Natick Black Lives Matter Rally To Focus On Black Property Rights

NATICK, MA — A Natick group that has been holding a weekly Black Lives Matter vigil on the common will host a rally this Sunday, and the main speaker will be a woman who has said she encountered racism while working on a development project in town.

Linda Valentin will speak about Black property rights, according to the event organizers. Valentin and her husband, Joel, own the Bilingual Montessori School of Sharon, and recently tried to redevelop a home they own along Pleasant Street.

The Valentins planned to build six condos in their Victorian home, plus four units in a 14,000 square-foot barn meant to be a larger replica of one that was originally on the property. A zoning bylaw passed during the 2019 Town Meeting, which the Valentins had worked on, allowed historic buildings to be rebuilt in larger form in some cases.

The project came to a head at a Jan. 15 Planning Board meeting where the Valentins were confronted by neighbors and members of town boards opposed to the project, specifically the barn. During the meeting, an attorney representing neighbor Michael Panchuck said the barn would "loom" over Panchuck's home. They decided at the Jan. 15 meeting to withdraw the condo project, but proposed instead building a school at the site. But the residential proposal has come back before the Planning Board in a different form.

A month later, Panchuck announced at a Planning Board meeting he would petition for a Town Meeting article to amend the zoning bylaw to prevent larger replicas of historical structures. At that meeting, Valentin said the zoning issue had become personal, and she and her husband were referred to as "monkeys" while pursuing their condo development, the MetroWest Daily News reported.

There is an article before fall Town Meeting in October that would change zoning bylaws to limit the size of "replicated historical structures."

The Sunday rally is being organized by the Natick Black Lives Matter group, and will begin at 3 p.m. on the common.

Correction: An original version of this story did not convey that the Valentins' Pleasant Street residential project is still being considered by the Planning Board.