City Council in brief: Bentley University pond renovations planned

Bentley University plans to rejuvenate the pond that borders its Forest Street entrance, according to details presented to city councilors at a Monday night meeting.

Chris Joyce, Bentley University’s vice president of marketing and communications, told the City Council’s Public Works and Public Safety Committee that the university plans to revamp the pond, which lost its bridge and some of its walking paths many years ago. 

It seemed like welcome news to the council. Councilor-at-Large Randall J. LeBlanc, chair of the Public Works and Public Safety Committee, noted that the pond was a community space beloved by Bentley students and nearby residents. 

“There was a whole lawn there. Bentley students used to lie out, you’d see people playing Frisbee. A lot of the local kids fished and grew up skating there,” LeBlanc said. 

Since then, however, the pond’s bridge rotted out, and rising water levels and poison ivy overtook some of its surrounding paths. 

Joyce said Bentley would like to work with the city to improve the area around the pond and make it a better community space.

The committee voted to refer Joyce to work with Waltham City Engineer Robert Winn on further plans to examine the effects of lowering the pond’s water levels to restore some of its walking paths.

Additional City Council actions

Additional news from the Monday night meeting of the City Council committees included:

• LeBlanc announced to the Public Works and Public Safety Committee that he had asked the state’s Fish and Game Department to discuss stocking Waltham’s waterways  — potentially including the Charles River and Bentley Pond — with fish for sport fishing. The committee agreed to send a formal request to the state for more information.
• The Licenses and Franchises Committee approved a plaque recognizing the work of Jerry LeBlanc, a founding member of the city’s Disability Services Commission. The committee agreed to install a plaque in front of the city’s former activity center as well as a plaque about the location’s history.