the best given the State requirement that all meetings beginning June 15 be “in person.” (Note: this provision was reversed on June 16. ). Across the State there has been much more public participation with Zoom meetings and committees have had a much easier time achieving a quorum.

Historical Commission members Hetty Startup and Pat Auth attended the meeting as an Ad Hoc subcommittee  (less than a quorum of the Historical Commission under the Open Meeting Law) to ask if the Local Historic District Commission is interested in working with them on preserving the historic houses on the west side of North Pleasant Street in the Limited Business District, that are now under assault by members of the Town Council who are pushing for much greater density in downtown Amherst. Startup and Auth asked the LHDC if they can work together to preserve and protect not only the historic houses but also the remaining historic streetscape along the west side of Kendrick Park. (see article by Suzannah Muspratt)

Taub noted that those houses had been included in the study for the Lincoln-Sunset Historic District, so much of the research has already been done. Auth has also been studying the history of the properties on the Massachusetts Cultural Resource Information System (MACRIS) inventory, the State’s list of critical historic structures. Lumley, speaking as the representative of the real estate profession on the LHDC said that all of the houses from Cowls Lane to the north end of Kendrick Park need to be preserved. This sentiment was seconded by Coldham, the architect representative.

Members of the Local Historic District Commission passed a resolution that two of its members will join two members of the Historical Commission to form an ad hoc subcommittee to accomplish this task. The two chairs will send a letter to the Town Council and the Town Manager informing them of their resolve.