Housing Headlines

PEABODY --- Developer Ed Greeley is seeking a Ch. 40B comprehensive land use permit from the city in order to redevelop a mill building into 45 mixed-income apartments while at the same time asking the city to expand the neighborhood's mill overlay district to include another building at the site.

WORCESTER --- City councilors on Worcester’s economic development subcommittee have directed the city manager's office to draft an inclusionary zoning ordinance mandating that a minimum percentage of new housing units within private development projects be affordable for low- and moderate-income households. The affordable housing shortage has left about 50% of Worcester renters cost-burdened, meaning they’re paying over 30% of their income on rent and utilities.

WORCESTER --- Worcester's effort to ease the housing crunch with an inclusionary zoning ordinance is based on data that show that Worcester has grown by 27,000 people in the past 10 years, but only 10,000 units of housing have been created during that time. Of those units, only 500 were designated affordable. An inclusionary zoning ordinance would ensure a certain amount of affordable housing is included in housing development projects.

WORCESTER --- A proposed commercial development in Worcester’s Main South neighborhood would give local small business owners the opportunity to build generational wealth by helping them purchase their own brick-and-mortar space. The project, supported by the Main South C ommunity Development Corporation, would turn a currently vacant lot into seven affordable rent-to-own commercial spaces,

BOSTON --- Despite several policy efforts by the state to encourage housing, recent decisions at the local level indicate that communities are still reluctant to approve new housing, a situation that is exacerbating the state's housing problems and creating a challenge that advocates hope the state's new governor will tackle head on beginning next year.

Housing authorities from Amherst, Boston, Chelmsford, Lowell and Newton have formed a working group to explore selling off scattered-site properties in their portfolio to reduce maintenance costs and raise funds to develop more affordable housing. Scattered-site housing was promoted by the federal government some 50 years ago as an alternative to dense public housing but that has proven to be difficult to manage, housing authority executives say.