The old library will remain home to Harvard’s community arts and culture center, known as Fivesparks, for at least the next five years. At its April 26 meeting, the Select Board voted unanimously to approve a five-year lease of the building to the nonprofit organization, and to forgive $12,400 in accrued rent for the time the building had to be closed during the pandemic.
Under the terms of the current lease, the group is responsible for $600 a month in rent, as well as all utilities, insurance, cleaning, snow removal, and maintenance and repairs on the inside of the building except the elevator and the heating system. That three-year lease began in 2017, but the town extended it when the building had to be closed for 10 months during construction of the accessible center entrance, and again when the pandemic forced the building to be shuttered for 18 months.
Fivesparks continued to run programs online during the pandemic, but revenue dropped significantly. The Select Board had agreed to defer rent payments for the months the building was closed, with an agreement that Fivesparks would spread the deferred rent out over future monthly payments. But this week they agreed to not only forgive the deferred rent, but also to charge only $450 a month for the first three years of the new lease to give the organization time to get back on its feet financially. The rent will increase to $600 for the last two years of the new lease, which begins on June 1 this year.
The only provision questioned by the board was one involving the elevator. Select Board member Alice von Loesecke pointed out that the language requiring elevator repairs to be completed in a week should be changed, because just getting parts for the 1988 elevator could be difficult, if not impossible. She suggested adding a clause stating that, in the event of an elevator breakdown, the building could remain open as long as the group stopped using any areas that were no longer accessible. Fivesparks board president Mark Mikitarian, who attended the meeting, said that would be only the mezzanine. Member Erin McBee said the new clause should also include a provision for rent reduction if any portion of the building could not be used while awaiting elevator repairs.
The board asked that Town Counsel Mark Lanza word the new elevator provision and review the lease; board Chair Stu Sklar will sign it when Lanza is through with it. Mikitarian told the Press that Fivesparks was grateful to the board and the community for their confidence in the organization’s “ability to fulfill the town Master Plan’s vision that the center be the social and cultural heart of the community and maintain its historic role as a central community gathering place.”
The rocky road to Fivesparks’ first lease
2007
The new library opens; the old library sits vacant.
2010
The Municipal Buildings Committee concludes that the town should keep the old library for civic use. It creates a working group whose members initiate the “pilot project,” a series of classes and events held in the old library for the purpose of determining demand for cultural activities.
2012
Based on the success of the pilot project, the Select Board agrees to lease the old library to the Center on the Common, a nonprofit arts organization run by a few pilot project members.
2013
The Center on the Common opens in January.
2014
The town closes the center in December due to lapsed rent, utility, and insurance payments. A few pilot project members form a new group, the Harvard Cultural Collaborative, and members begin developing a three-year business plan.
2015
In the fall the collaborative, seeking to lease the old library, presents its business plan to the Select Board. The process does not go smoothly; the board acknowledges that the building has been out of compliance with Architectural Access Board requirements for 30 years, and using it is a liability to the town. At one point, a Select Board member asks the collaborative if it would be willing to buy the building for $1 on the condition that it make the building accessible. Later the board decides it must know the cost of making the building accessible before leasing it to anyone.
2016
The board proclaims that all interested parties must go through the request for proposals process to lease the old library. Only the Harvard Cultural Collaborative responds to the RFP. Meanwhile, the Council on Aging offices move into the old library for six months during Hildreth House renovations despite the building’s lack of compliance with accessibility regulations.
2017
The town awards a three-year lease to the Cultural Collaborative, and it receives a three-year variance from the Massachusetts Architectural Access Board to use the back door as the only accessible entrance to the building, with the understanding that the town would need to make the entire building accessible during that time frame (which it did). The Cultural Collaborative holds its grand opening in September.
2018
The Harvard Cultural Collaborative changes its name to Fivesparks, the name of an asteroid discovered at Oak Ridge Observatory on Pinnacle Road in 1982.
—Joan Eliyesil
