NAHANT — The Nahant Board of Selectmen voted, 3-0, to place an article on the Annual Town Meeting Warrant that would give the town authority to take control over a portion of the East Point property currently occupied by Northeastern University’s Marine Science Center.
If passed, Article 22 will allow the town to enact eminent domain — a law that provides the government the right to purchase private property for public use — in order to declare part of East Point as a wildlife preserve, thus protecting it from future development.
“I don’t have anything against Northeastern,” Selectman Joshua Antrim said in March 2020, when the board first announced it would seek to enact eminent domain over East Point. “We’re not trying to execute eminent domain over the entire property … We want to protect that area from development. I would like to see it as a public park where people can walk freely.”
Citing concern about an expansion’s impact on the local environment, as well as the desire to keep nearby Canoe Beach a public area, the board previously declared it would seek public approval to designate $1.5 million of Massachusetts Community Preservation Act (CPA) funds — which are used for public areas of need, including affordable housing, historic resources, and recreational spaces — to finance the motion.
According to Antrim, CPA funds do not affect the town’s operating budget or its tax rate in any way. The borrowed money would also have no effect on the CPA’s ability to fund other projects. Antrim said the principal and interest on the borrowed money would cost the average Nahant household about $35 per year.
Northeastern was first granted free property rights to the 21-acre plot of land by the federal government in 1966. The Coastal Sustainability Institute opened at the site a year later.
The university’s expansion plans were first announced in 2018 and have since been adamantly opposed by several Nahant residents, who say the small island town and its local wildlife will be damaged by the proposed development — which includes, among other additions, a two-to-three-story, 55,000-square-foot building atop the Murphy Battery, two parking areas, and an expanded seawater intake system.
A January 2020 Superior Court ruling allowed the school to continue its plans after determining the environmental impact of site testing — required before construction could begin — would be minimal.
Under the Board of Selectmen’s current proposal, Northeastern University would retain ownership of the remaining land, its existing buildings and parking areas, and historical bunkers located on the property.
Board of Selectmen Chair Mark Cullinan said that, when drafting the article, the selectmen chose to use Massachusetts General Law Chapter 80A instead of MGL Chapter 79 for the proposed taking.
Unlike a Chapter 79 taking, which is irreversible, Chapter 80A allows the town to discontinue and withdraw from the taking if the process becomes too expensive or if the town and Northeastern come to an agreement.
“In choosing this method to go forward, rather than taking the land outright at Town Meeting, we give the town the ability to change course if it needs to,” Cullinan said. “It is, in our view, a no-risk alternative to the town, and should Northeastern agree to come back to the negotiating table, we will be negotiating from a position of strength.”
If approved, the budget for the taking equals $4.5 million. Of that sum, the selectmen said $3 million would come from private donations.
Article 21 of the Town Meeting warrant seeks to approve the CPA bonding. Both articles are scheduled to be presented May 15 and require a two-thirds majority vote to pass.
Elyse Carmosino can be reached at [email protected].
