Boston Business Journal August 10, 2004

Cummings moves pair of properties into nonprofit portfolio

Bill Cummings and his family have turned over two namesake properties in Woburn to a private foundation called Cummings Foundation Inc.

The donation, announced Tuesday, includes the entire 59-acre office and research complex Cummings Park and West Cummings Park, which includes 11 buildings totaling 1.5 million square feet. In addition to the two parks located on both sides of Washington Street, the donation also includes other Woburn buildings totaling 2 million square feet.

Properties in Stoneham, Wakefield, Wilmington, Sudbury, Burlington, Medford and Somerville were part of an earlier, similar donation by the family.

The Cummings family will continue to own the 2 million-square-foot Cummings Center in Beverly and a dozen other buildings in North Woburn.

To date, 43 buildings have been donated, including 15 this week, for a total of 3.9 million square feet in the Foundation's portfolio. Today's donation brings the foundation's net worth to more than $408 million with the latest donation, said co-president Dennis Clarke in a statement.

The properties will continue to be taxed in Woburn and host towns regardless of the donation to the foundation, said the statement. Clarke said the foundation's commercial buildings last year generated $2,942,000 in local real estate tax revenue for the city of Woburn alone. Investment profits from the real estate will be directed to the foundation.

Cummings Foundation is a 501(c)(3) private operating foundation, originally established in 1986 by William and Joyce Cummings. Eleven trustees, four of whom are also employees of Cummings Properties or the foundation, all serve on a volunteer basis. The foundation also owns and manages two retirement communities called New Horizons at Choate in Woburn and New Horizons at Marlborough.