Housing Headlines

NORTHAMPTON --- An estimated 150 to 200 homeless people in the area are causing a range of reactions, with service experts worrying about the increased case load, city residents complaining about the homeless camping out downtown and the homeless themselves navigating where they can find shelter and warmth given restrictions on shelter capacity due to COVID.

LEE --- Two years after approving a permit to convert the old Eagle Mill into a marketplace with 80 apartments, the Lee Planning Board has OK'd a revised plan that calls for reduced commercial space and 122 mixed-income apartments. The development team of Jeffrey Cohen and Berkshire Housing Development Corp. said the plan was revised after potential marketplace tenants backed out due to the pandemic.

HADLEY --- The town's affordable housing trust has voted 6-1 to use $50,000 for a COVID relief fund to help those in town who have been harmed financially by the pandemic and may be in danger of being evicted. Town officials had hoped to fund the program with $100,000 in Community Preservation Act funds, but that required a Town Meeting OK and last month's meeting was adjourned due to lack of a quorum.

TRURO --- The attempt to turn former state highway land into 39 mixed-income rental apartments may have hit another snag as the developer has told the town he cannot include seven. market rate units because they would make the project no longer feasible. Ted Malone of Community Housing Resource in Provincetown told the zoning board that the state, which assists with securing subsidies for affordable housing, doesn’t want more than three levels of income restrictions in a single project. The original plan called for three levels, plus market rate, so people earning 60, 80, and 110 percent of the area median income would be eligible for income-restricted rental apartments.

Massachusetts is preparing to move ahead with its plan to start administering COVID-19 vaccines to homeless people, with the Pine Street Inn in Boston expected to receive 100 doses sometime in the next two weeks. The Commonwealth is one of several states in the country to prioritizes vaccinating the homeless. Public health leaders and housing advocates are discussing how to track recipients so they can give them the second shot.

BOSTON --- The Newton-based company that redeveloped the Boston Herald building and surrounding neighborhood into the Ink Block neighborhood has proposed to raze the former Midtown Hotel near Northeastern University and build a mixed-use apartment building with 325 rental units, 48 of them affordable. The motel, which overlooks Christian Science Plaza, is currently occupied by 300 Northeastern students.