Housing Headlines

BURLINGTON – The extensive review 40B Local Initiative Project process took another step in the right direction this week as the Board of Selectmen unanimously approved the concept submitted by The Davis Companies for a 270-unit housing proposal at The Center at Corporate Drive on Cambridge Street. The development calls for 25 percent of the units to be affordable.

HINGHAM --- Of the strategies the town was considering to get safe harbor from Ch. 40B housing permits, Advisory Committee member Eric Haskell opines that selectmen picked the best option in choosing to support a 220-unit housing proposal that will keep the town's supply of affordable housing over 10 percent for years to come.

MARTHA'S VINEYARD --- A new consortium of advocates studying homelessness on the island have found that at least 64 people are homeless, and within that number, there are 16 families. The study also round that 90 percent of the homeless are island residents with roots in the community.

EASTON --- The town's Affordable Housing Trust is considering offering a grant to incentivize a developer to build a small affordable housing development of approximately 16 bedrooms on land the town bought in 1999. The Nov. 14 Special Town Meeting will ask voters to give selectmen the right to dispose of the Foundry St. property to a developer through an RFP process.

BEVERLY --- Rezoning around transit areas, starting a housing rehab program and starting a local housing trust are among the options residents are being asked to weigh in on as the city works with a consultant to create a new housing plan that will guide the community for the next 10 years.

BOSTON --- Fifty-nine units of affordable housing have been preserved in Dorchester and Mattapan through a $5.6 million sale of several properties to Codman Square NDC, tying up a saga of what tenants asserted was a long-term problem of property mismanagement and negligence on the part of their landlord.