Preservation & Sustainability--Resources You Can Use

High Falls, Rochester NY

This weekend, The Landmark Society will be joining over 40 other organizations, businesses, and agencies as a vendor at the Greentopia Festival in High Falls. You might wonder, what is the purpose of this Greentopia and how does it possibly relate to The Landmark Society and historic preservation? First, the event itself is designed to celebrate the green movement, showcase what the region is doing to contribute to the movement, and open up a discussion about what sustainability and "green" really mean.

Genesee Valley Park, Rochester NY

That's where we come in. Although preservation isn't usually the first thing that leaps to most peoples minds' when they hear the words "green" or "sustainable," reusing our existing building stock, preserving our historic landscapes and rural spaces, and reinvesting in our urban centers and rural villages are all examples of recycling on a large scale. And, of course, there are added environmental benefits to preservation--most historic neighborhoods are walkable, older buildings were built to last with high quality materials, and most older buildings incorporate green features such as double-hung windows with operable upper and lower sash that allow you to maximize passive ventilation rather than blast the A/C.

Erie Canal & converted grain tower,
Pittsford NY

So come visit me this weekend at The Landmark Society's table at Greentopia--I and other friendly Landmark Society staff will be there all weekend. I'll be more than happy to share with you why preservation is a necessary part of ensuring the health and sustainability of our communities. Or, if you're reading this post after Greentopia, explore some of the links below to learn more about preservation and sustainability and, more importantly, how you can help save our planet by saving our historic resources.

If you only read one thing, take a look at this article from the National Trust's Preservation Magazine:
A Cautionary Tale--Amid our green-building boom, why neglecting the old in favor of the new just might cost us dearly. By Wayne Curtis.

From us, The Landmark Society:
8 reasons why preservation is an environmentally friendly activity
The Greenest Building - display board from Greentopia
Embodied Energy - display board from Greentopia
Preservation Tips - display board from Greentopia

From CITY Newspaper:
Closing the door on vinyl windows

From the National Trust for Historic Preservation:
Sustainability & Historic Preservation
Weatherization Guide
Window Know-How: A Guide to Going Green
Historic Wood Windows Tip Sheet
Energy Efficient Strategies - Cold Climates
Energy Efficient Strategies - Main Street

From the NY State Historic Preservation Office:
Weatherization Toolkit

From Old House Journal:
Weatherstripping 101 (the print version of this article has more helpful photos and inserts)

The Greenest Building - This website calculates the amount of embodied energy contained in an existing building and the amount of energy required to demolish a building. You can even convert those numbers into gallons of gasoline.


Caitlin Meives is Preservation Planner with The Landmark Society. She'll be spending this weekend celebrating her two favorite things--the natural and the historic built environments.

Green Strategies workshop: There's still time to register!

There's still time to register for next week's "Green Strategies for Historic Buildings" seminar, which will be held June 4 in the Eisenhart Auditorium of the Rochester Museum & Science Center. This daylong professional workshop is aimed at architects, developers, property owners/managers, planners, engineers, and anyone else who works with historic buildings and wants to improve their energy performance.

The presenter will be Jean Carroon, Principal for Preservation at Goody Clancy, a Boston design firm. She has received national recognition for her achievements in the field of sustainable design for historic buildings. Our colleagues at the Preservation League of NYS, who heard Jean give a similar presentation last year, report that she is an excellent speaker and exceptionally knowledgeable about the topic. I'm very much looking forward to learning from her!

Learn more and register now for this exciting educational opportunity!

The workshop is presented by the National Preservation Institute; cosponsors are The Landmark Society, the Preservation League of New York State and AIA New York State.

Posted by Katie Eggers Comeau, Director of Preservation Services

Your Old House: Masonry Repairs

I am a little delinquent in writing up my impressions of the April 27 “Your Old House” workshop, featuring Marty Naber of Naberhood Restorations. My tardiness is in no way a reflection of my enjoyment of the workshop – it was a very informative session, and I learned a lot!

Marty Naber has been spending the past week on the roof of our headquarters building, the historic Hoyt-Potter house in Corn Hill, where he is faithfully reconstructing our chimneys. Some masons do not particularly enjoy working on chimneys, steeples, or other locations high in the air, but Marty and his team thrive on it! Chimney restoration is his favorite type of masonry project.

Most homeowners will not (and should not!) attempt to restore their own chimneys, so the portions of Marty’s talk devoted to his work with chimneys were not so much about hands-on projects that homeowners should attack themselves, as about what a contractor should be doing. For example, Marty mentioned that most homeowners do not go on their own roofs, cannot see all sides of their chimney, and may have no idea that there is a problem with their chimney until a roofer mentions it. In that situation, ideally, the chimney should be repaired first, followed by the roof, but in reality, roofers will often finish their project first, then tell the homeowner, “by the way, you need your chimney rebuilt.” Marty’s team can deal with this sequence, but he said it is much better to do it the other way around. Marty showed illustrations of the right and wrong ways to repair chimneys, some of the most common types of repairs his company makes, and explained why these repairs are necessary.

In addition to their chimney work, Marty’s company does stucco and cobblestone repairs the old-fashioned way (with results virtually indistinguishable from the original work), and repairs brick and stone walkways, steps, and so on. His presentation showed fine illustrations of all of these types of projects.

Our workshop participants (including myself) came prepared with questions about their particular masonry dilemmas, and we discovered that our group included people with early-19^thth century. century houses all the way up through the early-20 I was glad to find out that the discoloration on my stucco house, which initially really bothered me when I bought my house but which I’ve since come to appreciate as a “patina,” can be cleaned if I want to do so but is a normal and harmless phenomenon. I was also surprised to find out that Marty is not opposed to all masonry sealants; he said there are some one-way sealers that form a barrier while allowing the masonry to breathe, and under certain conditions, these products can be helpful. (That said, I wouldn’t advise anyone to experiment with these unless you know what you’re doing!)

We warmly thank Marty for his presentation, and for his careful work on our historic building!

Posted by Katie Eggers Comeau, Director of Preservation Services

Debunking the window-replacement myth

This weekend's Washington Post had an article saying what we keep saying: there are much more cost-effective (not to mention historically appropriate) ways to increase your house's energy efficiency than wood window replacement. Our colleague Erin Tobin, a Rochester native who now covers eastern New York State and New York City as a regional director of technical and grant programs for the Preservation League of New York State, had this comment on the article:

At least this article debunks the myth that replacing windows will save lots of money in energy bills, although it does repeat the falsehood that replacement windows will last for "decades" (how about "decade" if you're lucky). I'm glad to see the quotes from some of the energy auditors, but who is talking to the federal Energy Star people? Not even a mention of storm windows? And nothing about screens and summertime efficiency (aka fresh air).

The point Erin makes about the short lifespan of replacement windows is one I make in my own talks on sustainability, and I like to cite Donovan Rypkema, a historic preservation expert who says: "Regardless of the manufacturers’ 'lifetime warranties', thirty percent of the windows being replaced each year are less than 10 years old." Throwing out vinyl windows after less than 10 years doesn't sound all that "green," does it?

Posted by Katie Eggers Comeau, Director of Preservation Services

"This Old Wasteful House"

Be sure to check out the recent New York Times Op-Ed piece by Richard Moe, president of the National Trust for Historic Preservation, on how appropriate energy upgrades to older houses can address some of our country's most pressing needs:

We need to reduce energy consumption and carbon emissions. We want to create jobs, and revitalize the neighborhoods where millions of Americans live. All of this could be accomplished by making older homes more energy-efficient.

Posted by Katie Eggers Comeau, Director of Preservation Services

Great news for a 1950s icon!

Today's Democrat and Chronicle has some excellent news about one of my favorite post-WWII buildings: the former Donuts Delite building has been purchased by the owner of Salvatore's Pizzeria, who plans to rehabilitate the building as a new location for his pizza franchise. He also plans to expand his usual offerings to include a modest breakfast menu, including - of course - doughnuts!

Donuts Delite is one of the buildings that our Recent Past Subcommittee has been interested in. We've met with city officials and neighbors who shared our concern that the building, at a very busy intersection, might fall victim to the big-box/drugstore trend. It's great to read in the article that the owner specifically did not want to sell to anyone who might demolish the building; after all, it represents his family's legacy.

The one phrase in the article that gave me a little bit of pause was where the reporter stated that the new owner plans to do some work "to give the place a '50s feel." If anyplace in Rochester already has a '50s feel, it's Donuts Delite! It's great that the new owner wants to restore the floors and booths, but I would suggest that he stick to restoring the fabulous 1950s elements that are already there, rather than introducing new elements like tin ceilings that do not relate to the building's actual history. It will be really interesting to see what he does about signage: the neon Donuts Delite sign is a strong character-defining element.

I'll be sending the new owner some information about tax credits and other preservation incentives. He may not realize that his building can qualify as "historic!"

Posted by Katie Eggers Comeau, Director of Preservation Services

Buffalo News editorial supports rehab tax credit

From today's Buffalo News:

Pass a rehab tax credit

Program benefits aging neighborhoods without immediate cost impact on state

Now is the time to expand the state’s Rehabilitation Tax Credit program, a move that would spur job-creating house and business reconstruction while initially costing the state little in the way of revenues. The legislation—introduced again by Assemblyman Sam Hoyt and Sens. David Valesky and Antoine Thompson—has been honed through years of effort, and the latest version should overcome the objections voiced by the governor when he vetoed last year’s bill.

The bill language this year makes significant changes in response to the cost issue, limiting the program to distressed areas for both commercial and residential historic properties and sunsetting it in 2014. The bill still caps per-project funding.

There is no cost to New York State in the 2009-10 budget cycle from this program, which would start providing meaningful state-level building rehabilitation tax credits at the beginning of next year. Just knowing that the program would be available in 2010 would let developers launch new projects based on the financial promise that the program holds.

The key piece in Gov. David A. Paterson’s veto message was that the program needed to be included in budget negotiations. That pitch was made during the fall in an accelerated budget process, to no avail. So, attention turned to persuading the Legislature to add this program. The result is a stronger bill with more effective incentive levels, which at the same time gives more fiscal cost certainty to New York State. One of the key points is the offering of a five-year sunset, making it easier to approve a program that works in terms of the credit rate and the other key components while setting a time to evaluate the effectiveness of the program before considering a renewal.

The rehab tax incentive concept holds promise for renewing time-damaged neighborhoods in places like Buffalo and some of its surrounding communities. That rejuvenation means not only jobs but economic redevelopment at very local levels through construction starts, job creation and putting buildings back into reuse. This year’s bill does a good job of meeting economic stimulus goals while not making the program too expensive for the state.

Posted by Katie Eggers Comeau, Director of Preservation Services

Green Strategies for Historic Buildings: June 4 Workshop

We know that preservation is inherently green, but how do we put that into practice when working with historic buildings?

The Landmark Society is delighted to be working with our statewide colleagues at the Preservation League of New York State to bring an exciting new program on that very topic to Rochester. On June 4, 2009, the National Preservation Institute will present a daylong seminar, “Green Strategies for Historic Buildings,” at the Rochester Museum & Science Center’s Eisenhart Auditorium.

Jean Carroon, FAIA, LEED AP, will present the practical applications of using green building strategies for historic structures, demonstrating how the environmental goal of “reduce, reuse, recycle” can enhance the capital cost competitiveness of preservation projects. Workshop participants will also review the LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) standards used to assess building performance and focus on preservation challenges relating to energy efficiency, windows, lighting, indoor air quality, HVAC, and local and national codes and regulations.

This seminar is aimed at professionals who work with historic buildings: architects, engineers, facility managers, developers, etc.

We're really excited about this seminar. NPI is presenting 48 workshops this year throughout the country, but ours is the only one in New York State, and one of only two in the northeastern U.S.! Wouldn't it be great to demonstrate our region's support for preservation and sustainability with record-breaking turnout?

More information, including a registration form, can be found on our website.

Posted by Katie Eggers Comeau, Director of Preservation Services

Making the Case for Preservation in Tough Economic Times

This is our 100th blog post on Confessions of a Preservationist! We all got a bit swamped in January catching up from the holidays and getting a few new staff members oriented, but now that February is here, we look forward to keeping up this blog more regularly.

Daniel Mackay, Director of Public Policy for the Preservation League of New York State, testified this week at a hearing of the New York State Senate Finance and Assembly Ways and Means Committees regarding economic development initiatives, making a strong case that an expanded tax credit for the rehabilitation of historic properties in distressed areas is a critical tool for stimulating the economy:

If New York is to be successful in preserving open space, working farmland and curbing sprawl, economic development must be directed back to existing municipal infrastructure, and that will require recognition and reuse of New York State’s extraordinary legacy of historic buildings in our commercial downtowns and residential neighborhoods across the Empire State.

Because New York State faces a severe budget challenge, now is the time to prioritize implementation of the tools and programs that target public and private reinvestment where it is most needed, in ways that most effectively leverage private and federal dollars for community renewal and economic reinvestment, and in ways that most aggressively and immediately meet economic stimulus benchmarks.

The program that meets these tests and serves these goals is an expanded New York State Rehabilitation Tax Credit. Legislation will shortly be introduced by Senator David Valesky and Assemblymember Sam Hoyt which will effectively and appropriately expand this program, direct stimulus and rehabilitation activity to distressed areas, and contain costs for New York State…

The Preservation League, and a diverse and growing partnership of business leaders, municipal officials, economic development interests, and a wide array of environmental and preservation organizations [including the Landmark Society] are joining together in a campaign entitled “Reinvest New York” to promote inclusion of this program in the enacted 2009-2010 New York State Budget…

Implementation of an expanded New York State Rehabilitation Tax Credit program represents a targeted investment in the downtowns and historic neighborhoods that form the core of municipalities across New York State, and represents exactly the type of investment that New York State should make in difficult economic and budgetary times: a targeted tool that leverages significant federal and private investment and delivers proven results and benefits to municipalities across New York State.

- Excerpts from the testimony of Daniel Mackay, Director of Public Policy, Preservation League of New York State, at the Senate Finance and Assembly Ways and Means Committees’ Joint Legislative Hearing on the 2009-2010 Executive Budget Regarding Economic Development Initiatives, Wednesday, February 3, 2009.

Daniel shared figures demonstrating that in Maryland, Missouri and Rhode Island, three states with effective tax credit programs similar to the one we are hoping to enact in New York State, the economic benefits far outweigh the expenditures on the program. For example, in Rhode Island, every $1 million in state tax credit investment leverages $5.35 million in total economic output. In other words, the program more than pays for itself – it generates income for the state and creates jobs while improving our communities.

In the face of a very challenging budget climate, we’ll continue to work with the Preservation League to make the case that focusing our limited resources on the revitalization of our existing downtowns and historic neighborhoods is a wise investment with a tremendous payoff in the financial and environmental health of our state.

By Katie Eggers Comeau, Director of Preservation Services

Vote for Preservation!

This appeared on the PreservationNation blog yesterday, posted by Jason Clement, online content provider for the National Trust for Historic Preservation:

For so many reasons, this past presidential election was like nothing we’ve ever seen - online that is.

With the candidates YouTube-ing, their advisors Twitter-ing and pretty much everyone Facebook-ing, we had a front-row seat to see politics get a daytime talk show-style makeover. And now that we’ve picked a president and he’s just days away from taking office, we have another avenue for getting involved online.

The YouTube video (see!) above is from Valerie Jarrett, a co-chair of the Obama-Biden Transition Team. In it, she describes an innovative new project on Change.gov, the always-open online office of President-Elect Obama. Called the Citizen’s Briefing Book, it’s an opportunity for viewers to not only make policy suggestions for the new president, but to see and vote on the ideas of their fellow users. At the end of the project, the topics that are voted the most popular will make their way to Obama’s desk in the Oval Office.

All you need to do it visit Change.gov and register - a necessary (yet quick and easy) step in order to participate. Next, search the idea pool for “Historic Preservation.” You’ll find a variety of topics related to our mission, including this popular entry entitled “Historic Preservation is Sustainability:”

The National Historic Preservation Program is essential for the funding of public and private initiatives to advance sustainability. Financial tools to improve energy efficiency in buildings must include assistance for owners of historic buildings, both residential and commercial, to rehabilitate and upgrade their properties in accordance with historic preservation standards.

Maximizing the contribution of historic preservation to the green economy and sustainability requires a skilled labor force.

Global climate change leads to increasingly devastating natural disasters that require a comprehensive approach to the protection of historic sites and communities.

Infrastructure rehabilitation and improvements are critical to the preservation and sustainability of our historic urban and rural communities.

To this end, expanding resources for the National Historic Preservation Program is critical to providing the infrastructure needed for the stewardship and sustainability of the built environment.

You’ll see the rating of each idea once you open them. The goal is to “vote up” ideas like the one above (which is already at over 1,500 and counting) that are related to our preservation goals.

And of course, if you have a spare moment after doing your voting up, consider leaving comments as well (use our policy platform if you need help making the case). This is, after all, a public forum designed to uncover what the people feel are the most pressing issues facing our nation today. It’s critical that, when given “open government” opportunities like this, we all act as thought-leaders by demonstrating how preservation is so much more than just standing in front of bulldozers.

Posted by Katie Eggers Comeau, Director of Preservation Services

Three-minute preservation action item

Happy new year! Kristen Harbeson of the National Council of State Historic Preservation Officers has alerted us to another opportunity to let the incoming Obama administration know that historic preservation is the greenest tool for stimulating the economy while building stronger communities. I quote from Kristen's email:

As we have mentioned before in this forum, the Obama administration has provided a remarkable tool to communicate with the President-Elect’s policy team through the website www.change.gov. The e-mail this morning from John Podesta asks people to vote on the importance of questions that people have submitted to the incoming administration.

I encourage you to make the Preservation voice heard by taking just a few minutes to do the following:
1) Go to http://change.gov/page/content/openforquestions20081229/
2) You may need to sign in or create a username.
3) There is a box that allows you to “Search Questions.” Type in “Historic Preservation.”
4) Click the check on each of the questions to indicate that you think they are important questions.
5) WATCH OUT, though, for the sneaky question that talks about Historic Preservation as a “Land-Grab” to benefit the rich [and potentially other questions that are not actually preservation-friendly].

It takes just a few minutes, and may make a difference in the reception of your preservation advocates when they approach the new administration. If you submit preservation questions, you may want to let us know so that we can continue to spread the word to make sure your issues are addressed on Capitol Hill and in the White House.

I wish you all a very good New Year,
Kristen Harbeson
National Conference of State Historic Preservation Officers

Please take a couple of minutes to do this, and if you have other questions for the administration regarding historic preservation, please do so, so that the rest of us may vote on them! New questions are submitted every day, so check back in a few days to see if there are more opportunities to vote for preservation.

Posted by Katie Eggers Comeau, Director of Preservation Services

Preserving Susan B. Anthony's Neighborhood

For about a year, the Susan B. Anthony Neighborhood Association has been working together with the Landmark Society on a mini-grant program for homeowners in the Susan B. Anthony Preservation District. Funding for this project came from the sale of two houses that were donated to the Landmark Society and sold to new owners a few years ago.*

The mini-grant program got underway in the fall of 2007. We had 12 applications and all applicants were granted monies for exterior repairs to their homes. The program has been successful with over eight completed projects this year and three scheduled for early next spring.

Because the Susan B. Anthony neighborhood is a city-designated Preservation District, all exterior projects must be in-kind replacement or must be approved by the Preservation Board in advance. This can be a challenge. Our local chain hardware stores do not carry the same width or styles of posts that were used on our pre-Civil War era homes.

At the same time, working on these old houses can have unexpected rewards. One project became a community effort to repair front porch steps and railings. On a very cold November day a tent was erected over the front porch at 37 Madison St. The homeowner and several neighbors came together for five days under that tent to recreate the exact porch rails and steps that needed repair or replacement. They spent days on details to recreate the exact posts and rails that were original to the home. The collaboration amongst neighbors ensured that the finished project was designed exactly as it was designed over a century ago. Now the tent is gone and the front porch and stairs look exactly as they were originally designed, and will remain so for many years to come. It was enjoyable as a friend and neighbor to watch every day as they worked together under that tent and progressed on their project. Historic preservation grant programs can do more than preserve properties; they also can nurture and preserve the communities they serve!

By Dawn Noto, President, Susan B. Anthony Neighborhood Association

*An earlier phase of this project, in which architect John Bero met with individual homeowners to discuss maintenance and rehabilitation issues, was partially funded by a grant from the John E. Streb Fund of the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

Two Big Projects Taking Shape

At the end of today’s Preservation Issues Committee meeting, one participant commented, “that was a meaty meeting!”

It was indeed. We discussed two very large projects that have the potential to significantly reshape key areas in our region.

One of the two is a project called CityGate, where a developer proposes to demolish a complex of nine National Register-eligible buildings and redevelop the site as a mixed-use complex. This property is at the southeast corner of Westfall and East Henrietta roads, and was formerly the Iola campus, a tuberculosis sanitarium developed between 1911-1931. The complex has been determined eligible for the National Register due to its architecture (representing early-20th century institutional architecture; the work of German-trained architect Siegmund Firestone plus three notable Rochester architects) and for its social history, as a public health facility.

The site has very few neighbors, and thus far, there has been very little public interest in the project and few public comments. The Landmark Society is one of the few parties to have commented in the past, and we are currently working on our comments on the current iteration of the design. I would like to very strongly encourage anyone with an interest in urban design, historic preservation, planning, sustainability, adaptive reuse, etc., to take a look at what is proposed for the site and submit your comments. To do so, go to this site and click the link for the CityGate Draft Generic Environmental Impact Statement. It’s a big file and may take a long time to download; hang in there!

The majority of today’s meeting was devoted to a detailed presentation by Mark Tayrien of LaBella Associates and Dorraine Laudisi of the City of Rochester regarding the Midtown project, focusing on the City’s vision for the site, the process of making decisions regarding the historic buildings (the State Historic Preservation Office has determined that the entire Midtown site is eligible for the National Register of Historic Places), and the procedure for public input.

We were pleased that our committee was the first audience for the city’s brand-new outreach presentation that will be presented to a series of audiences as the city seeks broad public input on this very significant downtown project. We have a small team reviewing the planning documents in detail and preparing official Landmark Society comments. I also encourage everyone interested in the future of downtown Rochester to review and comment; the relevant documents are located here. There are quite a few documents posted; go first to the Draft Generic Environmental Impact Statement, dated November 10. You might also want to look at specific appendices, notably Appendix G, which deals with historic issues. It was clear from the presentation, and from the DGEIS, that some big decisions regarding the future of the site are not yet set in stone and the time is ripe for public input.

Comments on both projects should be submitted to Dorraine Laudisi at the city of Rochester (Dorraine.Laudisi AT CityofRochester.gov); please send us a copy! Dorraine told us today that the City is very eager to receive and incorporate comments from the public, particularly from people with expertise in planning, design, and historic preservation. She and her colleagues really rely on these comments to help guide the City’s decision-making, and to help them steer the developers toward the best possible outcomes.

Posted by Katie Eggers Comeau, Advocacy Coordinator

Seen the new phone book?

Have you seen the new 2009 white pages? The new book prominently features a vignette from the Susan B. Anthony neighborhood, one of Rochester's eight preservation districts. This compact neighborhood includes a nearly intact streetscape of vernacular 19th-century houses lining all sides of a picturesque central square, which is now adorned by the magnificent sculpture "Let's Have Tea" by a local artist (who can see his creation from his front window).

The house in the background is one of the neighborhood's best success stories from the past few years. A few years ago, new owners purchased and rehabilitated this house, formerly one of the most problematic properties in the neighborhood. Today it is one of the most distinctive houses on the square, and the owners have gone on to rehabilitate other properties on King Street. Thanks largely to their efforts, King Street looks much better than it did a few years ago and is no longer riddled with vacancies. The photos below show the house before, during, and after rehabilitation.

Congratulations to residents Michael Warfield and Angel Licea for the great work on their house, and to Pepsy Kettavong, the sculptor of "Let's Have Tea" - what a joy to see their work so prominently featured for all of the Rochester region to admire all year long!

By Katie Eggers Comeau, Advocacy Coordinator

Preservation Priorities for a New Administration

What should President-Elect Obama do to support historic preservation? The National Trust for Historic Preservation is asking people who value historic buildings, landscapes and communities to weigh in on their top priorities and to submit comments and suggestions as they prepare their official platform for preservation, to be shared with the new administration.

Vote on your priorities and submit stories, recommendations, and advice from your perspective here.

Posted by Katie Eggers Comeau, Advocacy Coordinator