The Housing and Development Committee of the Jamaica Plain Neighborhood Council (JPNC) held its regular monthly meeting last Tuesday, April 16.
On hand for the session were chair Danielle Somer Kieta, vice-chair Purple Reign, Willie Mitchell, Bernard Doherty, Gert Thorne, Caroline Royce, Aiden Foley, Esther Beiilard, and Pam Bender. Also in attendance was JPNC member Sarah Freeman.
The main portion of the meeting consisted of a presentation from Rebecca Mautner, the Vice-President of Real Estate Development & Assets with the Jamaica Plain Neighborhood Development Corp. (JPNDC), which has been building affordable homes in the community for 40 years.
According to the JPNDC’s website, the group focuses on “new projects that are 100% affordable to households earning below 60% of Area Median Income (AIM).” Among its forthcoming projects, the JPNDC will be involved with the redevelopment of the Shattuck Hospital campus which, according to its web site, is, “A partnership among Boston Medical Center, JPNDC, The Community Builders, Bay Cove Human Services, Boston Health Care for the Homeless Program, Health Care Resource Centers, Pine Street Inn, and Victory Programs to redevelop the 13-acre Shattuck Hospital campus to provide the best and most seamless care possible to people experiencing addiction, mental illness, and homelessness. The JPNDC will take the lead in developing 201 service-enriched apartments for families who have experienced homelessness.”
After providing an overview of JPNDC’s residential and business portfolios and other programs, Mautner discussed the Stonley Brookley project, a new building at the corner of Stonley and Brookley Rds., that will consist of 45 affordable condominium units with a mix of studio, 1-, 2-, and 3-bedroom units with a likely completion date of early 2025. Applicants for the units must be either U.S. citizens or lawful resident aliens and must be first-time home buyers, with preferences for Boston residents and first-generation home buyers. There also will be five artist live-work studios. The sale of all of the units will be conducted through a lottery.
The price of the units will range from approximately $180,000 for a studio to $297,000 for a 3-bedroom for persons who have incomes of 80% of AMI, though those figures are subject to being updated.
After the committee members queried Mautner about various aspects of the project, Paola Liendo, the JPNDC’s Director of Economic Mobility Services, made a presentation regarding the services offered by the JPNDC to prospective home buyers to assist them with complying with the many requirements for qualifying for a mortgage.
The next topic taken up by the committee was a discussion with the members of the committee’s MBTA’s Arborway Garage subcommittee. Bender, a member of the subcommittee, said the subcommittee is asking the full HDC to send a letter to the T and the city regarding the T’s proposal (with the city’s assent) to place a 150-space parking lot on the eight acres of community development land that was promised to JP dating back to the original Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) in 1999 and subsequently signed by the T and the city (by then-mayor Tom Menino) in 2001.
Sue Cibulsky, a member of the subcommittee, presented the draft letter to the full committee, which essentially asks the T to find another location for the employee parking lot so as not to impinge on the eight acres set aside for community development purposes.
The committee members voted 7-1 in favor of sending the letter.
The committee also briefly discussed the status of the Forbes Building, which the owner has committed to turning into permanent affordable housing.
The committee then adjourned until its next meeting on May 21.