The Longmeadow Community House, one of the three buildings under review by the Future Building Use Task Force.
Reminder Publishing file photo
LONGMEADOW — Longmeadow’s Future Building Use Task Force is getting the public involved in three community forums across the next few months to get opinions on how the town should move forward with uses for the Community House, Old Town Hall and Town Hall.
The task force will host its first forum on July 15.
Residents will have two more chances to attend the forums, with the next on Aug. 19 from 7-9 p.m. at the Greenwood Center, 231 Maple Road, and the third forum on Sept. 12 at 4 p.m. in the Longmeadow High School auditorium. Pre-registration is not required.
The Select Board began developing the task force in December 2025, with members finalized in February. Its goal is to ensure each building is used in a manner that best serves the community, reflects long-term municipal priorities and preserves or enhances the town’s cultural, historical and economic vitality.
The task force will wrap up work between December 2026 and February 2027, concluding the process with a final report to the Select Board with findings and recommendations.
Future Building Use Task Force member Paul Dunkerley said the task force has a member-base with a variety of different skill sets, such as real estate to property development.
He said the task force has taken the current building uses into consideration to establish what they can be used for moving forward.
“We have been reviewing a lot of documents that were made available to us, engineering studies, surveys, things like that, to try to build a foundation,” Dunkerley said. “We’ve also been working with some members of the town, like the DPW, to get a better understanding of what the structural needs are for these buildings, both from a co-compliance standpoint and an ADA compliance standpoint. A lot of the buildings are older, and they’re just in need of general updating beyond those two major categories.”
The forums include an overview of each building and presentations, such as videos showing the interior of the buildings. Residents will then have the chance to share what they would like to see, needs that are unmet in the town and the best use for each property.
“Once we complete that portion, we are charged with making a series of recommendations to our Select Board as to what the future use of these buildings may or may not be,” Dunkerley said. “That includes everything from the financial considerations associated with what we can or cannot do structurally with these buildings, how do we make them compliant, how do we meet the needs in town that are unmet at this point or the new opportunities that we might be able to address as well.”
Dunkerley said the task force also ensures that it acts appropriately toward the buildings’ historical significance and how they “add to Longmeadow as a whole.”
He added that the purpose of three forums in three separate locations is to ensure as many residents as possible are able to attend and share their visions.
“At the end of the day, this is their town, and in a large respect, these are their buildings,” Dunkerley said. “[Residents] need to have input into the process, so that as we make a recommendation to the Select Board, we make sure that these folks are heard … One of the things I think makes this town what it is, is that we do a pretty good job with shared decision making, and we share it at all levels. Everybody here has a voice, and everybody here has an opportunity to provide input.”
Assistant Town Manager Michael Barbieri said community engagement on this topic started long before the task force was created.
“Community engagement was literally the first item of business that happened,” Barbieri said. “The work that the task force has started to build off of was based on people’s feedback that they originally gave before the task force fully went to work.”
Dunkerley said that the task force feels confident it is on track to present the final report to the Select Board.
More information on the task force and building data can be found at longmeadowma.gov/1636/Future-Building-Use-Task-Force.
