PLYMOUTH — September 1, 2026 — An exhaustive audit presented to the Plymouth Select Board revealed that 44 municipal Community Preservation Act projects spanning recreation, open space, historic preservation, and affordable housing lack recorded deed restrictions required by state law and Town Meeting warrant votes. The findings triggered intense friction between town officials and local historical nonprofit leaders over administrative backlog, state bureaucracy, and whether future grant disbursements should be frozen until restrictions are officially in hand.
The Full Story
A comprehensive inventory of Community Preservation Act (CPA) projects delivered by Town Counsel Attorney Kate McKay and Community Preservation Committee (CPC) Coordinator Kristin Ford outlined a systemic administrative breakdown dating back more than two decades.
According to Massachusetts General Law Chapter 44B, Section 12, real property interests acquired or rehabilitated using Community Preservation funds must be bound by a permanent restriction running with the land. However, the town’s review cataloged 44 missing restrictions across multiple sectors:
Recreation: 25 unrecorded restrictions, including the Rail Trail ($400,000), Hedges Pond ($4.125 million across two votes), Stephens Field ($3.56 million across four authorizations), Nelson Park Playground ($476,529), and Jenney Pond dredging ($2.2 million).
Historic Preservation: 18 total missing restrictions, with five currently in progress. Outstanding properties include the 1820 Courthouse ($6.575 million across two articles), the Spire Center ($3.6 million), and Burial Hill ($750,000). The five active drafts include four distinct votes for the First Parish Meetinghouse totaling over $2.97 million and Pilgrim Hall Museum’s 2023 grant of $3.2 million.
Open Space: Six restrictions remain unrecorded but are progressing through legal review, including the Simes House ($200,000), Camp Norse off Carver Road ($900,000), Siever ($117,000), and Full Sail ($875,000). Restrictions for Rocky Point ($175,000) and the Pinnacle project ($1.21 million) were scheduled for recording immediately following the meeting.
Affordable Housing: One property, Oak Street ($1.238 million across two Town Meeting votes), remains unrecorded. The lapse has disqualified the site’s three housing units from being counted on the Commonwealth’s Subsidized Housing Inventory (SHI) due to procedural omissions, including the absence of a proper lottery when the units were initially occupied.
The presentation sparked a contentious debate over newly implemented CPC safeguards, which dictate that no grant disbursements will be released going forward without prior proof of a recorded deed restriction.
Representatives of prominent local nonprofits strongly pushed back. Donna Curtin, executive director of the Pilgrim Society and Pilgrim Hall Museum, warned the Select Board that the inventory was misleading and created redundant hurdles. Curtin argued that institutions like Pilgrim Hall already placed historic preservation restrictions on their properties decades ago and that requiring newly drafted state-level restrictions for emergency capital repairs—such as leaking roofs—creates burdensome, multi-year delays.
Select Board member Kevin Canty firmly rejected that reasoning, emphasizing that town staff and legal counsel are strictly bound by the language voted by Town Meeting. Canty pointed out that material modifications to a building, such as enclosing a leaking skylight at Pilgrim Hall, alter the architectural fabric and legally necessitate updated covenants.
“Without the restrictions, the money that was appropriated could be lost because there’s no protections. And that’s some of the issues we’ve been dealing with some of the organizations as of late, that we don’t have restrictions in place to protect the dollars that were appropriated and to protect the work that was completed with those dollars.” — Derek Brindisi, Town Manager
Town Manager Derek Brindisi noted that only 10 of 33 historic restrictions (less than 33%) have ever been recorded in the history of Plymouth’s CPC. Finance Director Lynne Barrett added that municipal bond counsel legally requires recorded property interests before Plymouth can execute municipal borrowing authorized by Town Meeting, elevating the issue from administrative bookkeeping to fiscal compliance.
Select Board member Bill Keohan called for patience and administrative collaboration, pointing out that state-level reviews at the Massachusetts Historical Commission and the Executive Office of Energy and Environmental Affairs often take years due to single-person review desks. Keohan advocated for releasing a withheld $300,000 final payment to Pilgrim Hall as documents finalize, but Canty and Chair Deborah Iaquinto held firm that taxpayer protections cannot be negotiated away after the fact.
