CRWA RECEIVES $75,000 GRANT TO FUND THIRD YEAR OF ENVIRONMENTALLY SENSITIVE URBAN DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM

Boston Foundation money to address potential environmental benefits of large-scale
development in the watershed

Weston, MA -- Charles River Watershed Association (CRWA), a leading environmental organization headquartered in Weston, today announced that it received a $75,000 grant from the Boston Foundation to fund the final phase of a three-year project to develop an environmentally sustainable urban development approach for the Boston area.  CRWA is working on water and open space issues in three densely developed areas of North Allston, Zakim North and Longwood Medical and Academic Area (LMA) to demonstrate how urban design and development can enhance the community and the environment. 

Using these demonstration projects, CRWA hopes to create development guidelines that can accelerate permitting while enhancing the environment. Recognizing that in an urban environment redevelopment offers the best opportunity for environmental restoration, CRWA is working with municipalities, community groups, government officials and developers to maximize opportunities to link development to larger infrastructure improvements and leverage additional resources.

CRWA’s work involves resource assessments, systems analyses and integration, outreach and education, legal research, and feasibility studies, all with one goal:  beginning to restore urban environments by finding ways to make the built environment act more like the natural environment.  It is our hope that the work we are doing in the three project areas will make real change in the way land and water resources in those places are designed and managed, restoring environmental resources and creating a checklist for developers that will help them get to “go” more quickly.

As part of their work to support environmentally sensitive urban development in the LMA, the Charles River Watershed Association is hosting a public “Blue Cities” forum on May 2 from 6-8:30 p.m. at Emmanuel College, 400 The Fenway, Boston.  For more information on the forum, contact Pallavi Mande at pmande@crwa.org.

CRWA sees redevelopment as an opportunity to create an urban landscape that works with the environment rather than against it.  “The key to successful urban environments,” according to Kate Bowditch, Project Manager at CRWA, “is to understand the way land and water work, and to create built systems that mimic nature.  People embrace these ideas pretty quickly once they start to think about them.” CRWA, founded in 1965, is a community-based nonprofit organization responsible for protecting the 80-mile-long Charles River and its 308 square mile watershed, using sound science, advocacy and legal expertise to understand and correct problems related to the environment. 

The Boston Foundation, one of the nation’s oldest and largest community foundations, has an endowment of close to $770 million.  Last year, the Foundation made grants of $63.9 million to nonprofit organizations and received gifts of $73.6 million.  The Boston Foundation is made up of more than 850 separate charitable funds, which have been established by donors either for the general benefit of the community or for special purposes.  The Foundation also serves as a civic leader, convener and sponsor of special initiatives designed to build community.  For more information about the Boston Foundation and its grant making, visit www.tbf.org or call 617-338-1700.

“We are delighted that the Boston Foundation has provided funding for the final year of this project,” said Robert Zimmerman, executive director of CRWA. “The best science and the best economics have taught us that urban development needs to mimic nature and restore degraded environments.  That kind of design is good for people, good for the river, and good for developers, whose property values go up.”

For more information about the Boston Foundation and its grant making, visit www.tbf.org, or call 617-338-1700. For more information about the work of the Charles River Watershed Association, visit www.charlesriver.org, or call 781-788-0007.