Farmhouse fate in hands of Town Meeting reps

BY Mary Carey
Staff Writer

Published on October 27, 2006

AMHERST - Saving the stately pre-1815 farmhouse on North East Street will return to the spotlight as an emotional issue before Town Meeting this week.

It took members less than a half hour in January to unanimously endorse a complicated strategy that involved spending $50,000 in Community Preservation Act funds to save the Benjamin Kimball house.

Since then, the state's Department of Agricultural Resources has thrown town officials "a little bit of a curve ball," as David Ziomek, the town's conversation director put it on Oct. 23.

Another $128,000 over five years will be required to remove 1.7 acres of land from the state's Agricultural Preservation Restriction program above what town officials had expected would be needed.

Whether to spend the additional $128,000 in CPA funds is the question posed in Article 6 on the warrant of the fall Town Meeting that begins tonight.

Much beloved by residents as a reminder of days gone by, the house's owner, Dorothy Gawle, entered into an agreement to sell the property to Roger Cherewatti, of Foxglove Lane. He planned to replace it with a new house.

But following a groundswell to save it last year, demolition was delayed.

If all goes according to the plan to save the house, the APR restriction would be lifted and replaced with five acres nearby, allowing Cherewatti to build a new house behind and to the right of the farmhouse.

Cherewatti, in turn, would agree to maintain the exterior of the house and surrounding landscaping the way it looks now. What he does to the interior of the house is not the town's business, Town Planner Jonathan Tucker said.

A special act by the Legislature to remove the APR restriction, which the town would seek when the new legislative session starts in January, assuming it has the money to pay the DAR what it calls "compensation."

The town has never removed land from the APR program, but proponents of saving the house maintain it serves both the interests of conserving farmland and historical preservation, since it is a farmhouse in a farmland setting.

Select Board members said they want to wait to hear the discussion at Town Meeting before making up their own minds.

"If this fails at Town Meeting, we've exhausted all our options and I think the Cherewattis would proceed with demolition in winter or spring," Select Board member Gerald Weiss said.

Robie Hubley said, "I think the town should do everything possible to protect this land. I don't think we should give up yet."

But Hwei-Ling Greeney said the town should take the plan off the table and a private entity should "come through with the funds."

"Basically, what we will get is really little for the money we will be asked to contribute." Greeney said.