Owner disputes 'at risk' label

By Patrick Gerard Healy

GLOBE CORRESPONDENT

     The Savin Hill house Raymond Tomasini has owned for more than 50 years is on the Dorchester Historical Society's list of top ten endangered properties. Problem is, Tomasini insists that his house at 24 Grampian Way is not endangered, thank you very much.
     "You can look at an old house and say it's falling apart, but what do you know about the frame? What do you know about what I did to straighten out the sagging floor? [The historical society] never spoke to me about what I did to preserve the house," he says.
     When Rosanne Foley, founder of the Architectural Preservation Committee, was putting together the list for the Historical Society last spring, she went around to the nominated locations with a camera. When she stopped in front of Tomasini's property, there were too many vehicles on the lawn to get a clear shot of the house. She had heard the house was on the market, and assumed because of its appearance that it was abandoned.
     "It didn't occur to me that anyone lived there," she says.
     Having your house designated endangered while you're living in it could bruise your ego, especially if you have spent most of your life in the building field. Tomasini served in the 339th Construction Battalion of the Army Engineers in World War II. He taught carpentry at Boston Trade High School from 1954 to 1975.
     But at 80 years old, Tomasini's ego seems unfazed. He says he does all the work around the house himself. His shoulders broaden with pride as he rattles off a string of recent renovation projects, which include jacking up the house, putting in new bay windows and most recently mortaring the chimneys.
     Neighbor Peter McNamara says he doesn't think it's the house itself that has put Tomasini on the Historical Society's watch list.
     "I think it's because of the vehicles outside and they see the house isn't painted to what people perceive what paint should be," he says. "It's also probably because he doesn't have a full-time gardener like some of the neighbors have and doesn't have a landscaper who comes once a week during the summertime."
     In front of Tomasini's house, there are two sedans, two boats, a bus filled with furniture and an old truck. The porch is cluttered with wood that Tomasini says he is recycling, kept under watch by a basset hound named Cleo, leashed to a railing.
     Tomasini explains the clutter: "I use everything that I have, and I go from one thing to another," he says. "A 200-year-old house takes constant maintenance. I do one piece, and it looks good, but then I've got 10 other things that need work."
     Foley says the house at 24 Grampian Way was nominated to help Tomasini, not to hurt him.
     "What this is about is not to stigmatize people for not keeping their property up, but to raise awareness and focus resources where they're needed," she says.
     Earl Taylor, president of the Historical Society, says he hopes putting Tomasini's house on the list will be "the spur that will repair it."
     When asked about the future, Tomasini says he's going to "leave the house essentially the same."