Education

Trash boom and volunteers keep Malden River cleaner

By  Karen Buck “Welcome to my office,” I recently told Malden city councilors and officials when I took them on a canoe tour of the Malden River, a waterway I cherish. I was happy to tell them that, thanks to the installation of a trash boom on the river and the hard work of volunteers, “my office” was getting cleaner. Consider the math: Since midsummer, the Trash Free Malden River Project, funded by the Massachusetts Environmental Trust (MET), has recruited 74 volunteers who donated 316 hours for clean up. We collected 1,120 single use plastic bottles, 976 alcoholic “nips,” 57 pounds of dry polystrene (Styrofoam), and 300 pounds of miscellaneous trash from the river. Some of this trash would have flowed down the Malden River into the Mystic River and may have continued into the Boston Harbor. Some of this trash would have been caught by the vegetation along the shoreline, disrupting the balance of nature. Without any cleanups, all of the plastic trash would have degraded into microplastics in the water, ruining our ecosystem […]

Arts

Malden Reads catches fire: The timeless themes of Fahrenheit 451

A book that imagines a future without books inspired activities during opening-day celebrations on Jan. 11 for the tenth anniversary of Malden Reads: One City, One Book. Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury’s landmark dystopian novel, has been selected for the “NEA Big Read: Malden 2020”  – the first time Malden Reads has picked a classic novel as a book for the entire city to read and ponder. A host of events are planned to explore the novel’s themes, including film screenings, discussions, a podcast series, youth activities, and a presentation on Bradbury’s life and influence. Copies of the book are available at the Malden Public Library, including translated print versions, audio and electronic formats. This year, Malden Reads was selected as one of only 78 nonprofit organizations nationwide to receive an NEA Big Read grant. An initiative of the National Endowment for the Arts in partnership with Arts Midwest, the mission of the NEA Big Read is “to broaden our understanding of our world, our communities, and ourselves through the joy of sharing a good book.” […]

Education

Who was Elisha Converse?

2020 marks the 200th anniversary year of the birth of Elisha Slade Converse, the first mayor of Malden and a major benefactor to the city. The video, “Who Was Elisha Converse?” (posted below) was produced by youth this past summer as part of the Mayor’s Summer Youth Employment Program (MSYEP). Fengying Guo, Bridget Gately, and Joshua Dube worked at MATV, Malden’s Media Center (soon to be UMA) to co-produce this six-minute video. “The most interesting thing to me about Elisha Converse was researching and learning about his incredible impact on Malden,” said Gately. “But what stuck out to me was his project on the creation of Fellsmere Pond after the burning of the Boston Rubber Shoe Company and how he paid all of his workers when they were out of work following the fire.” “Before we started the Converse project, I knew nothing about our first mayor, but I learned a lot about him as we worked on this project,” said Guo. “We all worked together to do research and we attended two of the […]

Education

Is the Grass Really Greener?

By Joanne Elie On Monday, November 25, 2019, the City of Malden met with members of the Malden community and the Malden City Council to unveil the design of the Roosevelt Park Improvement Project at a public information meeting. Many in attendance expressed their apprehensions about turf. Kathleen Sullivan, a fifth-grade science teacher who attended the meeting, is one of many who is not for turf. “Removing natural grass is detrimental to our environment. Artificial turf raises surface temperatures and creates a heat island effect while grass cools the surface naturally through transpiration. Turf is counterproductive to the work we need to do as a society to combat the effects of climate change.” Megan Buczynski, principal engineer for Activitas, Inc. the landscape design company working on the project, responds to the heat effect turf may produce. “The organic infill we plan to use reduces the heat on the field vs the rubber that is more commonly used in other fields.” The Geo infill referred to is a material that is 100% environmentally friendly. Geo infill […]

Education

ELECTION 2019: Final Questions for Candidates: Political Philosophy & Campaign Team

    By Prisco Tammaro The 2019 elections in Malden are approaching. The Municipal Election will be held on Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2019. To provide Malden voters with information, Neighborhood View  has been running a series of “Quality of Life” questions and answers with the city council and mayoral candidates. Suggestions for questions were provided via Facebook on a Malden (MA) Politic’s poll; 10 questions were formulated by the moderators in consultation with Neighborhood View and sent to all  candidates. Each candidate was given 150 words to respond to each question. Every effort was made to reach out to every candidate. Below are answers to Question 9 and 10. Question 9 focuses on political philosophy and Question 10 asks about campaign committees.  Please note: all opinions here are those of the candidates and Neighborhood View has not checked the accuracy of these comments. See links for previous questions at the bottom of this page.  QUESTION 9: As an elected official, what is your philosophy? Is it your responsibility to follow the will of the voters […]

Education

Malden Works receives Norman B. Leventhal Prize to improve access to the Malden River

Due to an editing error, an earlier version of this story misattributed quotes on the Leventhal jury process  to to Kathleen Vandiver; the quotes  should have been attributed to Marcia Manong. Neighborhood View regrets the error.   By Kevin Perrington-Turner A Malden urban coalition has won a prestigious $100,000 prize from the Norman B. Leventhal Center for Advanced Urbanism (LCAU) at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) that will be used to fund a two-year program of projects on the Malden River to create greater access to the river for Malden’s diverse population. Malden Works for Waterfront Equity and Resilience, known as Malden Works, was named the winner of the first Norman B. Leventhal City Prize in September. Malden Works has formed a steering committee to ensure all communities are represented in upcoming projects. The $100,000 triennial prize was established by the Leventhal Center for Advanced Urbanism to catalyze innovative, interdisciplinary urban design and planning approaches worldwide to improve both the environment and the quality of life for residents. “The prize was a really difficult competitive […]

Education

ELECTION 2019: Questions for the Candidates: Week 4 of 5 – Housing Needs

  By Prisco Tammaro The 2019 elections in Malden are approaching. The Municipal Election will be held on Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2019. To provide Malden voters with information, Neighborhood View is running a series of “Quality of Life” questions and answers with the city council and mayoral candidates. Suggestions for questions were provided via Facebook on a Malden (MA) Politic’s poll; 10 questions were formulated by the moderators in consultation with Neighborhood View and sent to all  candidates. Each candidate was given 150 words to respond to each question. Every effort was made to reach out to every candidate. Below are answers to Question 7 and 8 which focus on housing needs in Malden. Please note: all opinions here are those of the candidates and Neighborhood View has not checked the accuracy of these comments. See links for previous questions at the bottom of this page.  QUESTION 7: What percentage of units in new developments would be allocated to affordable housing?  MAYOR – Incumbent – GARY CHRISTENSON Several communities have adopted inclusionary zoning to leverage the […]

Education

ELECTION 2019: Questions for the Candidates: Week 3 of 5: Trees & Traffic

By Prisco Tammaro The 2019 elections in Malden are approaching. The Municipal Election will be held on Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2019. To provide Malden voters with information, Neighborhood View is running a series of “Quality of Life” questions and answers with the city council and mayoral candidates. Suggestions for questions were provided via Facebook on a Malden (MA) Politic’s poll; 10 questions were formulated by the moderators in consultation with Neighborhood View and sent to all  candidates. Each candidate was given 150 words to respond to each question. Every effort was made to reach out to every candidate. Below are answers to Question 5 and 6 which focus on trees and congestion in Malden. See links for previous questions at the bottom of this page.  QUESTION 4: What can we do to increase the number of trees in the City, and preserve the existing stock we have? MAYOR – Incumbent – GARY CHRISTENSON I am committed to making sure we set aside funding for tree plantings so that we can continue to plant over 150 […]

Education

ELECTION 2019: Questions for the Candidates: Week 2 of 5 – Open Space

  By Prisco Tammaro The 2019 elections in Malden are approaching. The Municipal Election will be held on Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2019. To provide Malden voters with information, Neighborhood View is running a series of “Quality of Life” questions and answers with the city council and mayoral candidates. Suggestions for questions were provided via Facebook on a Malden (MA) Politic’s poll; 10 questions were formulated by the moderators in consultation with Neighborhood View and sent to all  candidates. Each candidate was given 150 words to respond to each question. Every effort was made to reach out to every candidate. Below are answers to Question 3 and 4. These questions focus on  development along the Malden River and development at the site of the former Malden Hospital. There is a link at the bottom to Questions 1 and 2, which focused on transparency. QUESTION 3: Malden River is being redeveloped. How do you suggest we plan to make the banks of the Malden River accessible to the general public? MAYOR – Incumbent – GARY CHRISTENSON The […]

Education

ELECTION 2019: Questions for the Candidates: Week 1 of 5 – Transparency

By Prisco Tammaro The 2019 elections in Malden are approaching. The Municipal Election will be held on Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2019. To provide Malden voters with information, Neighborhood View will run a series of “Quality of Life” questions and answers with the city council and mayoral candidates.  Suggestions for questions were provided via Facebook on a Malden (MA) Politic’s poll; 10 questions were formulated by the moderators in consultation with Neighborhood View and sent to all  candidates. Each candidate was given 150 words to respond to each question. Every effort was made to reach out to every candidate. Today’s two questions focus on issue of public meetings and government transparency.  QUESTION 1: PUBLIC MEETINGS Would you support a plan and provide resources to have Committee of the Whole, Subcommittee and License Board meetings be live streamed and archived for the public?  MAYOR – Incumbent – GARY CHRISTENSON Not only would I support such a plan, but as chair of the Municipal Building Committee for the new City Hall, I have made it a priority to […]