Wendell News Outlet

National Register Q & A

Q: What is the National Register of Historic Places?

A: The National Register of Historic Places is the official list of the nation's cultural resources worthy of preservation. It is the federal government's way of recognizing North Carolina’s historically and architecturally important properties that are 50 years of age and older.

Q: How are decisions made about what is listed on the National Register?

A: All people judging a property must do so by federally established criteria. These criteria are designed to assure that the property is significant in one of the areas of architecture, archeology, or history.

To be architecturally significant, a property must be an excellent example of a style, or method of construction, or the work of a master craftsman or architect. To be archaeologically significant, it must contain or have contained information important in our history or pre-history. To be historically significant, it must be associated with events or persons that made an important contribution to the history of the area and/or broad patterns of our national history.

Q: Isn't it true that only buildings or sites connected with famous people get listed on the National Register?

A: No. The criteria allow for much more than recognizing the achievements of a few well-known individuals. The National Register is designed to recognize the accomplishments of all people who have made a contribution to our country's history.

Q: What does the National Register mean to me?

A: The National Register records and recognizes the contribution to our heritage that your property represents.

Q: Will someone tell me what color I have to paint my house?

A: No. If you are using your own money, you can do anything you choose to a National Register listed property, including paint it any color you select.

Q: Will I be able to leave my property to my children or to anyone I want?

A: Yes. National Register listing in no way affects the transfer of property from one owner to another.

Q: Will anybody be able to stop me if I want to tear down my property?

A: No. In no case can National Register listing alone prevent you from tearing down a structure. If you tear down a National Register structure, however, and replace it with an income-earning structure or site, you will not be able to deduct the cost of demolition for federal income tax purposes. This is a tax provision to discourage the destruction of Register properties. Tax provisions to encourage the maintenance of such properties also exist.

Q: Will I have to open my house to the public for tours?

A: No. National Register listing does not require that you open your house to the public.

Q: Don't historic buildings and archaeological sites stop a lot of government projects like highways and water systems that are really important for a community?

A: No. Historic resources act only as a caution light, not a stop light, in the planning of federally funded projects. State historic preservation officers try to work with the agencies funding these projects from the very earliest stages. They strive to reduce the likelihood of conflict or of wasted time and money by identifying the historic concerns early and incorporating them in planning the project. In any case, the existence of a historic building or site cannot, on its merits alone, stop a construction project of this type.

Q: What kinds of properties can be included in the Register?

A: The National Register includes buildings and structures such as houses, commercial buildings and bridges. It also includes sites such as battlefields, parks, and archaeological sites. It includes districts--groups of buildings, structures or sites that make up a coherent whole, such as a neighborhood or an industrial complex. Finally, it includes objects---not portable museum objects, but large movable properties such as fountains and monuments.

Q: What kinds of significance must properties have in order to be registered?

A: Properties important in history, prehistory, architectural history, engineering history, archeology, or culture may be entered in the National Register. In other words, a property associated with the history of a community may be listed, and so can a prehistoric archaeological site, an example of a type of architecture, landscape architecture, or an engineering process, or a place of continuing but traditional cultural importance to a community (e.g., a place associated with an American Indian tradition or a well-preserved rural landscape.)

Q: What level of significance must a property have in order to be registered?

A: The Register includes properties determined to have significance at the national, state, and local levels. In other words, although the Register is "National," it is designed to include properties of importance to the people of the nation where they live, in their communities, not just great national landmarks. A general store, your community's park, its main street, or its Indian mound, may be just as eligible for inclusion in the National Register as Independence Hall or Gettysburg Battlefield.

posted by Administrator  # 10:04 PM