Jeffrey Kemp addresses the City Council on Wednesday night about an attempt to save two houses he backed for demolition.
NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — Residents in the lower Houghton Street area expressed their frustration Wednesday over plans to save a pair historic rowhouses.
"We've looked at those buildings long enough," Linda Snow, who has lived behind them since the 1960s, told the City Council. "They should have came down 30 years ago."
Snow was one of more than a dozen people who attended Wednesday's council meeting (held a day later than usual because of Tuesday's primary) to demand the city take care of the problem buildings.
The matter had been placed on the agenda by Councilor Keith Bona, a North Street resident who raised concerns at an earlier meeting about the demolition stay made by the Historical Commission at its August meeting.
Residents were upset over what they saw as backtracking after the commission approved in April the razing of the five buildings owned by Romeo estate along Houghton Street.
Jeffrey Kemp of North Street, a member of the North Adams Historical Society, had made a presentation to the commission at that meeting detailing his reasoning on why the buildings should come down and was dismayed that he hadn't been invited to the August meeting.
Historical Commission Chairwoman Justyna Carlson said the meeting in August, like that in April, had been publicly posted.
"There was no intention to hide the meeting or its intent," she said. "[The agenda] clearly says 'revisiting the demolition of the mill houses on Houghton.'"
She told the council that two critical events had brought about the delay: Finally getting in touch with a representative of the estate after more than a year of effort and the determinations by two experienced carpenters that two of the buildings were in good structural shape and could be saved.
The demolition approval wasn't revoked but postponed for one year, as allowed, to attempt to save the properties, Carlson said. "If a viable project is not found in a year, they will all be demolished."
Members of the commission and historical society plan to create a nonprofit 501(c)3 organization to acquire the property at a nominal fee and raise funds to restore two of the buildings to their original 1840-50 conditions.
The corner store at Liberty and Houghton is expected to be demolished in the next few months by the estate. The most northward building will be demolished and its salvageable parts stored in the third building, which will be torn down once the first two buildings are restored.
The commission says there will be no water, sewer or heat in the buildings; an electric security system would have be installed and possibly historically appropriate exterior gas lighting.
"I proposed the demolition order in the April meeting," said Commissioner Alan Horbal. "It bothered me about those houses because they were on the ... maps from the 1870s."
He asked the council and residents to imagine what they might look like once cleaned up and refurbished.
"We would have two nice buildings with brick sidewalks and maybe gas lighting," he said. "But it takes time and it takes patience and we can't go on the property."
Once the nonprofit is filed, he said, "we can solicit donations to downgrade the buildings."
The structures would essentially be monuments to a time past, the last existing homes of early Industrial Revolution workers who toiled in the nearby mills. Like the 1753 House replica in Williamstown, the Adams Quaker Meeting House in Adams or the Fitch-Hoose House in Dalton — also the last of its kind — the buildings would be museums with limited use.
John Lipa, who's lived near the houses for more than 60 years, said it's not just the structures but the whole area that is blighted. The city doesn't have the resources to maintain the land where it's torn down properties.
"Even if you make the best museum in the world it has to have a good entrance. ... This entrance sucks," he said.
Firefighter Michael Goodson, who bought his house on Liberty Street eight years, said he's had a front-row seat watching the junkies and rodents going in and out of the deteriorating buildings: "It's a constant eyesore now."
Councilor Nancy Bullett again noted the easy access into the structures. One door isn't even on, but propped up.
A nonprofit will be established to acquire and raise funds for the rowhouses.
"It's imperative we don't let 24 hours go by without securing that property," said Councilor Wayne Wilkinson, asking Mayor Richard Alcombright to secure the buildings and send the bill to the estate.
The mayor wondered why the City Council was holding the discussion.
"We are talking about properties that are not in this round of demolition anyway," he said. "What is the council's intent?"
President Lisa Blackmer said she was under the impression that the council had wanted information from the Historical Commission and then would refer it to committee.
"They can do what they want. I do know when we've dealt with this before, if the Historical Commission defers the demolition, we cannot use CBDG funds. Correct?" she asked the mayor.
Alcombright said, yes, the city would have to use funds other than Community Development Block Grant funding. The city had taken the buildings out of this year's list because the estate had shown a willingness to shoulder the demolition costs, estimated at $70,000 to $100,000.
Bona said he wanted to bring the discussion to the full council. "We have dozens of homes, some with for-sale signs, who are dependent on what will happen to these," he said.
Councilor Eric Buddington thought the discussion a legitimate way to get informed; Councilor Jennifer Breen noted the number of residents in the audience whose voices should be heard.
The mayor agreed that the buildings were troublesome but also thought the Historical Commission should be supported in its efforts to save a piece of city history. While there's no deadline, the preservation group won't have long to work on it, he said.
"They will either fix it or it will come down in the next grant round," said the mayor.
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Jeffrey Kemp addresses the City Council on Wednesday night about an attempt to save two houses he backed for demolition.
A nonprofit will be established to acquire and raise funds for the rowhouses.
