Harrison Thorp
If you walk east on Franklin Street from downtown you’ll pass by the Franklin Street Cemetery where you’ll find a 20-foot obelisk marking the grave of one of Rochester’s most iconic residents: Charles Benjamin Gafney, who bequeathed his Wakefield Street mansion to charitable causes following his death in 1898.
Trustees decided to utilize the magnificent Victorian as a home for senior living, and it opened as the Gafney Home for the Aged in 1904.
Now Community Action Partnership is trying to change the mission of those trustees by pushing a project that would house needy residents of all ages in a four-story 35-unit apartment complex that will sully the beautiful neighborhood homes and tree-lined sidewalks of Wakefield Street.
The four-story L-shaped apartment complex planned on acreage behind The Gafney Home
Two of downtown’s most respected and longstanding businesses, Studley’s Flower Gardens and the Governor’s Inn, pleaded with the Rochester’s planning board last week to not move forward with this plan.
Studley’s co-owner Molly Meulenbroek said she was aware of the need for housing, but as a former historic district commission member felt it may not be a good fit.
“The scale and the height of the building could change the character of Wakefield Street,” she said.
Governor’s Inn co-owner Herman Ejarque warned the board that the building would be an eyesore and a disservice to the downtown.
Community Action Partnership lawyer Joshua Lanzetta
Ironically, it was Community Action Partnership lawyer Joshua Lanzetta who tried to school Meulenbroek on what the role of historic district commission is.
“HDC’s (historic district commissions) are not punitive,” he said. “They don’t function to limit development or stop progress. They’re there to preserve historic structures or properties.”
Well, I think that’s what she was doing, actually: trying to preserve a historic “property.”
We wonder if Attr. Lanzetta ever looked at what the city’s historic district has for its mission statement. Here are some of their goals.
“Fostering the preservation, restoration, and rehabilitation of structures and places of historic, architectural, and community value;
Conserving and improving the value of property in the District
Fostering civic pride in the beauty and noble accomplishments of the past;
Fostering civic pride in the beauty and noble accomplishments of the past;”
We think Meulenbroek’s comments were spot on. The modern four-story apartment complex eyed by CAP is a total aberration of the other grand structures surrounding the property.
The view from Marilyn Foster's back yard. If the four-story apartment house goes up
the blue sky will be obscured (Rochester Voice photo)
Meanwhile, Marilyn Johnson Foster, whose property abuts The Gafney Home to the north, argued that the 2019 deed to the Gafney House property specifically called for senior housing and senior programs only in the hands of its new owner, CAP.
This time CAP Attorney Lanzetta noted that the deed restriction was not the purview of the planning board and could not be a factor in its denial.
“The deed restriction is not part of this review,” he said.
So let’s look at what the deed says when it comes to what activities can legally be undertaken at 90 Wakefield Street. Here it is verbatim:
1) The property shall be used to support Community Action Partnership of Strafford County's programs supporting senior citizens and/or for the development of senior housing on the premises, and in addition may be used for such other programs by the Grantee for support of low income persons, and for its administrative operations. The Grantee may convey or lease all or a portion of the above described premises to an affiliate for purposes of developing senior housing on the premises, providing however, that deed restrictions limiting the property to that use are contained in any such deed or lease.
The passage clearly says and in addition can be used for such other “programs” by the Grantee for support of low-income persons. It does not, however, reference “housing.” just “programs.”
We suppose some lawyer could make a good argument that “programs” could be “housing.” But as they say at the State House in Concord, “Words matter!” We think another good attorney could squash that good!
Bottom line, no where does it say it can be used for nonsenior housing.
Rochester Mayor Chuck Grassie told The Rochester Voice on Friday that he doesn’t believe the City Council will ever be voting on CAP’s proposal.
Remember, this all began on July 21, when the City of Rochester discovered a “mistake” in the zoning tax maps, leading to the change that put Foster’s property in the downtown commercial district instead of R-2, which it had been previously.
So will this end with a whimper or a lawsuit.
We shall see.
If it were a lawsuit I believe the former owner of the Gafney Home at 90 Wakefield St., the honorable Charles Benjamin Gafney, a Civil War hero, philanthropist and distinguished probate judge, would like to see how that played out.
Betsey Andrews Parker, who serves as the Chief Executive Officer of the Community Action Partnership of Strafford County, did not return a phone call requesting comment on their plan.
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