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Date: 3/30/2022
AMHERST – The Amherst Town Council approved over $2.3 million for various projects recommended by the Community Preservation Act (CPA) Committee in its meeting on March 21.
The council quickly approved most of the funding recommended by the CPA, including pickleball courts, trail improvements and $750,000 combined toward transitional and affordable housing. The bulk of the CPA portion in the meeting, however, focused on separating two houses applying for repair funds under the historic preservation classification from the rest of the applicants.
The Conkey-Stevens House and Alice Maude Hills House (Amherst Women’s Club) both raised concerns from council members as privately owned buildings. Supporting those would force a restriction on Amherst to maintain historical elements of the houses for years to come.
The council decided to take individual votes on the properties, with Amherst Women’s Club gaining unanimous support. Finalizing a decision on the Conkey-Stevens needed deliberation.
“One of the issues the Finance Committee had was a historical restriction means that if the building were sold, there’s an obligation to keep up the exterior that was just repaired … the same house could come back for repairs later,” said Cathy Schoen, vice-chair of the Finance Committee and District 1 counselor. “I am totally supportive of the Women’s Club, but when it comes to a private home owned by a private condominium association with the assessed value of nearly $1 million, we would be enhancing the value of this property but we don’t have public access. I think it’s not a good precedent.”
Though the Amherst Women’s Club is also privately owned, it is a nonprofit and Schoen said she knows they are very open to the public and provide a public service which makes it more appropriate for CPA funding.
Other councilors saw the Conkey-Stevens home as a gem of Amherst and didn’t want to give the impression to prospective applicants as though CPA funds were exclusively for public establishments.
Town Council Vice President Ana Devlin Gauthier said she had formerly been a member of the CPA Committee and wanted to avoid dissuading any private entity from applying for CPA assistance.
“CPA is not just there for town projects coming from Town Hall,” Gauthier said. “It’s intended for the community at large. Limiting our support limits who’s able to own these properties to folks who can fully fund them out of their own pockets and that severely limits ownership. They’ve already spent $35k on the understory of the porch and $44k on other upgrades. They’re putting money into this too; they’ve just hit their max and they need our support. This is one of the things CPA is here to do.”
The counsel considered reducing the $240,000 requested to a more palatable figure. Gauthier explained that the committee had already minimized the number, and at this point, the house was essentially all-or-nothing. She outlined the necessary requests and helped to recruit at least one other counselor.
“Initially, I was considering supporting the amendment just because I didn’t want to lose any appropriation to the Conkey-Stevens House” said District 3 Councilor Jennifer Taub. “I was really impressed to see that the Homeowners Association has already contributed $150k when Ana went through the figures. I’m persuaded that if we are going to support it, support it at a level where they can do the work that needs to be done.”
The repairs detailed by Laliberte Builders include an estimated $60,000 to 120,000 for replacement windows and window dormers alone. The vote ultimately passed in favor of granting the Conkey-Stevens House the amount in full, with the only votes against coming from Schoen and Ellisha Walker.