Bourne’s Finance and Development Corporation: Can it revitalize a marginal economy?
by Glenn RittBourne’s challenge is as stark as ever. How can it become a destination rather than a gateway to Cape Cod?
As Sandwich becomes a full-year economy and Wareham attracts giant retailers and planned communities, Bourne remains about one-third seasonal, confronts a shortage of high-paying jobs and suffers from an overwhelming scarcity of commercial property. Only about 10 percent of the town’s revenue derives from commercial and industrial taxes.
Underscoring these realities is the fact that there are not enough businesses in town to actually employ all Bourne’s working residents, requiring many to commute elsewhere for better paying opportunities.
Bourne, meanwhile, has the lowest per capita income on Cape Cod and among the least acreage available for business development, in part because it shares boundaries with the Massachusetts Military Reservation.
Given all this, however, the future is by no means bleak.
There is growing optimism that Buzzards Bay can be revitalized as a prototypical Cape Cod village, but with a modern-day twist – multistory condominiums overlooking the scenic Cape Cod Canal, attracting high-income empty nesters and young professionals. In turn, this development could spawn new restaurants, boutiques and entertainment that will lure customers from miles away.
The village’s future is among the highest priorities of the young Bourne Finance and Development Corporation, which promises to be not only a catalyst for change locally, but quite possibly (along with the Falmouth EDIC) a model for other Cape Cod communities to emulate.
The public/private entity is poised to guide the town’s economic development and to engineer unprecedented consensus among government officials, businesses and residents of nine distinct villages.
Still in its infancy, the BFDC is mobilizing around financing and constructing a wastewater treatment system – sewers – absolutely necessary if Buzzards Bay is to emerge from a generation of neglect.
The corporation’s other main focus is helping the town determine where other commercial revitalization might occur, such as MacArthur Boulevard, the four-lane thoroughfare linking Bourne Bridge with Falmouth, which could support commercial growth without impinging on the rural character of other town villages. With its easy access to Boston and Providence, areas immediately adjacent to the highway are ideal locations for offices, research parks and service businesses, according to some BFDC members.
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ts future may be depicted by companies such Hydroid Inc., which designs sophisticated underwater monitoring equipment – some for the Department of Defense – and recently moved from Falmouth to a location off MacArthur Boulevard.
Matching reality with vision
Moving ahead won’t be easy, BFDC members acknowledge. Sewer construction is becoming every Cape village’s priority, and it promises to cost the entire peninsula upwards of $1 billion over the next generation. In Buzzards Bay’s case, the challenge is complicated by a very low water table that will inhibit construction and location plans.
Meanwhile, what is good for Buzzards Bay may not resonate in Bourne’s eight other villages. “When you ask people where they live, few ever say ‘Bourne,’” observes Tom Moccia, director of the Buzzards Bay Village Association and a BFDC member. “They cite their village, whether it is Cataumet or Pocasset or Bournedale.”
Nevertheless, most BFDC members voice confidence that the Bourne community as a whole is coalescing around the corporation’s mission – witness support from Town Meeting.
On the other hand, external realities continue to impinge on the town’s sense of destiny.
Ever since Route 25 bypassed Buzzards Bay, Bourne has been reeling economically. As a gateway to the Cape, it suffers sometimes debilitating traffic congestion – particularly in the summer – as millions of vehicles pass through, but rarely stop in town.
That also makes it harder to get Cape Cod Commission approval for significant commercial development, such as CanalSide Commons, since such projects could fuel even more traffic.
Politically, Bourne is a bit of an orphan. Three different state representatives share pieces of the town, and none live there. That lack of a unified, strong voice is evident as well at the county level.
“Quite frankly, we are the lowest item on the totem pole,” declared BFDC President John Harding, a town real estate broker. “We have let ourselves put up with it. As a result, we are stuck with traffic and the ones who benefit are down Cape. Everyone has a unique set of problems, and we need to get the state to pay attention to our needs.”
That conviction, shared by many in town, is why there’s a growing call to secede from the Cape Cod Commission.
Meanwhile, Bourne is the only town on Cape Cod without its own chamber of commerce.
The Canal Region Chamber of Commerce is headquartered in Buzzards Bay and its director, Marie Oliva, sits on the BFDC. But she must represent Wareham and Sandwich along with Bourne. That formula has worked in one way – expanding business-to-business opportunities regionally. But it also is why neighboring Sandwich has created its own chamber in the last 18 months and attracted more than 200 members.
These realities have fueled the BFDC’s evolution. It is not a typical town committee, chamber or tourist bureau. It is an independent, nonprofit organization established by an act of the Massachusetts Legislature and supported by Bourne Town Meeting.
It is authorized to promote the “common good and general welfare” of Bourne and “improve the living standards of its citizens by fostering … employment and educational opportunities. The corporation is governed by a 15-member board of directors – three appointed by the Bourne Board of Selectmen, the others elected by the BFDC members.
The BFDC possesses a range of powers. It can acquire, hold and dispose of property; receive donations, borrow money, issue bonds, make loans and cooperate with other public or private organizations. It has a part-time executive director, Sallie Riggs, who most recently developed the National Marine Life Center in Buzzards Bay.
During its infancy, the BFDC has created a permitting guide for business development in town; worked with the town’s Local Comprehensive Plan committee to create action items for economic development; and participated in a University of Pennsylvania School of Design project to created plans for redeveloping three town centers.
Its membership includes real estate brokers, attorneys, the Canal Region Chamber, planning consultants, marketing specialists, business managers, town citizens and the heads of two town powerhouse institutions – the Upper Cape Cod Regional Technical School and the Massachusetts Maritime Academy.
Their presence is far from window dressing. They represent very real models and resources for a town seeking to distance itself from a seasonal tourist economy and to attract new jobs and businesses in the technology and marine sectors.
“We are coming out of our shell,” declared Admiral Richard Gurnon, president of the MMA. “We have expanded undergraduate majors into emergency management, homeland security, marine safety and international maritime business. We are appealing to the entire first-responder world,” he emphasized.
MMA’s tall dormitories overlooking the canal might inspire a developer’s vision of similar residential towers, while the academy’s annual $25 million budget ripples throughout the town and region. Of 250 employees, about half live in the local area; they and a thousand undergraduates buy gas, eat pizza and frequent local businesses.
Meanwhile, the technology school represents a font of skilled tradespeople, noted planning consultant and BFDC member Wesley Ewell. “Companies are standing in line to hire graduates, and the school has virtually a 100 percent placement record.”
It all begins with wastewater treatment
Currently, several BFDC working groups are focusing on economic development, wastewater management, ways to leverage state and federal funding programs, as well as plans to revitalize Main Street Buzzards Bay, in coordination with the Buzzards Bay Village Association Inc.
“Basically, when we look at economic development for Bourne, we are targeting three things,” said Ewell. “Our tax base, employment and economic activity – what keeps dollars churning within town. We need to attract businesses that do not employ entry-level jobs. We must use the human resources here – our very large pool of skilled tradespeople – to our benefit.”
Ewell and others see huge opportunities to turn what has been a seeming albatross – Bourne’s geography as the gateway to Cape Cod – into a decided advantage.
“Bourne can be a very attractive location for financial company back-room operations, health-care facilities and other businesses that are being priced out of the central Boston area,” he said. “Bourne can accommodate them with lower costs, rents, better commuting times and a higher quality of life.”
Everything, however, will depend on constructing a viable wastewater treatment system that can absorb critically needed development without compromising the fragile water tables and coastline, emphasized BFDC President John Harding, who owns Harding Realty Corporation.
“If we are to be truly successful, then in five years we have done what it takes to create a wastewater infrastructure plan for this town and done everything possible to fund it. The first town to sewer wins. Environmentally and economically, they just plain outright win. It is the number one priority for this town, no matter how you look at it.”
In the short term, the BFDC’s most valuable contribution may be to replace emotions with facts, said Michele Ford, co-vice chairman of the Bourne Finance Committee. “Rather than arguing the emotion of my idea versus your idea, we can now discuss it empirically.”
A good example is the BFDC’s recent involvement in a task force on the future of CanalSide Commons, the controversial commercial/residential development at the Bourne Bridge rotary, which has been repeatedly downsized by the Cape Cod Commission and now will be primarily a Chapter 40B residential project involving more than 300 units.
“If you heard the tenor of conversation from the first meeting to six months later, we had moved from the emotional ‘I do or don’t want it’ debate to a more reasoned ‘What are the issues and facts?’” said Ford.
Building consensus around facts is critical – for both political and economic reasons, Harding emphasized. “If we are going to go to developers and bankers, they need facts. Moreover, we have to find out from them what they want to invest in. Then we can sit and decide if we want them to do that.”
“We already have been very successful pulling together the town planning board, selectmen, chamber of commerce, the Buzzards Bay Village Association, the Long-Term Planning Committee, and even the Cape Cod Commission [which is contributing $25,000 to a Buzzards Bay Village study],” said BFDC director Riggs. “We are so far ahead of where we were two years ago. Now we have to just keep plugging away.”
Glenn Ritt Glenn Ritt is editor and co-publisher of Cape Business Publishing LLC. He is the former publisher of Cape Cod Community Newspapers and editor of The Bergen Record in New Jersey. 
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