Vote to establish the Benjamin Lynde House Local Historic District

Transcript (~7 min @ 1:38:48)

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▶ 1:38:33 Speaker 1: Councilor Chen? Yes. Councilor Finocchiaro? Yes. Councilor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councilor Karamcheti? Yes. Councilor Kowal? Yes. Councilor Bremsky? Yes. Councilor Park? Yes. Councilor Romanul? Yes. Councilor Vandiver? Yes. Councilor Williams? Yes. President Freeman? Yes. That motion passes. ID number 2026-1291, vote to establish the Benjamin Lynn House local historic district.

▶ 1:39:03 Devin Romanul: This came out of ANO? Yes. It did come out of ANO. Okay. All right. My apologies. Sometimes they come from elsewhere.

▶ 1:39:09 Speaker 6: I think it was the night that you were in.

▶ 1:39:10 Devin Romanul: Right. All right. Memory getting the better of me. Mr. President, this comes to us from the Appropriations and Oversight Committee with a recommendation for passage, and at this time I'll make a motion for passage. Second.

▶ 1:39:19 Speaker 4: Motion of passage made by Councilor Romanul, seconded by Councilor Vandiver. On discussion, I have Councilor Park. Yes. Thank you. When this initially came up, my concern, for the record, I did not approve of this simply because I saw this parcel of land as, ironically enough, as something that would be very beneficial to multi-family housing, specifically affordable housing. And at the same token, while we're trying to build up and support affordable housing, I wanted to make sure that this opportunity was available for any sort of lots that could potentially support this sort of endeavor. The answer wasn't clear to me at that point, whether this could in fact be supported if we deeded this as a local historic district. But in fact, you can build multi-family housing, including affordable housing, provided that the project complies with the zoning laws, and now the strict compliance guidelines set by the Historic District Commission. So, whether a developer chooses that path will be up to them. I will fully support that. But as a result, I am going to approve this. That's all. Councilor Chen?

▶ 1:40:39 Jason Chen: Thank you. I came in supporting this, but am now concerned that the historic district will have too much power and be too restrictive and use that as a NIMBY argument to prevent housing from coming in, and I'm wondering what power the council has to stop that. I liked the design, for example, that had a new building with a number of units and then moved the Benjamin Lynn House to the corner and incorporated new and old, and I'm just not sure if the historic district would allow something like that, and they would use a number of historic preservation arguments to prevent it, and I'm wondering how we would stop that. I guess I don't want the historic district to get too powerful in the cases of adding real housing, even if it is zoned for multi-family. I'm not comfortable with the limits of this.

▶ 1:41:31 Speaker 4: Councilor Williams, followed by Councilor Vandiver.

▶ 1:41:34 Ryan Williams: Thank you. I would put as exhibit A through the chair, the building across the street from us, which is under Historic District Commission, or was under Historic District Commission jurisdiction, and went through a very lengthy discussion process and wound up being razed and having a multi-family building put up in its place. So the Historic District Commission is the beginning of a conversation with property owners and developers about the historic significance and importance of their parcel, and it's like the demo delay ordinance, a tool in the toolbox. It just sort of indicates that we think that that house has a special historic significance. It does not prevent a developer from building something on the site if they abide by all the rules and wait out the timelines, as we saw across the street with us. So, I don't think that we need to worry too much about the Historic District Commission's power. And also, we as a council vote for the Historic District Commission members when they come before us, and so we can ask them clearly for their opinions on this matter, and if we don't like the answers that they give, we can vote no on them.

▶ 1:42:45 Speaker 4: Councilor Vandiver?

▶ 1:42:47 Speaker 6: Yeah. I

▶ 1:42:50 Kimberly Vandiver: appreciate those comments, through the chair. It's Main Street, it's close to downtown, and we have a housing crisis, so I I appreciate those comments, and that in a way that is respectful of the neighborhood and the local context, I would love to see housing there. At some point during this past process, I know Rob Tellis from the Historic District Commission put forward a plan for 13 units on the three properties that would've been in a historical vein. It would kind of keep the Benjamin Lynde House at the center and put some sort of outlying properties in the way that multiple farm-related dwellings or outbuildings might have been. But that would actually be housing, and it would hide the parking behind, and he had some creative ideas about that. So, I think I would love to see something where everybody is coming to the table, including the Historic District Commission, and saying, "What do we need and what do we not need?" But there's a real tension there. We have downtown, we have the Historic District Commission, puts real restrictions on businesses on what they can do for signage and how they can operate. But it also makes downtown have a quaint feel. So, I don't know. I don't have an answer to those tensions. But I know there's also a lot of support in the neighborhood, it isn't in my district, for this specific house and property and its history. So, I'm going to give that group of the Historic Commission the benefit of the doubt that they will proceed in good faith and towards preserving the house and not solely towards preventing change.

▶ 1:44:36 Speaker 4: Councillor Finocchiaro.

▶ 1:44:37 Cal Finocchiaro: Thank you. Again, I appreciate the conversation we're having around the table. I too obviously support more housing in the community. I think, like I've said this before, I think we're doing a good job in Melrose of putting up a lot of housing around. I just think that this house is very different than even potentially the building that went up across City Hall. Is, for our purposes in Melrose, a historical figure. And I think that it's also a beautiful house. And we're not looking to make every single old home a historic district. I think this one is just special. So, we're not looking to thwart housing from happening, but I think it's gotten this far. This house, obviously the people, like someone like Lori Massa, who's in the Planning Department, supports this, and I know she's very supportive of housing, so I don't think someone like that would do anything to prevent that from happening. So anyways, obviously you know I support this. I just gave my two cents.

▶ 1:45:46 Speaker 4: Thank you. Any further discussion on the motion on the floor? Seeing none, Madam Clerk.

▶ 1:45:52 Speaker 1: Okay. Councillor Chen? Yes. Councillor Finocchiaro? Yes. Councillor Jamaleddine? Yes. Councillor Karamcheti? Yes. Councillor Kowal? Yes. Councillor Bremsky? Yes. Councillor Park? Yes. Councillor Romanul? Yes. Councillor Vandiver? Yes. Councillor Williams? Yes. President Freeman? Yes. That motion passes.