In making his recommendations for how to spend more than $24 million in Community Preservation Act (CPA) funds, Mayor Martin Walsh has included several projects in Dorchester and one in Mattapan that have been approved by the city’s Community Preservation Committee and will next be reviewed by the city council, which is expected to vote on the overall allocations in the coming weeks.

Per the mayor, $2.35 million in CPA money would fund six open space and historic preservation projects this year in Dorchester:

• $800,000 to Norwell Street Park to build a new park on four parcels of open space adjacent to Talbot Avenue Station on the Fairmount Line;

•$250,000 to the Franklin Field Seniors Garden to build a new community garden for residents of Franklin Field and surrounds;

• $400,000 to restore the steeple of the Second Church in Dorchester, which is one of the oldest wooden churches left in Boston, built in 1806 and home to a Paul Revere bell;

• $730,000 to the Dr. William W. Henderson Inclusion School for a new, fully accessible playground and school yard on its lower campus;

•$150,000 to the Magnolia Street Garden to develop a permanent community garden and neighborhood plaza after serving as an informal gardening space for several years;

• $20,000 to First Parish Dorchester, which was built in 1897, to remove and restore a Palladian window and complete the window restoration on the only Colonial-Revival clapboard meetinghouse in Boston.

In Mattapan, $30,000 would go to the Mattapan Food Forest to plant fruit trees and build planting beds on a vacant lot on Morton Street.
The largest share of the funds will go to subsidize affordable housing projects across the city. Some $4 million would be set aside for the Acquisition Opportunity Program whose purpose is to prevent displacement by acquiring existing private market rental units and designating them as permanently affordable.

An additional $4 million would go to the ONE+Boston program, helping income-eligible prospective home buyers get down payment assistance and payment reduction in the interest rate for a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage. 

“We’re in the middle of a housing crisis that requires bold and creative solutions. I’m proud that through this new round of funding, we are dedicating the majority of this funding round to affordable housing projects,” said Walsh in a statement. 

With this funding round, the Boston will have awarded over $67 million to support projects in every neighborhood since residents voted to adopt the Community Preservation Act in 2016.