A rendering of the proposed White Stadium. (Image from the Boston Planning and Development Agency)

THE MASSACHUSETTS Supreme Judicial Court’s recent unanimous ruling in favor of the City of Boston did not just end the legal challenges to the White Stadium renovation project. It cemented the project’s many promised benefits, including a home for a prominent professional women’s soccer franchise while providing the community with significant access to a state-of-the-art athletic facility,  and substantial funds for Boston Public Schools athletics.

The new White Stadium will also deliver much-needed substantial infrastructure upgrades in the Franklin Park neighborhood for stormwater management, public safety, and preservation of the tree canopy.

Unfortunately, many residents in the surrounding neighborhoods of Roxbury, Dorchester, Jamaica Plain, and Mattapan are not celebrating the SJC’s White Stadium ruling. A significant reason was the decision to bypass what is known as the Environmental Justice Community Engagement and Outreach process. This is a legally required procedure for almost every large-scale infrastructure  proposal in a designated environmental justice area, according to the Massachusetts Environmental Policy Act.

As a school facility, White Stadium can legally proceed without a full state-level environmental review, including EJ Community Engagement and Outreach. The project’s rightful exemption from full MEPA study allowed designers and planners to proceed without having to comply with the rigorous legal  components of EJ outreach. The decision to bypass a traditional process represents a missed opportunity for a collaborative journey between the City of Boston and local residents that delivers a White Stadium molded by a shared sense of place and unified sense of purpose.

By opting out, city and project planners lost the chance to lessen mistrust and strengthen community bonds. It is widely understood that neighbors—even not-in-my-backyard folks—are best positioned to understand any project’s human needs and the impacts it will create based on their lived experience. Meaningful residential participation in the design and planning phases of a project goes a long way toward building lasting support for technical decisions affecting quality of life, equity, health, and economic vitality.

At a minimum, the EJ Engagement and Outreach process offers substantial guidance for planners and engineers that allows projects to establish measurable, achievable goals that consider all stakeholder needs, in particular a community’s cultural and visual identity, accessibility, and health disparities.

For the White Stadium project, the Franklin Park area exceeds every legal threshold to apply EJ standards. These include minority population percentages above 40 percent, disproportionate existing health and environmental burdens, and low-income households.

Given the chance to participate in a rigorous EJ Engagement and Outreach process based on “meaningful” levels of involvement by all stakeholders, there is every reason to believe that the White Stadium redevelopment’s benefits would be even better that what has been delivered to date by finding ways to actively uplift residents.

Instead, it is an unfortunate early legacy of the White Stadium project that a sizable portion of the community continues to express dissatisfaction based on a belief they were denied the opportunity to have a say in the future of their neighborhood and community.

As things stand today, it will never be enough that the White Stadium project team and city have held more than 100 public and small-group meetings since the summer of 2023. The impressive monetary resources project leaders have touted as mitigation for game-day and construction-phase impacts will not wash away the disappointment and distrust. Many community stakeholders insist they were unseen, marginalized, and disproportionately burdened.

Leaders at every level in the Commonwealth recognize and appreciate the benefits of embracing EJ Community Engagement and Outreach practices. This includes Mayor Michelle Wu’s administration, which has committed significant resources and time across Boston to foster widespread participation in other infrastructure project decision-making.

There is no question that Mayor Wu supports the broad goal of identifying and delivering practical mitigation strategies for infrastructure and major real estate developments that are based on extensive community input. Every process that helps avoid, minimize, or mitigate disproportionately high and adverse human health and environmental effects associated with any particular project is a win for the city.

In a perfect world, successful EJ Community Engagement and Public Outreach programs for infrastructure projects yield a new dynamic that redefines community relations with government. These processes drive project design that echoes community desires and secures local priorities, including economic equity, safety, environmental health, and mobility. Residents are given the chance to evolve from reactive players to involved partners invested in the future of their built environment.

Historical skepticism toward public agencies is certainly understandable. The White Stadium engagement process certainly did not assuage that mistrust. Following formal project announcement in 2023, many opted out of stadium planning. Right or wrong, cynics felt the deal was done, engagement was a waste of time, and that nobody cares.

But there’s still time for White Stadium project planners to deliver on the principles of EJ Community Engagement and Outreach – improved levels of trust, transparency, and stronger pathways for ongoing collaboration. The potential benefits—fewer transportation impacts, more impactful community investments, amplified public space enhancements—seem obvious. At a minimum, project engineers can volunteer to publish metrics that allow distrusting community leaders to monitor project commitments, environmental remediation, and neighborhood benefits during and after construction.

Every infrastructure project wins when residents in environmental justice communities feel seen and heard.

Scott Farmelant is the principal consultant and owner of Boston Strategic Communications. He served as lead author of the first-ever Massachusetts Department of Transportation Strategic Guidance for Environmental Justice Outreach Protocols, which was published in 2023.