Save Fenway Park's letter of support in the Times

This letter to the editor was published today in the New York Times. Read below or click the title.

November 21, 2005

Fighting for Landmarks

To the Editor:

Re "Turning Up the Heat on a Landmarks Agency," by Nicolai Ouroussoff (Critic's Notebook, Nov. 14), and "Passion on Both Sides of Landmark-Status Bill" (Arts pages, Nov. 15):

Anyone who has ever worked to protect a building knows that the world of historic preservation is complex and at times its own worst enemy.

We cannot save every building, nor should we. But every building deserves a public hearing.

The building's relationship to its neighborhood and to those who live or work near it is something understood only by those who experience the building in that way. Those people deserve every opportunity to speak on behalf of a structure that cannot speak for itself.

Yankee Stadium is about to pass into history without a squawk because the powers that be see dollar signs instead of city and baseball history while they work behind closed doors. Yankee Stadium! When will those in the Bronx be allowed to speak?

Renovation works. These battles don't get won very often, but to be fought fairly is all that one can ask for. We did it, New York. So can you.

Erika Tarlin
Somerville, Mass., Nov. 16, 2005

The writer is a board member of Save Fenway Park.