Housing Headlines

WEYMOUTH --- The woes continue to pile up for the master developer of the South Weymouth Naval Air Station as the local three-town board overseeing the redevelopment has issued a notice of default to LStar for its failure to attract development, provide necessary infrastructure and meet its financial obligations. This comes on the heels of the City of Weymouth saying it will not provide any more water or wastewater service until LStar demonstrates it can carry out the project and news that the developer has failed to meet the reporting requirements of a $30 million state bond.

FRAMINGHAM --- Noting efforts by other communities to rejuvenate its industrial parks, the Framingham City Council has voted to change its zoning rules for the parks on its western borders to allow a greater variety of businesses like restaurants and shops in places where only manufacturing or industrial uses have been allowed. However, unlike communities like Needham, Framingham maintained its existing ban on new homes and apartments, even though employers such as Staples had pushed for the ability to add workforce housing.

PLYMOUTH --- Longtime Plymouth reporter Emily Clark does a thorough deep dive explainer on affordable housing and why so much of what is built doesn't meet the area's housing needs. Int he course of telling her story, State Sen. Vinny deMacedo, R-Plymouth, said his office receives four or five calls a week about the lack of affordable housing in the area.

BOSTON --- Commonwealth Magazine's Michael Jonas looks back at a recent Boston City Council hearing in Roxbury through the eyes of district city councilor Kim Janey, who says she was not surprised that 350 showed up to voice their concerns about displacement and a 70 percent rise in housing costs.

FRAMINGHAM --- Developers building over-55 housing developments are in limbo as the Framingham City Council is considering several updates to its 13-year-old active adult housing bylaw. Under consideration are allowing developers to pay into a fund rather than build affordable units and requiring that all over-55 developments offer some units geared toward low- and moderate-income residents.

Policy consultant and local zoning expert Amy Dain pens a column that itemizes how many malls are taking a page from the downtown revitalization playbook and reinventing themselves as "lifestyle centers" with some housing, city amenities, open-air shops and restaurants.