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Present: Bill Barry, Matthew Bronski, Marilyn Fenollosa, Allan Galper, Jack Glassman, David Hart, Pamela Hawkes, John Hecker, Susan Hollister, David Kelman, David King, Doug Manley, Henry Moss, Elizabeth Randall, Stephanie Reinert, Roberto Rosso, Susan Schur, Regan Shield, Malcolm Smiley, and Sara Wermiel 1. Heritage at Risk on the Gulf Coast: The committee discussed John Wathne's suggestion that where entire New Orleans neighborhoods would be cleared except for a few stranded historic houses, those isolated buildings might be moved and reassembled with others to create a more coherent ensemble. Bill Barry noted that this suggestion could demonstrate the flexibility of the Secretary of the Interior's Standards as the historic resource is in some sense the lost neighborhood context for individual buildings and some sense of that context could be reestablished as a valid response to Katrina. Bill said that Patty Gaye of the Preservation Resource Center of New Orleans called this a "marvelous idea." David Hart noted that in areas where topography made the replacement of buildings a sustainable proposition, infill could create a good mixed community around these individuated survivors, but there could also be a scale problem. Bill Barry said that flood insurance requires that buildings be raised up to about 3' above ground level and that many historic structures in low areas were built that way in the first place. Sara Wermiel observed that "moving buildings around" is a very American response to growth and change in cities and towns. 2. Technology & Conservation Brick Conference: Susan Schur said that over 200 people came to the recent conference and that evaluation forms were very positive. Jack Glassman said that he found the conference well run and comprehensive in its scope, as it embraced both historic brick architecture and very contemporary approaches to an ancient unit of construction. Others noted that the mix of theory, case histories, and talks by craftspeople, manufacturers, and conservators kept the Brick Conference alive for a weekend of indoor activity, while tours enlivened the following Monday. A couple of people were disturbed that not all the sessions were about historic brickwork. 3. Japan House Tour: Professor William Coaldrake who teaches architectural history at Harvard is a specialist in Japanese carpenters' guild structures, trade practices, and the detailed history of their construction techniques. Over twenty years ago, he helped a firm of Japanese carpenters that specialize in historic techniques build a transplanted house at the Boston Childrens Museum. Professor Coaldrake took a dozen of our committee members and their friends to the Japan House after hours and introduced us to ways of seeing that are consistent with the spaces and materials of the house from the point of view of its builders and successive inhabitants (through 1976). The entire design continuum of room proportions, views and spatial relations among objects was transformed as soon as we became members of a floor-sitting-culture. When he is not teaching, Professor Coaldrake's research involves cracking written codes (in historic Japanese scripts) that concealed the trade secrets of family firms of carpenters. Go to the Childrens Museum. Find the Japan House. Enter, remove your shoes, sit down and look. Try to go upstairs… 4. Archdiocese of Boston, Property Disposition: Marilyn Fenollosa (great niece by marriage of Ernst Fenollosa, author of Essay on the Chinese Written Character) survived the floor-seated culture of the Japan House and attended our next meeting, where she was the center of attention. Marilyn has worked for the past several years with others concerned about the disposition of Archdiocesan churches that were closed in suppressed parishes- along with their associated parochial schools, convents, and other historic properties- because they hope to protect their historic architecture. Marilyn started by noting that the "disease of closure" is contagious. New York State is shutting down 32 churches. Springfield is starting to propose closures. She compared the response of suppressed parishioners to the closure of their churches as following the Elizabeth Kubler-Ross stages of adjustment to death, a process of grieving that begins with denial, then anger…and on to final acceptance in an emotional state of resignation. Out of 10 million Massachusetts Catholics, only about 300,000 attend Mass. The activity of churches is measured according to the "Sacramental Index," a metric composed of the annual number of marriages, baptisms, and funerals in a church. The magnitude of the demographic shift is undeniable. There are few new priests. The average age of priests is already "old" and climbing. The costs of salaries and benefits are also climbing. Competent building engineers surveyed Church property and estimated an accumulated $300 million of deferred maintenance and major repairs. The damages awarded for sexual abuse cases is significant enough to provide new public relations leverage for the Archdiocese's case that some parishes must be discontinued and their property converted to real estate. In 2002, parishes in 144 communities had $160 million worth of land and buildings not used by the Church. Marilyn explained that five subunits of the Archdiocese (Vicariates) met to represent eighty-two parish clusters and recommend which churches should close and which should remain open. More than 25% recommended that there be no church closures. Their recommendations went through regional Bishops, then a central committee of lay people and clergy, to finally reach Bishop O'Malley. This process considered the sacramental index, ethnic cohesion within the parishes, and financial viability. They did not include architectural quality or historic significance among their criteria. Bishop O'Malley announced closure plans in January 2004. The Church leadership is centralized. All decisions come from the Chancery in Brighton. The Church is the exclusive owner of property. This is an interesting fact (or declaration) as dioceses in Tucson, Portland and Spokane have filed for bankruptcy and insisted that they do not own property, in order to protect parish churches from the claims of creditors. The Vatican has said that the parish priest must approve any church sale. There have been parish appeals (in Boston about ten), and all were denied in January of 2006, but several congregations have pressed their claim to higher courts in Rome. Cardinal O'Malley decided to leave these parishes intact and their churches open until their appeals are settled. There have also been lawsuits, vigils and occupied churches. Churches in Everett, Sudbury and Weymouth were occupied. Weymouth and Scituate have gone to court claiming that the congregations own the property and that the Archdiocese has only held it in trust. The Weymouth case was thrown out. The Scituate case is still in litigation, in part because of a clouded title. In West Concord there was a local landmarking, the endangered church was designated as a historic district consisting of a single property. In Lowell, historic district boundaries were shifted to include threatened churches. Watertown created a Zoning Overlay District to permit housing and commercial uses but save parochial school buildings. Other localities moved to tax the vacant church properties in their communities to maintain pressure on the Church to keep buildings active. Marilyn is part of the Preservation Coalition, a group of eighteen local and national preservation organizations in Massachusetts that meets monthly to track Archdiocesan policies and decisions, guide new congregations that purchase closed churches, and generally work as advocates for a preservation component in the disposition process. It is daunting, slow work. In Februray 2004, the MHC commissioned a survey of Archdiocesan properties. This was prior to the Church's announcement that listed churches to be closed. Before this, St. Joseph's Parish in Roxbury had been suppressed, its early 19th century church closed--then demolished. The Boston Preservation Alliance, Historic Boston Incorporated, and the Boston Landmarks Commission had tried to protect this important church. The Mayor was unhappy at this loss and about the treatment of the parish. MHC has surveyed 143 communities. The Preservation Coalition published a Toolkit for Affected Parishes. This collection of papers and guidelines covered such topics as Reuse Opportunities, Marketing Tips, Maintenance and Condition Assessment guides, and suggestions for fund-raising. The Coalition has organized workshops and charrettes at conferences at the BU School of Theology, the MHC Statewide Conference, and in Lowell, where the Lowell Historic Board was grappling with five church closures. (Lawrence, always worse off, had six.) It is tough to convert churches for other uses without their losing architectural integrity. Marilyn used St. Adens in Brookline as an example of a church that could be converted to housing with new, enlarged dormers, but still read as a "church." St. Adens is still in litigation. On the St. Aden's site there is enough land and there are enough non-religious buildings to meet the Archdiocese's financial target without including the church. The planning office in Brookline made it possible to convert the property to 40B housing through a special permitting process. The process has been punishingly slow, and while it crept along; the Archdiocese simply demolished another Brookline church anyway. Only the preservation community was willing to help the lost parish of St. Adens. Marilyn noted firmly that there is no sense in trying to become involved in the Church's politics. Although housing is the prevalent form of reuse, there have been institutional buyers from Northeastern, Tufts, and in Waltham, Salem and Quincy. Marilyn sighed, looked back and concluded:
Featuring Vance Freymann and Jack Gold, "The Providence Preservation Society" 8: 00 a.m., Thursday, May11, 2006 The Architects' Building 52 Broad Street, 5th floor, Boston, Massachusetts
Henry Moss, Matthew Bronski, and Sara Wermiel co-leaders and scribes
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