Malden Plans Roosevelt Park Community Meeting

MALDEN, MA — Proposed renovations at Malden’s Roosevelt Park will be back in the spotlight for a community meeting on Thursday, Sept. 8

Set for 6 p.m. at City Hall, the meeting will, in part, aim to gather input from community members on the project, as noted in a city announcement this week.

“The purpose of the community meeting is to engage and inform the community about the project, to receive feedback, and to address questions or concerns about the project, including about environmental issues,” the city said.

The meeting comes just a matter of weeks after the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development flagged what it said was a lack of sufficient outreach in earlier phases of the project’s planning. The meeting also comes as project opponents have continued to raise concerns, citing feared heat island, flooding and habitat impacts of the project, among other things.

Located next to Malden’s Salemwood School, Roosevelt Park has fallen into disrepair over the years, according to city assessments.

In response, the city has pitched a $3.5 million project that it says will improve the area by adding a better athletic facility, reducing flooding and “remediating contaminated soil," as noted by Director of Strategic and Community Development Debbie Burke last month. Under the plan, renovations would include a new athletic turf field and various new drainage measures.

Some community members and elected officials alike have taken issue, however.

“It’s wrong for the school, it’s wrong for the neighborhood, it is everything that environmental justice is not,” retired Salemwood School educator and Malden resident Kathy Sullivan told Patch last month.

In mentioning environmental justice, Sullivan referenced federal guidelines that call on communities to ensure “equal protection from environmental and health hazards” among other things.

City Councilor Ryan O’Malley recently noted coordinated efforts by the Friends of Roosevelt Park group, which is looking to scrap turf plans and instead move forward with a project that involves removing contaminated soil from the park and replacing the current field with a new grass field.

“We need your help,” O'Malley wrote in a call for support on social media.

The city has plans to pay for the Roosevelt Park project using Community Preservation Act money, a bond and a $1.2 million loan from the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD).

HUD gave conditional approval for the project late last year. It then delayed releasing funds to the city earlier this summer, though, after noting well over 100 letters opposing the project that it received from Malden community members.

HUD sent Malden back to the drawing board to revise environmental review documentation that it filed with its loan application, saying that the city had not properly considered environmental justice concerns about its Roosevelt Park project, among other things.

HUD detailed a series of requests in its message to Malden, asking the city to show various documentation of outreach and community planning before receiving loan money.

Burke said after HUD’s response that the city remained confident that it could meet HUD’s loan conditions to move forward with Roosevelt Park rennovations.

Next week’s meeting will take place in a hybrid modality, with community members able to attend in person or via Zoom by registering using the link here.