Help us reach out to new members and park users and socialize with other FBH members who care about the Reservation. Save the date for the next Outreach Committee meeting, Monday, August 25, 6:30 pm in Milton. To RSVP and for location: info@FriendsoftheBlueHills.org or 781-828-1805.
You can help out before the next meeting by passing out literature at farmers markets or at the Reservation itself. We're looking for helpers Saturday, August 9.
We look forward to seeing you!
The Blue Hills offers great hiking, swimming – and photo opportunities! Submit your best shots to our ‘Preserve the Beauty’ Photo Contest between now and September 15 for a chance to win a cash prize and help us celebrate our very own natural treasure.
Cash prize awarded to youth (18 and under) and adults (19 and above).
For details and an entry form, click here.
Secretary Ian Bowles has responded to Lantana function hall’s proposal to bulldoze 3 acres of Blue Hills Reservation to construct a parking lot. (To see the Secretary’s letter, click here.)
We were pleased that the Secretary requires Lantana to update its woefully outdated appraisal of the prime wooded parkland that this private developer intends to destroy for a parking lot. A fair market appraisal will demonstrate how Lantana is proposing a raw deal for all of us in the Commonwealth. Lantana is trying to purchase this property for less than 1/4 of its estimated value. We have written the Department of Conservation and Recreation to insist that DCR require an appraisal that will show the true value of this property.
We were disappointed that the Secretary accepted Lantana’s DEIR, even though the proponent demonstrated no public purpose, failed to consider obvious alternatives and restricted the analysis of alternatives so that they appear to be impractical. Although over 100 people and organizations submitted comments in response to Lantana’s DEIR, the Secretary is not requiring Lantana to address the concerns raised in these letters.
We look forward to working with all of you to make sure Lantana function hall is not allowed to swap almost nothing for over three acres of prime wooded Reservation land.
FBH member Robert Mussey posted this gorgeous shot of sunlit morning mist, from a forest in the Milton part of the Blue Hills Reservation:
This is just one of many excellent images photographers have contributed to our Flickr group. Got a camera? Join in! Also, stay tuned for details about our annual photo contest!
The Ponkapoag Golf Course In the Blue Hills Reservation has been making the news lately as the state legislature worked to get out the budget for the new fiscal year which started on July 1. A proposed provision in the budget to lease out the golf course to either the Town of Canton or a private operator was holding up progress as reported in the following news articles:
"Site plan is dismissed as par for the course"
Boston Globe, June 16
“In the rough at Ponkapoag”
Boston Globe, June 18
“State shouldn’t take a swing at Ponkapoag Course”
Boston Globe, June 23
“Budget hangs on golf course plans”
Boston Globe, July 2
The state budget finally passed three days late and the Boston Globe reported the results on July 4 stating that, “The budget also includes a provision to lease Ponkapoag Golf Course in Canton, a storied state-owned course that has fallen into disrepair while under management of the Department of Conservation and Recreation. Under the plan, the state would lease the course to an outside manager. Town officials in Canton will first be given at least 180 days to decide whether they want to take the course over.”
The provision in the state budget is Section 103 on page 257. It states that the Division of Capital Asset Management and Maintenance may, on behalf of and in consultation with the Department of Conservation and Recreation, lease the golf course to an operator for up to twenty-five years. There are provisions that the operator would have to complete the necessary repairs to the course and maintain it as a 36-hole course.
The key word in the tax bill is “may.” This means that DCR can reject any lease offer until all aspects of the lease are to DCR’s satisfaction. It does not have to accept anything that is not in the best interests of the all users of the golf course and the Reservation.
Another important stipulation is that the operator chosen could not build anything else on the property or use it for any other purposes. This keeps the golf course as it is except for the improvements that will have to be made in order to operate all 36 holes.
One troubling requirement in this section is that the Town of Canton would receive compensation from the lessee for at least the amount it would receive in property taxes if the golf course were taxed as a commercial property. This provision may be a mistake that will be corrected before the budget becomes law because the golf course already makes some payments in lieu of taxes to the Town. Such a provision could also make this lease unprofitable for any prospective bidders. More importantly, FBH is concerned that such a payment sends the message that our parkland is somehow taking away from the value of a town instead of enriching that town and all of our residents and visitors.
The provision to first offer the lease to the Town of Canton also raises questions. What is the point in transferring operation from one government entity to another? Is Canton any more able to manage a golf course than DCR? Ponkapoag Golf Course should remain a regional asset for the benefit of all, not just for the profit of a single municipality.
Also of interest to FBH is the continued use of the walkways and trails through the golf course by the users of the Reservation. The golf course is an integral part of the Reservation and the trail system. It must remain as such. The budget provision makes no mention of this, but FBH and DCR will both work to ensure that this is part of any lease agreement.
The Friends of the Blue Hills hopes that any lease will result in a good deal for both the state and the users of the golf course. Earlier legislative attempts to lease Ponkapoag to the Town of Canton would have greatly benefited that town at the expense of the state and the Reservation. The lease should continue to provide reasonable revenue to DCR, maintain the low cost to the public users, make the necessary improvements to the golf course, and keep its trails and walkways as an integral part of the Reservation.
An easy way for you to support FBH is through our Amazon.com page. Every Amazon.com purchase that starts from the FBH website helps support our organization.
But that page is more than just a link to Amazon, it's also our Recommended Reading list of books related to the natural history of the Blue Hills Reservation and Massachusetts. Are there books you think we've left off the list? Let us know in the comments!
"Real Bostonian" - one of the members of our FBH Flickr Group, has posted a gorgeous panoramic image of Ponkapoag Pond:
This is just one of many excellent images photographers have contributed to the group. Got a camera? Join in! Your photo will be displayed on the front page of our main website.
A post from John B. Sheehan:
“Don’t it always seem to go, that you don’t know what you’ve got
till it’s gone”
Joni Mitchell – Big Yellow Taxi
Since it was established in 1893, the 7000 acre Blue Hills Reservation in Quincy, Milton, Canton, Braintree, Randolph and Dedham has been an Edenic magnet for outdoors lovers---and a juicy target for developers. For the past thirty years, the Friends of the Blue Hills (FBH) has engaged in a perpetual struggle to keep development pressures at bay, fighting governmental and private initiatives that would expose the Reservation to a death by a thousand cuts.
The latest skirmish is a scheme by the Lantana function house in Randolph to pave part of this paradise and put up a parking lot. The preposterous pretext for this proposed land-grab is the safety of Lantana’s patrons, some of whom are allegedly forced to confront the mortal danger of crossing a side street from Lantana’s current parking lot. Lantana argues that the only solution to this Gordian problem is constructing a 378 space parking lot in heavily forested public lands, in the process destroying a decades-old trail and hemming in a rich vernal pool. The issue is currently before Environmental Secretary Ian Bowles, who is reviewing Lantana’s Draft Environmental Impact Report (DEIR) prior to deciding whether the transfer should occur. (Links to this and other relevant documents can be found at http://www.friendsofthebluehills.org/lantana.htm .) The public has until Friday, June 20, 2008 to submit responses to the DEIR to Secretary Bowles, and the protests should be loud and sustained.
Objections to this boondoggle encompass the legal, moral, political and practical. First and foremost, public parks should NEVER be sold off to private business interests except under the most dire of circumstances, something akin to a national emergency. This concept is enshrined in Article 97 of the State Constitution, enacted in 1972 to prevent this very thing from happening. The purpose of Article 97 is to “protect, preserve and enhance” all public parklands. Only if certain rigorous conditions are met (not present here) will a land transfer occur. In fact, Article 97 was first used in the 1970’s to permanently halt the construction of the Southwest Expressway, which would have obliterated the Fowl Meadow and Little Blue section of the Reservation.
The moral and political imperatives are simple: We are the stewards of this planet for future generations. ‘Unforgiveable’ should be the verdict handed down by our grandchildren if we permit irreplaceable forestland to be sold for transitory, private pecuniary interests.
The practical objections are addressed in detail in the FBH’s response to Lantana’s DEIR and can be summarized. Lantana seems to believe that swapping a few parcels of undevelopable land and throwing in some heavy equipment is enough to ‘buy’ a public park at a below-market price. (The valuation Lantana uses is not the highest and best criteria for commercial property, which this would be.) Alternative solutions for the ‘dangerous’ street crossing (bridge, crossing guard, speed bumps, etc.) were rejected as too costly or impractical. Instead, consistent with recent Massachusetts public works projects (see ‘Big Dig’), Lantana has opted for the most complex and expensive (to the public) option. And lastly is the unstated fact that Lantana’s current parking lot parcel would suddenly become buildable—thanks to the new parking lot in the Blue Hills Reservation. Which, it can be surmised, would eventually require expansion to accommodate the new development.
All this because Lantana claims that it fears for its customers’ safety. (If it truly is as dangerous as Lantana says, the town of Randolph might want to consider shutting down Lantana itself as a public nuisance.) I don’t know about you, but I taught my kids to look both ways before they cross the street. Maybe Lantana could tell its patrons the same thing.
