Housing Headlines

WEYMOUTH --- Income thresholds for public housing applicants are set at a level that excludes some disabled veterans, lawmakers and veterans said recently as they discussed a bill seeking address that issue.

WILLIAMSTOWN --- One of the sites that was first identified as a possible place for affordable housing that would replace mobile home park housing lost during Tropical Storm Irene may be in danger of flooding itself as residents say the former PhoTech Mill industrial site was in the river when the Hoosic River overflowed in 2011. Berkshire Housing Development Corp. is hoping to redevelop the mill building and land into 46 affordable apartments.

NANTUCKET --- As many as 25 neighbors and abutters of the proposed controversial 56-unit Surfside Commons 40B affordable-housing development packed a recent Zoning Board of Appeals meeting to voice their concerns over the proposal by Atlantic Development.

SOMERVILLE --- About 65 members of a local group called Zone Smart packed a Residential Neighborhoods Zoning Overhaul Meeting to ask that the city re-examine a decades-old law that limits the number of unrelated people in a single dwelling to four.

NEWTON --- Consultant Judi Barrett, part of a team hired by Mayor Setti Warren to develop an affordable housing strategy didn't hold back at a public form recently, saying Newton’s ambiguous zoning code and politicized permitting process have created an unpredictable land use scheme that leads to long drawn out fights between developers and residents while not creating much new affordable housing for the city.

BILLERICA --- With waiting lists for local public housing at 10 years for families and three years for seniors, Billerica Housing Authority Executive Director Robert Correnti is asking the town about the possibility of creating more housing at the old Ditson School, which is now empty after the Middlesex County Sherriff's Office moved out.