Housing Headlines

Falmouth --- The first affordable housing project in town is accepting lottery applications until July 15. The Notantico Woods project contains 11 one- and two-bedroom units with income guidelines based on the median income in Barnstable County. Lottery winner names will be drawn at Falmouth Town Hall on July 24 and residents are expected to move in starting September 1.

FRAMINGHAM --- Town officials are proposing a series of zoning changes that would allow multifamily developments in the downtown and other areas and allow a broader variety of uses in office parks. "Fundamentally we have a suburban zoning model that we're applying to what is essentially an urban area," said Arthur Robert, the town's economic development director. "We have to find ways to change that."

HARVARD --- The state Dept. of Housing and Community Development has OK'd an agreement between the town's affordable housing trust and the developer of Devens Green in which the trust will provide $140,000 in subsidy to ensure that 25 percent of the rental units in the 124-unit clustered development project will be affordable and count toward the town's supply of subsidized housing.

BOSTON --- Nearly half of the 2,461 apartments, condos, and homes permitted in the first half of 2015 fall into either the affordable housing category, for low-income residents, or will be priced as middle-class units, according to a report to be released by the City of Boston on Tuesday, July 7.

NEWTON --- The Massachusetts Housing Appeals Committee has rejected Newton's claim that 1.5 percent of its land is being used for subsidized housing, one of the thresholds a community can reach to gain more control over Ch. 40B housing proposals. The state committee rejected the city's assertion that a YMCA and three golf courses should excluded from the town's total land area.

BOSTON --- The Bay State Banner kicked off a two-part series on how Boston's soaring home prices are impacting the elderly with a story by reporter Sandra Larson on how high rents are putting the squeeze on the city's elderly, especially in the South End and Chinatown.