statler
Senior Member
- Joined
- May 25, 2006
- Messages
- 7,909
- Reaction score
- 498
:?
LinkThe Globe said:Park Service is 1 step closer to creating Heritage Area in state
20 areas awaiting federal approval
By Alan Wirzbicki, Globe Correspondent | July 25, 2006
A National Park Service advisory panel will recommend today that the agency be given the power to designate National Heritage Areas without congressional approval, a move that could give the green light to long-delayed plans for a Heritage Area west of Boston.
Recognition as a National Heritage Area -- a geographic area of national historical significance that qualifies for millions of dollars in federal grants -- requires an act of Congress, a process that preservation groups say is often cumbersome and has led to a backup of about 20 areas waiting for federal approval.
The proposed ``Freedom's Way" region in New England covers an area of 45 towns in Massachusetts and southern New Hampshire that were hotbeds of support for Patriot forces against the British during the American Revolution, as well as for the abolition of slavery and women's suffrage during the 19th century.
Plans for Freedom's Way include sites in the Boston suburbs of Concord, Lexington, and Arlington, and extends as far west to the towns of Winchendon and north to Amherst, N.H.
Promoting the museums and historical landmarks in the area as a single, nationally recognized historic region would increase tourism, supporters of the plan said. After being designated, however, the landmarks must receive financial commitments from other sources -- including state funds and private sector donations -- in order to receive matching federal funds.
The Park Service report, described by officials who have read it, recommends allowing the service to set up a standard procedure for getting applications instead of leaving every decision up to Congress.
``If this does break the logjam, then we're up and running," said Marge Darby, chair of the Freedom's Way Heritage Association, a Devens-based nonprofit group that has lobbied for federal recognition since 1993.
Darby said raising private donations to meet federal requirements wouldn't be a problem because the plan has widespread community support.
The Senate has already passed legislation allowing the Park Service to select Heritage sites in 2004; supporters hope today's report, compiled by an advisory committee appointed by the White House, will put pressure on the House of Representatives to follow suit. Two other regions in New England -- the Upper Housatonic Valley in Connecticut and western Massachusetts and the Lake Champlain Valley in Vermont and New York -- are also on the waiting list.
Some property rights groups do not want expansion of the Heritage Areas program, which they say encourages towns to adopt stricter zoning; other critics worry Heritage Areas were diverting Park Service funding away from conventional National Parks.
Congress has already established two other Heritage regions in the Boston area: the Essex National Heritage Area on the North Shore and the Blackstone River Valley National Heritage Corridor in Rhode Island and Massachusetts.
Annie Harris, the executive director of the Essex National Heritage Area, said the report was a vote of confidence in a program that began in the 1980s as an experiment with the private sector -- over the opposition of some in the Park Service.
Unlike national parks, the government does not own or manage Heritage Areas, and the federal government does not have a say over how the areas are used. Under the rules, at least half of the funding for Heritage Areas must come from sources other than the federal government .
Darby said if Freedom's Way wins federal approval, grant money would be used to cross-promote museums and historical sites that already exist in the region, many of which are cash-strapped.
Darby said museum officials involved in the planning for Freedom's Way have also discussed using the money for information kiosks and for buses to take tourists to and from each site and on a ``passport" program to encourage tourists to explore different parts of the region.
The Massachusetts communities that would be included in the Heritage Area are: Winchendon, Ashburnham, Ashby, Townsend,Pepperell, Dunstable, Gardner, Westminster, Fitchburg, Lunenburg, Shirley, Ayer, Groton, Leominster, Lancaster, Harvard, Littleton, Westford, Princeton, Sterling, Boxborough, Acton, Carlisle, Clinton, Bolton, Stow, Maynard, Concord, Bedford, Hudson, Sudbury, Lincoln, Lexington, Woburn, Arlington, Medford, and Malden.