Historical Commission approves three CPC applications ahead of Oct. 7 deadline

SUDBURY -- September 20, 2022, Sudbury Historical Commission approved three CPC applications and gave a skeptical hearing to a $100,000 Olmsted garden request. The commission voted unanimously to submit a $35,000 application for an Indigenous cultural landscape study drafted by member Catherine McGrath, and authorized two additional applications, for further historic property inventories and a Hosmer House cultural landscape, building and collection study, with dollar amounts to be set at the October meeting. Sudbury Valley Trustees facilities manager Brandon Park sought support to stabilize a leaning eight-and-a-half-foot Olmsted-designed retaining wall at Wolbach Farm, but member Diana Warren, a former seven-year CPC member, said she did not see the committee "approving a grant in the ballpark of $100,000 for just a partial rehabilitation of a, quote unquote, historic garden." The commission also authorized final review of consultant Peter Benton's Historic Preservation Plan before the Sept. 30 invoice deadline.