University PILOT Payments Detailed

The Boston Globe ran another story about university PILOTs (payments in lieu of taxes) to Boston and surrounding cities.  (BTW:  I carefully avoid repeating that repetitious phrase of redundancy, "PILOT payments.")  The story hook was a recent study by Newton's Blue Ribbon Commission on the Municipal Budget. 

A summary:

Berklee School of Music:  $175 thousand to Boston
Boston College:  $215 thousand to Boston; $100 thousand to Newton
Boston University:  $3.20 million to Boston
Harvard University:  $1.77 million to Cambridge; $1.75 million to Watertown; $1.60 million to Boston
MIT:  $1.22 million to Cambridge
Northeastern:  $137 thousand to Boston

How much is brought in by each city?

Boston:  $23 million per year (as of 2003)
Cambridge:  $3.6 million
Newton:  $100 thousand (apparently BC is the only university/college contributing)
Watertown:  $1.75 million (I'm not sure if there are any PILOTs other than Harvard)

The point put forward by Newton's Blue Ribbon Commission is that, for example, Boston College owns property in Newton with a combined, assessed value of $355 million -- one-third of the value of all the tax-exempt property owned within Newton -- and yet Newton only receives a very small PILOT.  (The remainder of the tax-exempt properties?  Roughly $300 million in governmental and religious institutional property.  Also, "Newton-Wellesley Hospital...  reported $392 million in net assets to the IRS in 2005," although assets are not the same as property holdings.)  BC's property value holdings are substantial, and their PILOTs appear disproportionately small by comparison to the other institutions listed here.

Off-Leash Dogs in Cambridge's Fresh Pond Park

Boston Globe ran a story about a move by the City of Cambridge to license Cambridge residents' dogs in order to allow only Cambridge dogs to run off-leash at Fresh Pond:

But the Cambridge Water Department, which oversees the park, wants to ban nonresident pooches from roaming off leash and plans to outfit Cambridge canines with bright red medallions, so the rangers who patrol the park can see which dogs belong and which do not.

Cambridge already officially allows off-leash dogs in Fresh Pond Park, but the Water Department feels that there are so many running around now and pooping that the water supply is getting contaminated.

Since off-leash and on-leash dogs both poop equal quantities, their solution is to cut down on the number of dogs in the park by not allowing the out-of-town dogs from going off-leash. Officially-sanctioned, off-leash dog areas in parks are so uncommon that they are magnets attracting dog owners from a much larger region. At least some people in Allston believe that this is what happened in Ringer Park a couple of years ago, although it was never officially-sanctioned as an off-leash dog area. (A Yahoo!Group called "Ringer Dog Park" was formed circa 2003.)

Boston hasn't officially allowed "Dog Recreation Spaces" (the official term) until a City Ordinance (11.10-2) passed by the Council two years ago provided the mechanism for neighborhood groups to apply for, construct, and maintain them.

The South End has the first such park, Peters Park, created under this new Boston City Ordinance. The park has been allowed to be used as a dog recreation space for a number of years; the dog owners there applied to convert it to official status under the ordinance, which required a number of improvements. It cost around a quarter million bucks. Reading on the topic:

11/14/04: Puppy playpens? Council mullsmethod to create canine havens
10/21/05: They say the place is going to the dogs
1/30/07: Tails wag for first sanctioned dog park
3/4/07: Tails wag the park, now set for fancy fences, close watch