Politics & Government

Preservation Committee OK's Seven Proposals for Funding

This fiscal year's funding totals $2.7 million, a big jump from the $900K granted in May.

After debating the merits and calculating the costs, Belmont's Community Preservation Committee has selected seven projects to receive grants ranging from a few thousand dollars to $2 million – the largest in the committee's brief history – in the coming fiscal year. 

According to CPC co-chair Floyd Carman, the final list of approved projects will now go before Town Meeting on May 7, 2014 where the town's legislative body will either approve or deny the committee's recommendations. 

This year's grant requests total $2.7 million, a marked increase from the $872,000 doled out to nine projects at the last annual Town Meeting in May in the inaugural funding round. And one project, a $2 million grant to pay for approximately 40 percent of the expected $4.5 million of the new Underwood Pool, ties up most of the money in this cycle.

The fiscal 2014 projects are: 

• Underwood Pool construction: $2 million

• High School Junior Varsity Field irrigation upgrade: $8,700

• Electrical upgrade at Belmont Housing: $165,000

• Daniel Butler School Playground project (Phase II): $66,524

• Winn Brook Field renovation: $100,000

• First-Time Homebuyer Assistance: $375,000

• Belmont Community Moving Image Archive: $12,000

Belmont voted in a 2010 town-wide election to impose a 1.5 percent surcharge on residential and commercial property taxes after the first $100,000 of residential property values is exempted from the surcharge. In 2013, the annual surcharge averaged $135.39 per Belmont single-family household. 

The grants are restricted for projects in four categories: community housing, historic resources, open space and recreation. To support expenditures in these areas, the state provides partial match of the funds raised by the community surcharges.

More information can be found on the CPC's web page.


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