Nantucket Historical Commission votes to oppose Coast Guard's steel tower replacement at Brant Point

NANTUCKET — June 12, 2026 — Nantucket Historical Commission unanimously opposes Coast Guard plan to replace 1908 Brant Point range light towers with standard galvanized steel structures. The commission voted Friday to send a formal comment letter to the Massachusetts Historical Commission after Environmental Branch Chief Mike Andrews of Civil Engineering Unit Providence told the panel that the original wooden towers are too rotted to repair and that rebuilding them in kind would cost approximately $1 million. Commissioner Barbara Halstead rejected proposed mitigations including a monument and off-site relocation: "Nantucket is not about showing what we used to be, we are about maintaining what we used to be." Public commenter Mary Longacre raised the possibility of Community Preservation Act funding to bridge the cost gap, and commission staff urged Andrews to investigate whether Coast Guard federal preservation officers or congressional appropriations could supplement the project budget. The commission also continued to its July 7 meeting a Section 106 review of a $15,000-plus linear-foot sewer extension project in the Somerset Needs Area, pending receipt of comments from the state historic preservation office on a Project Notification Form submitted May 15.