GloucesterTimes.com, Gloucester, MA

News

City eyes new shot at CPA

By Richard Gaines
Staff Writer
Published: July 26, 2008

Mayor Carolyn Kirk said yesterday she would use the bulk of the money generated by the potential passage of the Community Preservation Act to help complete the preservation of City Hall.

But she also said "there has to be an understanding in the community" that, if voters approve a 1 percent Community Preservation Act surcharge on property tax levies this November, a much larger request for tax revenues beyond the limits of Proposition 21âÑ2 would have follow to shift some significant portion of infrastructure commitments from the water and sewer rates to the tax base.

Gloucester voters will get a third chance to adopt the act, which would impose a 1 percent surcharge on the property tax levies, producing roughly $425,000 a year. The amount raised locally triggers a less than 1-to-1 match from the state, and would create opportunities to leverage public and private grants.

City Council this week voted unanimously to put the Community Preservation Act authorization on the ballot again after advocates, led by Sandra Dahl Ronan, agreed to delay implementation of the act until fiscal 2010 to avoid having the levy double up on the final two quarterly bills of fiscal 2009.

Ronan said the delay might prove beneficial because advocates are pushing the Legislature to put a statutory floor on the state match, which now floats based on the number of communities that have adopted the act. The local contribution is matched with revenues raised through a 20 percent surcharge on transactions at the state's registries of deeds.

Kirk said it was her objective to "try to put the CPA (vote) in a realistic perspective."

An informal consensus seemed to jell within the City Council during the month-long debate on water and sewer rates that some of the future work needed to be financed from the tax rate. No figure was put on the size of a potential debt exclusion override needed to make that shift, but it would dwarf the relatively small increase in taxes that the Community Preservation Act referendum would authorize.

Meanwhile, the City Hall project — proceeding in fits and starts throughout the decade — is now in its second phase, with the clock tower under wraps and repair. Finishing the entire job is estimated to cost another $3.2 million, according to a report earlier this month to the mayor by Maggie Rosa, chairwoman of the City Hall Restoration Committee. Hearing that, Kirk yesterday told the Times she told Rosa, "The well is dry."

The city spent about $500,000 to make the 1871 National Historic Register beauty safe enough for continued use in 2004 and 2005. Then Mayor John Bell and the contingent of city employees based in the hall were forced out for a year when the beams and trusses under the slate roof were found be weakened.

The clock tower work involves similar shoring of support elements and a straightening of the tower which was found to be leaning in two directions.

The work is financed by a $1.3 million loan order. The tower work is estimated to cost about $900,000.

J.J. Bell and Mary McCarl, members of the restoration committee, are processing an application with the National Park Service to have the hall's status upgraded to "national landmark."

The city's only two recognized landmarks, Rosa said, are the Beauport-Sleeper house and the schooner Adventure.

"Unless someone gives us gobs of money," she said, "we won't be able to do everything."

During her mayoral campaign last year, Kirk opposed the Community Preservation Act, which was on the ballot with her and her rival for the mayor's job, then-Council President James Destino.

The referendum was rejected by 32 votes. It was defeated for the first time by a wider margin in 2000, the year the state law became available for adoption.

During the campaign, Kirk said she understands the lure of the state match, which she compared to the urge to "buy a dress that's on sale." Kirk's opposition to the Community Preservation Act was cited by Rosa in her endorsement of Destino, who supported passage of the act. Rosa was also a mayoral candidate, but had been eliminated in the preliminary election.

Kirk told the Times yesterday that, if the act is adopted this time around, "the money will go to the preservation of City Hall."

The act requires that at least 30 percent of gross revenues be committed to preservation, open space and affordable housing. The community is free to spend the remaining 70 percent of each year's appropriation on any combination of authorized purposes or for a single authorized project. A committee made up of representatives of municipal boards and others selected by the community in a way of its choosing recommend how the discretionary funds are to be spent. Appropriation is voted by the council.

Under the terms approved by the council, voters in November will be asked to authorize a 1 percent surcharge on property taxes. But the first $100,000 of assessed value is exempted. Low-income taxpayers and moderate-income seniors would be given the opportunity to apply for exemptions from the Community Preservation Act surcharge as well.

Since the law was enacted by the Legislature in 2000, 133 municipalities have adopted it, including Rockport and Manchester.

Ronan said under the structure adopted by the council, the owner of a $400,000 home would be required to pay about $2.25 a month into the Community Preservation Act fund.

Richard Gaines can be reached at rgainesgloucestertimes.com

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