Category Archives: Affordable housing / 40B

West Street 40B

Posted on January 30, 2014 | Comments Off on West Street 40B

I was reminded because of my post about the West Street 40B project developer (Gatehouse) apparently having difficulty securing its financing, that even if the developer is having those troubles with its financing as was reported to me by knowledgeable sources at the Massachusetts Municipal Association annual meeting last week, that the 40B permit itself that Gatehouse has in hand remains open and good for three years, so that the permitted 40B project for the 92 unit development remains active, if moribund.  Even if Gatehouse is not able to proceed, they could sell the permit to another developer who is able to secure financing.

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Posted in Affordable housing / 40B

CPA

Posted on January 8, 2014 | Comments Off on CPA

I was just looking over a great source of information about Massachusetts’ Community Preservation Act (CPA).  The CPA is the opt in system in Massachusetts that gives towns state matching monies once adopted.  See the Community Preservation Coalition’s website – http://www.communitypreservation.org/   Unfortunately, to date, Medfield has yet to opt in, so while we continue to pay in, we are leaving the state monies on the table.

This is the Community Preservation Coalition’s summary description of the CPA –

CPA is a smart growth tool that helps communities preserve open space and historic sites, create affordable housing, and develop outdoor recreational facilities. CPA also helps strengthen the state and local economies by expanding housing opportunities and construction jobs for the Commonwealth’s workforce, and by supporting the tourism industry through preservation of the Commonwealth’s historic and natural resources.

Over a decade of work went into the creation of the CPA; it was ultimately signed into law by Governor Paul Cellucci and Lieutenant Governor Jane Swift on September 14, 2000. Read more about the history of CPA.

CPA allows communities to create a local Community Preservation Fund for open space protection, historic preservation, affordable housing and outdoor recreation. Community preservation monies are raised locally through the imposition of a surcharge of not more than 3% of the tax levy against real property, and municipalities must adopt CPA by ballot referendum. View a map of all CPA communities, or learn more about CPA adoption.

The CPA statute also creates a statewide Community Preservation Trust Fund, administered by the Department of Revenue (DOR), which provides distributions each year to communities that have adopted CPA. These annual disbursements serve as an incentive for communities to pass CPA. Learn more about the distribution amounts received to date by CPA communities.

Each CPA community creates a local Community Preservation Committee (CPC) upon adoption of the Act, and this five-to-nine member board makes recommendations on CPA projects to the community’s legislative body. To explore CPA projects completed to date, visit our CPA Projects Database.

Property taxes traditionally fund the day-to-day operating needs of safety, health, schools, roads, maintenance, and more. But until CPA was enacted, there was no steady funding source for preserving and improving a community’s character and quality of life. The Community Preservation Act gives a community the funds needed to control its future.

CPA Accomplishments To-Date

  • 155 communities have adopted CPA (44% of the Commonwealth’s cities and towns)
  • Close to $1.2 billion has been raised to date for community preservation funding statewide
  • Over 6,600 projects approved
  • Over 7,300 affordable housing units have been created or supported
  • Nearly 19,200 acres of open space have been preserved
  • Over 3,200 appropriations have been made for historic preservation projects
  • Nearly 1,000 outdoor recreation projects have been initiated
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Posted in Affordable housing / 40B, Budgets, History, Open space, Recreation

MSH visioning this Sat.

Posted on January 8, 2014 | Comments Off on MSH visioning this Sat.

The town’s State Hospital Advisory Committee (SHAC) is holding a public visioning session this coming Saturday from 10 AM to 3 PM at The Center, to get input from all residents about what to do with the Medfield State Hospital site.  There will be a special town meeting (STM) in February or March for the town to decide whether to buy the MSH site for the $3.1 m. price the selectmen recently struck with DCAMM, so all residents are encouraged to attend to learn more and to give the town the benefit of their thoughts.

Buying the MSH site allows the town to control the ultimate uses of the site, and DCAMM has offered easy financial terms – they will finance the purchase over ten years, so that we only need to pay $310,000 per year.  In a worse case situation, the town would have to pay about $10 m. to demolish all the buildings, but it would be preferable to develop the core campus and have the developer do the demolitions, where they can do it less expensively since they do not have to follow prevailing wage law requirements so they can do it cheaper.

The scenario and time constraints are such that the town will need to first make the decision to buy, before the town can decide upon the ultimate uses of the land.  This inverted process results because:

  • the town would like to respond to the pending purchase opportunity before Governor Patrick and his administration leave office in a year (when that opportunity may disappear),
  • the required special legislation will need to be crafted and passed by July when the legislative session ends.
  • Semator Timilty opines that the legislation will need to be submitted by April to have any chance at passage in the legislature by July, and
  • the town has to have made the decision to buy the MSH site at the special town meeting (in February or March) before the legislature will even consider that needed legislation.

Hence the need to have a special town meeting (STM) in the next two months.

POSSIBLE USES

The SHAC recently circulated a survey to the residents, and got 258 responses.  The most popular suggested uses were for open spaces, trails, recreation, farming, and housing, more or less in that order.  The good news is that the site is sufficiently large that all of those uses can be accommodated along with the development that will provide the appropriate economic returns to the town.

OPEN SPACES & TRAILS – The town would be buying 134 acres that is surrounded by hundreds of other acres of land that is currently open space and will continue to be open space.  Those other lands that the town will not purchase contain many fields and trails that will continue to be open to the public to use, just as they are now.  All the lands along the river and the large fields to the east and west of the MSH buildings will continue to be public lands, open to all, just as now.

The 134 acres being bought by the town consists of two parcels, the 40 acres that surround the sledding hill and the 94 acres where the buildings are currently located.  While there are 40 acres around the sledding hill, only twelve of those acres on that side of Hospital Road will be able to be developed, due to state restrictions against development of lands containing agricultural soils.  Hence, 28 acres on that side of Hospital Road will not be developed and will remain open land.

I can today go out the door of my house (adjoining the MSH area) and jog or cross country ski for miles and hours, without ever being on roads, except to cross them, and there is so much open spaces in the area that fact will not change.

FARM – DCAMM has indicated that the town can discuss with the state’s Dept. of Conservation and Recreation (DCR), the state entity that will acquire ownership and control of the fields to the east and west of the MSH buildings, about farm and/or CSA use of those lands.  I personally like exploring having a farm and/or a CSA operation in town, and I think the DCR lands at the MSH could be an excellent location, just as the town’s Holmquist lands would be as well.

RECREATION – As noted above, there will always be much open space available for passive recreation uses in that general vicinity.  The town can also opt to have any of the rest of the lands it buys made available for recreational uses.  One of the suggestions for development at the site is as a regional recreational facility.

HOUSING – There should be plenty of land on which to develop housing of the sort that is lacking and therefore needed in town, housing that which will not entail large municipal costs, such as housing for the elderly, housing for empty nesters, and/or dense developments such as Olde Medfield Square which has only one school child in its first 27 occupied units.

I have suggested that the town should develop a master plan to look at all our options for locating affordable housing and other town needs throughout the town, and I hope that we can integrate the MSH site into a town-wide plan that addresses all our future needs in a well thought out and integrated manner.  Planning the development at the MSH could then become part of our plan for the development of all the rest of the town.

Bill Massaro has been a close follower of and participant in the MSH clean up and development process.  His email this week does a nice job of summarizing our current situation –

=======================================
Sent: Saturday, January 4, 2014 7:15:34 PM
Subject: State Hospital Property Reuse Visioning Workshop 1-11-14 : What Would You Like To See There?

 Hi Everyone,

Because of your continuing  concern and support,  after 5 years of struggles we were able to reach agreement with DCAMM on the cleanup and restoration  of  the 100-year old hazardous landfill  alongside and in the Charles River at the former State Hospital.

So 2013 will be remembered as the year we not only protected the Town’s main well, but  left another  priceless gift to the future generations who will  take advantage of the safe recreational opportunities you have made possible, and who will forever appreciate the restored beauty on this stretch of the Charles.

The next few months present us with the opportunity to decide what gift we will leave for future generations on the rest of the Hospital  property .

After the Hospital closed  in 2003, DCAMM’s refusal to sell any of the property to the Town led to the 2008 Legislation authorizing  2 parcels for Developer sale and their reuse for 440 housing units.

As part of the new cooperative relationship, the current administration at DCAMM has offered to sell these 2 parcels to the Town.  The Board of Selectmen have accepted DCAMM’s offer and have begun defining a detailed purchase and sale agreement, and sometime within the next few months a Special Town meeting will be called to give residents the opportunity to approve or reject the purchase.

On Saturday January 11 at 10:00 a.m. at the Center on Ice House Road, the State Hospital Advisory Committee (SHAC) will hold a Visioning Workshop to get your views for potential uses of the property.  SHAC members will first present background information on the parcels  being offered,  provide details on the proposed terms of sale, and provide a summary of recent resident surveys and consultant studies on potential reuse of the property.

You will then have the opportunity in small break-out groups to discuss issues and opportunities.  Lunch will be provided and afterwards you can join in developing  scenarios for alternative future use of the property.

The attached invitation  provides additional information on the meeting time and a link for further information.

This meeting will give you the opportunity to have your voice heard in deciding how 2014 will be remembered by future Medfield generations.

I hope you can  attend.

The RSVP address is sraposa@medfield.net

Thanks

Bill

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Posted in Affordable housing / 40B, Development, Medfield State Hospital, Nature, Open space, Planning, Select Board matters, Sports, Town Meeting

On being a selectman

Posted on July 25, 2013 | Comments Off on On being a selectman

Long discussion yesterday with Mike Sullivan and his intern, Kyle Andrulonis, about Building Committee and town governance issues.

  • garage site work being preformed by our own DPW is ahead of schedule
  • huge amounts of underground infrastructure being installed, including what Mike described as several Olympic sized swimming pool holes to allow for on-site disposal of  the storm water run off
  • DPW saving the town lots of money
  • salt shed almost completed

The DPW will deal with the North Street paving before the start of school – it is greatly needed as soon as possible given how bad the hole at Green Street has become

I reminded Mike of my suggestion to have Ken Feeney lead a discussion about how our road maintenance efforts extend the life of our roadways and to confirm our use of best practices to extend road life.  The Massachusetts Municipal Association has been providing a lot of information about how ongoing maintenance is the cheapest route in the long run.  I also reminded Mike that Ken should publish his list of streets planned for repairs so pe0ple know just where their street stands on the list – that will give residents some idea of how long they will be waiting.  Giving the residents good data is what the town needs to be doing.

The DPW also needs to get to the Garden Club projects approved by the Board of Selectmen relating to upgrading the plantings at all four town signs and the Hospital Road at Rte 27 island.

The Affordable Housing Committee draft of its Affordable Housing Production Plan was put out last fall, but progress seems to have stalled.  In response to my queries, Mike mentioned that the consultant, Judy Barrett, we hired to write the plan, left the company with whom we contracted for that plan (specifically so we could get Judy to do it).

I have no town committee meetings this week, but I am still spending lots of time reviewing the draft legislation and documents about the transfer to the town of the Medfield State Hospital land for the water tower and the wellfields, as the details of the language are worked out to match the agreement with DCAMM that was part of the mediated resolution of the MSH environmental clean up.  I am told that we are now hoping that the legislature will take up that issue come September, given their light summer schedule.  The town owes thanks to resident volunteers Steve Nolan, Bill Massaro, and John Harney for shepparding that effort along.

Massachusetts Historic Commission 7/18/13 letter to DCAMM agrees to allow demolition of the stable and maintenance builds at the Medfield State Hospital, but refused demolition of the Odyssey Building across the street.  The stable is beautiful, but in danger of collapse.  The mainenance building needs to be removed so testing for the volatile organic compounds (VOC’s) can continue under the site of the building.  DCAMM had kindly agreed to demolish Odyssey house at the town’s request as part of the mediated settlement of the Medfield State Hospital environmental clean up, but now the MHC stands in the way of that happening.  There will need to be a long discussion with the MHC over the 1890’s building at the Medfield State Hospital, as it is expected that their condition will turn out to be so poor as to be uneconomic to rehab.  The MSH Development Committee is exploring undertaking condition studies to get better data.  The Town of Medfield also needs to know how its own Historic District Commission will react if the town asks to demolish those 1890’s buildings – Commission chair, Mike Taylor, at the MSH Development Committee meeting last week intimated that he preferred the buildings to be saved.  All mainly agree that is an admirable goal, but the real question is at what cost – if it costs too much to rehab the 1890’s buildings, it could make any redevelopment of the MSH site uneconomic.  Most are guessing that the poor, dilapidated conditon of those buildings will mandate their demolition.

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Posted in Affordable housing / 40B, Buildings, DPW, Garden Club, Medfield State Hospital, On being a selectman

Community Preservation Act

Posted on July 19, 2013 | Comments Off on Community Preservation Act

The Community Preservation Act provides matching state monies to towns that opt in, by voting to surcharge themselves an extra 1-3% on their property taxes.  The state match started out at 100%, but as more towns opted in the match and dropped to 28%.  Still, it is free money that Medfield could pick up if we opted in.

Medfield’s annual town meeting (ATM) voted in the past to not participate.

My analysis has always been to look at whether we as a town are likely in the future to spend any town monies on the allowed uses, namely

  • historic preservation,
  • open spaces,
  • recreation, and
  • housing.

Since I do think that Medfield will eventually spend monies on all of those areas, I see that we are just leaving the state monies on the table by not adopting the CPA.  Therefore, the fees that we in Medfield pay as surcharges on recording fees at the Norfolk Registry of Deeds (the source of the CPA state monies), goes to make CPA payments to other towns.

The only reason I can think to not adopt the CPA would be if I intended to leave Medfield, because then I would not benefit from the long term savings that are generated by getting the state monies.

For more information see –

http://www.communitypreservation.org/

http://www.sec.state.ma.us/ele/elecpa/cpaidx.htm#Other

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Posted in Affordable housing / 40B, Budgets, History, Open space

Town needs 158 affordable units to get to 10%

Posted on June 3, 2013 | Comments Off on Town needs 158 affordable units to get to 10%

From Steve Nolan, Chair of the State Hospital Use Committee (SHUC), town will need 158 more affordable housing units to get to 10% affordable housing (after The Parc is built)  –

As a point of information, I wanted to let everyone know that DHCD recently released an updated Subsidized Housing Inventory.  A link to the inventory is pasted below.  The inventory lists Medfield as having total housing stock of 4,220 units, of which 194 units are affordable.  If we add the 96 units on West Street to this, we would have a total housing stock of 4,313 units of which 290 would be affordable.  Assuming no other growth in the number of housing units in town, we would reach 10% affordable units if 158 new affordable units were constructed.

 
 
Stephen M. Nolan

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Posted in Affordable housing / 40B, Medfield State Hospital

On being a selectman

Posted on March 29, 2013 | Comments Off on On being a selectman

Busy week with lots of time demands –

  • Saturday – excellent 3 hour session put together by Bob McDonald, Chief Operator of the Waste Water Treatment Plant on installing alternative energy around town, including a solar PV array at the Waste Water Treatment Plant.
  • Superintendent finalists – lunch Monday, Tuesday and Thursday with the three finalists.  I was glad that one selectman was able to attend, and that I now have great confidence in the person who will be leading our schools.
  • Energy Committee Tuesday evening to discuss the Saturday Waste Water Treatment Plant program, and future inititives.
  • Bring Your Own Device (BYOD) explanation at Medfield High School Wednesday evening.
  • Downtown Study Committee last night to hear about the cost to bury utility lines in the downtown.  Comcast representative estimated the costs at $100,000 – 125,000/1,000′ for Comcast, slightly more for Verizon, and a lot more, $1m./1,000′, for NSTAR.
  • Medfield State Hospital Development Committee last night too, to mainly discuss demolition costs of the buildings, town control of site by purchasing it, and how to respond to DCAM’s letter offering to sell the Medfield State Hospital site to the town on vague terms.  A follow up discussion with DCAM is required to clarify the DCAM terms.   Bill Massaro’s rough estimates to demolish all the building at the Medfield State Hospital were $2.3 m. if done without complying with prevailing wage laws, but $7.3 m. if prevailing wages had to be paid (I.e. – if it were done by the town).

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Posted in Affordable housing / 40B, Development, Downtown, Energy Committee, Medfield State Hospital, On being a selectman, Planning, Schools

MMA reacts to Gov’s housing authority proposal

Posted on January 10, 2013 | Comments Off on MMA reacts to Gov’s housing authority proposal

This in an alert from the Massachusetts Municipal Association this afternoon (earlier call today from Mike Sullivan with respect to the same issue – Mike concerned over town’s loss of local control over Medfield Housing Authority, where the Medfield State Hospital site is available land, especially where Gov. also has a goal of building 10,000 housing units a year until 2020) –

January 10, 2013

GOV. PROPOSES SWEEPING CONSOLIDATION

OF LOCAL HOUSING AUTHORITIES

Municipal Officials Should Assess Local Impact and Contact Legislators

Gov. Deval Patrick announced today that he would file legislation to regionalize the operation and financial management of local housing authorities.

In a major shift in how public housing property and programs are managed in Massachusetts, the Governor’s bill would consolidate the current roster of 240 local housing authorities into six regional authorities that would, in the words of the Administration, “take over ownership and fiscal and operational management of all public housing in the Commonwealth.”

The text of the legislation has not yet been released.  However, according to the Administration’s description of the plan unveiled by the Governor at a State House press conference at noon on Thursday, January 10th, each of the six new regional housing authorities would be governed and administered by a single executive director with a new governing board consisting of 9 appointees by the Governor, and be supported by central and regional management staff and local site managers.

The Governor’s official announcement said that the legislation will allow communities to “retain control over land use and significant redevelopment decisions, including change of use, ownership or the financial structure of an existing building or vacant land,” and the new regional housing authorities “will also be required to seek local input into an annual plan that outlines projected capital and operating expenditures and tenant activities.”

The Governor’s bill, when filed, will be referred to the Joint Committee on Housing for a public hearing later this year, providing more time for full analysis of the details.  The proposal is expected to be highly controversial with most housing authority executive directors and commissioners opposing it. The MMA encourages you to contact your legislators as soon as possible if you have concerns about having your housing authority and its assets consolidated into the Governor’s new plan.

Click here to view a copy of the Governor’s press statement announcing his legislation

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Posted in Affordable housing / 40B

ZBA approved Gatehouse’s 40B by 2-1

Posted on December 6, 2012 | Comments Off on ZBA approved Gatehouse’s 40B by 2-1

This afternoon the Zoning Board of Appeals of the Town of Medfield voted to approve the Gatehouse application for its 40B project on West Street by a 2-1 vote.  Zoning Board of Appeals chair Bob Sylvia was the dissenting vote, and reportedly resigned from the ZBA after the vote. Bob had served on the ZBA and been its chair for forty years.

Bob Sylvia was arguing for an approval for sixty units.  However, the town’s legal consultant for the Gatehouse application, Mark Bobrowski, and the town counsel, Mark Cerel, both opined that such a large reduction in the number of approved units would allow Gatehouse to easily have the ZBA  decision reversed by the state Housing Appeals Committee (HAC) as a constructive denial. 

Mark Bobrowski had been earlier tasked by the ZBA to write a draft decision, including what concessions he thought legally achievable and appropriate.  Bob Sylvia disagreed with that draft, and he then recently undertook to author his own alternative version of an approval decision. 

The Zoning Board of Appeals faced a Hobson’s choice, per the counsel it got from Mark Cerel and Mark Bobrowski.  The classic legal advice is that the ZBA has to approve such a 40B application, but with reasonable conditions, if it hopes to survive a developer’s appeals of its decision to the HAC.  The strategy for the ZBA is to know just how far they can push the concessions in their decision, and still have the decision upheld by the HAC.  The ZBA’s disagreement today was apparently over just how far out the ZBA decision could successfully push that line, and skilled attorneys disagreed over where that line could safely to be drawn for Medfield. 

Of the other ZBA members, Russ Hallisey is an attorney who deals with real estate issues, and Charlie Peck is a banker.

It is too bad that a professional disagreement amongst attorneys resulted in the resignation of Bob Sylvia, an attorney who has successfully volunteered for and lead the ZBA for forty years.  I served for ten years on the ZBA with Bob, and have great respect and admiration for his leadership of that body that I witnessed.

See Patch article.

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Posted in Affordable housing / 40B, Zoning

CPA website

Posted on November 30, 2012 | Comments Off on CPA website

Chris McCue Potts just noted to me an excellent website that describes the benefits and successes of the  Massachusetts Community Preservation Act – http://www.communitypreservation.org/

The wonderful things we in Medfield could do with some extra monies.

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Posted in Affordable housing / 40B, History, Open space