Category: National Historic Preservation Act (Page 5 of 5)

The Historic Preservation Board at their October 2015 meeting at the Ephrata Cloister. [Standing L to R: Martin Rosenblum, Richard Leonori, John Conti, Susan Hannegan, Robert Armstrong, Jane Sheffield, Steven Gimber. Seated L to R: Jeff Slack, Brian Fritz, Margaret Newman, Suzanna Barucco (Chair), Richard Burkert. Not pictured: Steven Burg, Lloyd Chapman, Sherri Geary]

Pennsylvania’s Historic Preservation Board: Past, Present, And Future

February 17, 2016 / Bryan Van Sweden / 0 Comments

It’s been a happy convergence of events. As planning started for the 50th anniversary of the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA) of 1966, the PA State Historic Preservation Office announced its new name and is currently rehabilitating its office space, adapting and reusing the staff’s original office cubicles from Y2K. All that reorganizing has uncovered some long forgotten records that had been packed up and moved to the Commonwealth Keystone Building when the staff relocated here from their original home on the fifth floor of the State Museum Building. These files are an interesting look back at the early years of the federal/state partnership in historic preservation and the Historic Preservation Board. Continue reading

5 Things To Know: Section 106 and Consulting Parties

December 16, 2015 / Emma Diehl / 0 Comments

Arguably, like most any full-time hard working adult, there aren’t enough hours in the day to absorb all of the informative blogs and interesting articles regarding Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act (NHPA) of 1966 that traverse the “intra-web.” So no surprise, I recently came across a blog a mere 6 months after its initial posting that immediately grabbed my attention. On March 6, 2015, the National Trust for Historic Preservation’s Preservation Leadership Forum posted Elizabeth Merritt’s “Worst Practices for Section 106 Consultation.” Her blog very candidly captures the 10 worst approaches to Section 106, noting instead that Section 106 should in fact be a “team exercise, with all parties working together to come up with an agreed-upon solution.” Recognizing that historic preservation is a public interest, Section 106 is inherently a consultative process. But who should be included in that process or, in other words, who should be getting the invite to the party (after all, they are called consulting parties)? This blog hopes to provide some guidance on answering that question. Continue reading

CLG Soul Searching

September 16, 2015 / Andrea L. MacDonald / 1 Comment

The 1980 amendments to the National Historic Preservation Act established the Certified Local Government (CLG) program to give local governments a formal voice in the national historic preservation conversation.

The Central Market in Lancaster. The City of Lancaster is a Certified Local Government.

Let’s call out the super-powers of metaphor to explain this relationship. I often like to use the fabulously versatile bungee cord. Yes, the thing you use to keep your bike attached to the bike rack on your car or for a dozen other things. Imagine the CLG program as a bungee cord. It can expand. It can reinforce. In this metaphor, the CLG bungee cord connects the National Park Service to State Historic Preservation Offices to municipalities to citizens. The CLG bungee cord carries the energy and economic connection between the national preservation program and a local preservation program for participating local governments. Broad guidelines have been established by the National Park Service that provide the framework for participation in the CLG program; however, states have wide latitude to tailor the program to best assist the characteristics of their local governments. Continue reading

Do you know what HPF Stands For?

July 1, 2015 / Cory Kegerise / 0 Comments

Q: What do the National Register of Historic Places, Section 106 consultation, Federal Historic Preservation Tax Credits, Certified Local Government grants, Tribal preservation activities, and Historically Black Colleges and Universities have in common?

A: All of these programs (and more) are supported by the Historic Preservation Fund. Continue reading

Ceramic figurine uncovered along I-95 in Fishtown. Courtesy of PennDOT.

Digging Deep: Pennsylvania and the Making Archaeology Public Initiative

May 20, 2015 / Guest Contributor / 2 Comments

by Joe Baker, PennDOT Cultural Resources Program

Dr. Frank Vento along the banks of the Susquehanna River. Photo by Joe Baker.

On a lovely morning in early autumn, I arrive at an old farm along the Susquehanna River to find Dr Frank Vento in his natural element. That is to say, he is squatting down at the bottom of backhoe trench some eight feet deep, carefully examining the many layers of flood-deposited sediment left behind by the great river. Frank is a geomorphologist: a geologist and archaeologist whose specialty is the formation of floodplains, terraces, and other kinds of landforms created by the interaction of climate, gravity, water, wind, and sometimes, humans. Frank is down there looking for something, and as I walk up to the edge of the trench, he finds it.

“Hah! I knew it!” Continue reading

Before the (Next) Storm: The Disaster Planning for Historic Properties Initiative

February 4, 2015 / Jeremy R. Young / 3 Comments

The Pennsylvania State Historic Preservation Office (PA SHPO) is pleased to announce that it has begun moving forward on an exciting and historic new initiative to continue through 2017.

Special funding awarded by the National Park Service following Hurricane Sandy has enabled the PA SHPO to assist select counties with prioritizing their communities’ historic properties during the pre-disaster planning process—to help ensure they are better protected the next time a major disaster strikes the Keystone State. Continue reading

Preservation at 50: Planning for the Anniversary of the National Historic Preservation Act

December 17, 2014 / Cory Kegerise / 2 Comments

I am dismayed to learn from reading this report that almost half of the twelve thousand structures listed in the Historic American Buildings Survey of the National Park Service have already been destroyed. This a serious loss and it underlines the necessity for prompt action if we are not to shirk our duty to the future.

– Lady Bird Johnson in With Heritage So Rich, 1966

In the waning months of 1964, a small group of preservation advocates, beleaguered by nearly two decades of Federal transportation and urban renewal programs that decimated historic communities across the country, gathered to strategize about a new national framework for historic preservation. They wondered whether the “progress” ushered in by the post war economic boom could be redefined in ways that would respect, and even enhance, historic places? Those efforts would eventually lead, in October 1966, to the adoption of the National Historic Preservation Act, the most comprehensive and fully articulated law protecting historic places in the United States.

The country is preparing to mark the 50^th anniversary of the NHPA in 2016, and there are many preservation accomplishments to celebrate, but also much left to be done. Preservation50, a coalition of national preservation organizations and agencies is organizing the celebration of the NHPA anniversary and they need your input and involvement. Continue reading

Crossing the line: Meeting our SHPO colleagues from across the Northeast

November 5, 2014 / Cory Kegerise / 0 Comments

By Cory Kegerise and Serena Bellew

From time to time, Bureau for Historic Preservation staffers are asked about how a particular process, form, or issue affecting historic resources in Pennsylvania is handled in different states. Fortunately, in the age of e-communication there are websites and listserves to provide answers to most of these questions. But no matter what field you’re in, nothing can replace some old-fashioned face-to-face interaction with peers and colleagues from other places to help bring a fresh perspective to your day-to-day work. And so, in that spirit, representatives from State Historic Preservation Offices from Maryland to New Hampshire gathered in New Castle, Delaware on October 28 & 29 for two days of information exchange and networking with each other, the National Park Service, and the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation. Continue reading

Getting to Know the Pennsylvania Historic Preservation Board

February 26, 2014 / Andrea L. MacDonald / 1 Comment

If you haven’t participated in a Pennsylvania National Register nomination you may not have experienced a Historic Preservation Board meeting. But that shouldn’t stop you! The meetings are open to the public and we welcome all preservation aficionados to attend a future meeting. The 2014 schedule is posted on our website. The nominations to be reviewed at an upcoming meeting will also be posted to the website about one month prior to the scheduled meeting.

The purpose of the Historic Preservation Board is to provide expert judgments about the historical, architectural, and archeological significance of resources in Pennsylvania as authorized by Section 101 of the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, as amended, and Sections 504 and 505 of the Pennsylvania History Code. Continue reading