Malden Shares Concept Plan For Courthouse Redevelopment

MALDEN, MA — The city of Malden on Wednesday shared plans for an envisioned redevelopment of the former district courthouse on Summer Street as the new Malden Center for Arts and Culture.

Shared as a concept plan, the vision is open to public comment, officials said. Anyone with comments should contact city Senior Planner Evan Spetrini by email at espetrini@cityofmalden.org. Community members can also comment through an online project page.

“We are thrilled to present to the Malden community our plan to remake the former Courthouse on Summer Street into the Malden Center for Arts and Culture,” Mayor Gary Christenson and City Councilor Amanda Linehan wrote in a shared statement this week.

The courthouse initially closed for construction in 2019, largely shifting cases to Cambridge District Court in Medford. In May of last year, as court officials opted against moving back into Malden, Christenson convened a steering committee to look into the possibility of an arts and culture center.

Linehan and Spetrini assumed co-chair positions on the committee.

More than a year later, the city now has its concept plan, which officials developed in tandem with the Steering Committee.

“The plan is a roadmap for how we can create the Arts Center and plans for everything from what programming it will host to how it will fund itself,” Christenson and Linehan said in their recent statement.

Current plans don’t lay out a specific floor plan or configuration for the building. Instead, this concept document walks through next steps for the city while sharing guidelines for that remaining process.

A finished arts and culture center would likely include a variety of multimedia, studio and performance spaces within what is now the old courthouse, according to the plan.

The project will face hurdles, however. These “pain points” and constraints include competition from other cultural spaces in neighboring communities, the concept plan noted.

An opened arts and culture center would also require extensive staffing, in turn requiring a certain number of large market-rate space rentals to subsidize community uses, according to the concept plan.

“Developing the courthouse into the Malden Center for Arts and Culture will require significant financial investment to acquire and renovate the building,” the plan said. “Financially, decisions will need to account for the cost of acquisition and redevelopment and identify potential business models whose sustainable revenue streams can support the work of the Center and meet the needs of the community.”

The city worked with legislators to move legislation to let Malden buy the courthouse.

An appraisal last fall pinned the acquisition price at roughly $480,000. Legislation then passed last month before being signed by Gov. Charlie Baker on Wednesday.

City officials anticipate finishing their acquisition of the building this fall.

“Once we own the property, we will work to determine what changes we need to make to the building and what the business model will look like,” Christenson and Linehan said this week.

The city is planning to eventually bring in a nonprofit operator to manage the arts and culture center once it opens.

The city could separately turn to a mix of grant opportunities, tax credits and a capital campaign to help support renovation and reopening costs, this week’s concept plan said.

The building, the concept plan said, is generally well maintained.

Community members can read the full concept plan on the city’s project website. Comments on the plan must be received by Aug. 15.