A Capital Idea

— FY2025 Budget

— White Stadium Renovation

We use a lot of bandwidth this time of year talking about the Department of Conservation and Recreation’s (DCR) budget for the obvious reason. Following the February release of the Healey-Driscoll Administration’s proposal to fund the state’s day-to-day operations, the House of Representatives is now crafting its proposed budget, to be released in early April, followed by the Senate in May.

Then a House-Senate Conference Committee will iron out the differences, so the Legislature can pass a final budget and send it to the Administration for its consideration. Ideally, the FY2025 budget will become effective on July 1. But if past practice is an indication, House-Senate negotiations may force the Legislature to pass interim operating budgets until a final budget wins approval.

While that process is playing out, we thought it would be a suitable time to reflect on another important aspect of bringing our essential state parks up to 21st Century standards, the annual capital budget. Unlike the operating budget, the capital budget is not funded by general revenue tax dollars. Instead, the income for the capital plan comes from other sources, including selling bonds and various federal funds awarded to the state.

Each year, based on the level of debt the state Treasurer determines Massachusetts can legally incur, state agencies develop capital plan recommendations for the Governor. The Governor then determines how much debt it is advisable for the state to incur. The Executive Office of Administration and Finance (A&F) then works with the agencies to apportion that borrowing power among the agencies. The governor then announces the annual capital plan along with a five-year rolling capital plan that is updated every year.*

You may have heard something about capital spending recently when Philip Eng, General Manager and CEO of the Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority (the T), announced that in order to achieve a “State of Good Repair” that it needs $24.5 billion, a truly mind-blowing number. It is a safe bet that whatever comes out of ongoing haggling, we the people will be funding a multi-billion-dollar a year T capital program, and it will take many years, perhaps decades, to achieve that State of Good Repair.

It also takes a good deal of capital spending to keep our state parks and other DCR open space and facilities in a State of Good Repair. While DCR’s capital backlog is nowhere near the T’s, more than a decade of underfunding left the agency in a $1.0 billion deferred maintenance hole that is going to take years to eliminate. Add to that a decade’s worth of inadequate post-2008 recession operating budgets that forced 300 employees out the door, including engineers and others who bring capital projects to life. The lack of funds helped bring Massachusetts the dubious distinction of being last in the nation in per capita tax dollars spent on public open space.

What that meant on the ground in our parks was patched roofs that should have been replaced, crumbling, decrepit bathrooms and other infrastructure, a shelved Parkways Master Plan, delayed stormwater mitigation projects, and other important projects placed in a state of limbo while the damage and the costs to fix that damage increased with each passing year. It also meant park staff on the ground joining the endangered species list.

But all that is changing thanks to the advent of more and better organized park advocates, Mass Parks for All among them, 2021’s Legislative Special Commission on DCR’s landmark report, which flagged our woeful park spending national rank, and state elected and appointed officials who got the pandemic’s lesson that our parks are essential to our physical and emotional health.

This fiscal year, DCR has about $150 million in capital authorizations, and another $100 million in capital funding from the federal American Rescue Plan Act (ARPA) to spend before the end of calendar 2026. And DCR is working overtime to hire the staff that will let it put that kind of funding to use. Commissioner Brian Arrigo noted at a recent Stewardship Council meeting that for the first time since 2011, the agency passed the 1,000-employee mark.

DCR is also building an online clickable capital budget map offering project details to make the process more transparent and understandable. Because of this, and because there will not be a new Environmental Bond Bill this year – the last one was passed in 2018 – we urge the Legislature and the Administration to adopt a more aggressive capital plan for FY2025, one that will significantly decrease the backlog but not outstrip DCR’s ability to put the funds in play.

Apropos of that, MPA offers state government, those elected and appointed, the following challenge – eliminate DCR’s deferred maintenance backlog by the end of calendar 2030. That’s an average capital expenditure of $182 million per year on the backlog, not including the inevitable new capital projects that will become apparent over time. Given the fact that the first 21 months will be frontloaded with $100 million in federal money, it seems eminently doable if we all put our minds to it and act accordingly.

Unlike the T, we can remedy our park system’s capital needs this decade. Our parks contribute to our physical and emotional well-being, help mitigate climate change, and contribute mightily to our annual $16 billion outdoor activity economy. For the momentum we’ve achieved together over the last four years to be truly meaningful, it needs to continue for the next five-and-a-half years. This is especially important in formerly neglected environmental justice communities.

We understand that all of this relies heavily on an economy that continues to perform well. The last few months of declining state tax revenue, and the mid-year budget cuts they forced, are a cold dose of the reality we face as we move deeper into the 21st Century. But other indicators point to a more positive scenario. A steadily improving job market and the slowing of inflation may yield that longed-for soft-landing, and slow but steady growth.

In the end, we must aim high to climb out of the hole we found ourselves in when COVID-19 proved how important our parks really are and how little we were spending on them when the pandemic hit. We can and must do better for ourselves and the generations to come.

White Stadium renovation project injunction denied

On Friday, March 22, a Suffolk County Superior Court Judge denied a request for an injunction associated with a lawsuit filed by the Emerald Necklace Conservancy and several Boston residents. The suit seeks to slow down the City of Boston and Boston Unity Soccer Partners’ planned renovation and conversion of White Stadium into a part-time women’s professional soccer stadium. While the judge denied injunctive relief, the lawsuit is still in play, and the plaintiffs are mulling over next steps.

Everyone agrees that public-private partnerships in pursuit of a public good can be a good thing. Everyone also agrees that White Stadium has been neglected for years. In fact, the City has a detailed Franklin Park Action Plan, which predates the latest proposal, that contains detailed plans for the stadium. With the more recent plan, however, the City wants to rehabilitate the stadium and the surrounding grounds so that it can host professional soccer matches and other activities while still serving the general public.

The lawsuit and request for an injunction rested in part on a contention that the land in question is covered by Article 97 of the Massachusetts Constitution and the state law that enforces it, the Public Lands Preservation Act (PLPA). Mass Conservation Voters (MCV), our sister organization, was part of a coalition that got PLPA passed and signed into law in November 2022. Article 97 and PLPA mandate the steps to be taken to convert public parkland for another use. It includes a public notification process, an alternatives analysis to make sure there are no better options, the provision of compensatory land to replace the land being taken, and a two-thirds vote of the Legislature for final approval.

The judge ruled that White Stadium, home to some Boston Public Schools football teams, is owned by the School Department, and as such is not parkland. This means that, unlike Franklin Park, part of Frederick Law Olmsted’s Emerald Necklace, it is exempt from Article 97 and PLPA.

While the PLPA process appears to be off of the table, the Emerald Necklace Conservancy and the neighbors were not out of line to question whether public use of this historic parcel might be curtailed by using it for a professional sport, even on a part-time basis. MCV weighed in providing context for the concern, while more than 100 people attended a March 25 meeting to put those concerns on the record in the community.  

Meanwhile, Boston Unity Soccer Partners has publicly reached out to the plaintiffs to include them in the process moving forward. And there are more community meetings planned around transportation and other issues. We hope that both sides are able to come to an accommodation that preserves the spirit of Article 97 and the PLPA that public spaces, particularly in long-aggrieved environmental justice neighborhoods like this one, remain publicly accessible.

Doug Pizzi is executive director of Mass Parks for All

*Correction: A previous version of this article described the capital bond bill process.