October 8, 2025 Submitted by Yvette Kanter on behalf of Invest in Hingham
Over the years, Invest in Hingham has stood behind the projects that keep our town strong- from the new Public Safety Building to the new Foster Elementary School and the Override. Each of these efforts was a community-wide investment in the future of Hingham.
We are now reintroducing Invest in Hingham for 2026, with a new mission: supporting the approval of funding for a new Center for Active Living.
The Center for Active Living* is more than a building – it’s Hingham’s senior center, a hub for health, wellness, meals, art, and meaningful connections. Yet today, our 5,000-square-foot facility is too small, outdated, and unable to meet the needs of the current and rapidly growing senior population. The proposed new Center for Active Living (CAL) is a right-sized, practical solution. It will provide safe, modern, and accessible spaces for programs, social connection, wellness, meals, fitness, and outdoor activities. The new CAL will be located just outside Bare Cove Park, with convenient access to the park’s entrance gate on Bare Cove Park Drive and opportunities for outdoor wellness programming that make use of the park’s natural setting.
This vision has been more than a decade in the making, shaped by community input, town leaders, and building experts through dozens of public meetings to explore the requirements and location options. Now, it’s time to act.
In April and May 2026, Hingham residents will decide whether to invest in this vital project. Supporting the Center means investing in the heart of our community, ensuring Hingham remains a place where every generation can live fully and thrive together.
Hingham’s Center for Active Living was formerly known as the Senior Center. Across Massachusetts, many senior centers have been reimagined and renamed as Centers for Active Living or Intergenerational Community Centers. Hingham’s Senior Center was renamed in 2023 to better reflect its mission: dedication to older residents, community-wide impact across the lifespan, and the long-standing goal of a modernized, expanded facility.
This is long overdue! I worked as a fitness instructor there years ago. The most concerning problem I saw back then – which still exists today! – is insufficient, unsafe parking. This was not resolved in the proposal to renovate the police station for more space. I saw seniors with challenging mobility issues and walkers parking on Burr Road or worse on Central Street trying to navigate ice and snow, crossing busy roads, to get into the center! The small parking lot does not meet the needs of this population. It’s an unsafe situation. Surely this is not the way we, in Hingham, want to treat our senior population? They deserve the best! They have served our community as teachers, librarians, coaches, and more. They volunteer in many roles including our elections. Many have been paying taxes for a lifetime and have voted to support our schools and public service buildings. The current center is too small and not set up well to provide needed services. For example, I started a strength and balance class there approximately 15 years ago. Within a year my class of 4 ballooned to over 40! People had to be turned away each class because the room could not safely accommodate them. The census never wavered in the 10 years I taught there. People showed up a 1/2 hour early to get a spot and avoid being turned away. During the pandemic the hybrid technology never worked properly in that location. Many seniors I know are fed up with the current site and no longer attend programs there. This is sad. Isolation and loneliness is a big problem for this population. Our seniors deserve a building that can provide all the services elders in other towns enjoy, including upgraded technology, and an adequate parking lot with safe access. If you build it, they will come! Bare Cove seems like a perfect location for multigenerational programing too…
Joan — for the seniors that are mobile and enjoy the senior center walking club, there’s parking at the rear at 407 Main Street (enter that address into your GPS). It is a 2 minute walk into the back of Town Hall from that lot. The architects indicated that 100 cars could fit at 407 Main Street. The parking nearest the center could be prioritized for those with mobility issues, and the Town could also implement the ADA recommendations it recieved a number of years ago to make parking alterations to increase the number of disabled spots right in front of the senior center.
Joan – those seniors that are mobile should put 407 Main Street into their GPS. There are spots for 100 cars within a 2 minute walk to the back of Town Hall. Those seniors who have mobility issues should be parking in the the parking lot in front (or behind now that Police have left) of Town Hall A great way to help the parking situation for our seniors!
For me, this isn’t a decision about supporting Hingham’s senior population. We proved that when we were voted to pay $5.5mm for land on 3A for a public safety building, which we were told would also allow for “[e]xpansion of the current Senior Center into the current Police Department space, nearly tripling its size and maintaining its central location, while avoiding the building of a new standalone facility” (from Selectboard minutes). Do you think that vote that would have passed if voters were told that no, we’re going to move the police out AND we want to build in Bare Cove Park? (Its not fair to say this site isn’t in Bare Cove Park and I’ll elaborate when given a chance.)
We have built an amazing community in our Town where we look after each other regardless of whether your 1 year old or 100 years old, or you’ve lived here for 5 minutes or 50 years. But the proponents of this senior center at this location neglected to think about an equally important member of our community — our protected open spaces and our wildlife. We don’t need to destroy a forest in an Area of Critical Environmental Concern to take care of our seniors.
The essential ecosystem at Bare Cove Park will be permanently and irreversibly harmed and even destroyed by the combined adverse effects of the new HHA Affordable Senior Housing, the pickleball courts and the CAL building, and their parking lots, even if all MA Water Protection Act and River Protection Act laws and regulations are followed.
Choose a better location for the senior center!