To the editor (of the Salem News):
The Beverly Housing Authority, which is planning a poorly conceived housing project for low-income families at the Montserrat train station, is exhibiting all the traits citizens deplore in state agencies. Their repeated refusal to meet with neighbors who have many legitimate concerns about this project is outrageous.
Whether Beverly needs another new low-income housing project, when so many of the BHA's other properties are in such disrepair is a legitimate debate, but it's not our primary focus. Their plan makes absolutely no sense regardless of the income level of the residents.
The BHA plans to spend $1.3 million for five units of housing in three buildings on less than a half-acre of land at one of the city's busiest intersections. The site is between two train crossings that regularly back up into each other. And they plan to rent these units to families, so as many as 20 or more people - including many children - will live on this small triangle of land!
The project has been in the works for years, yet no one in the neighborhood, even direct abutters, have ever been consulted or notified about the BHA's intentions. For several months, a group of us, working with Ward 4 City Councilor Scott Houseman, has been pressing the BHA for a meeting to address our concerns. The BHA has repeatedly refused to meet, yet has already secured what the city says are all the necessary permits and has put the project out for bid.
The method by which the BHA acquired this land from the MBTA (for a mere $10) is also troubling, as is the method by which the city approved the plan: To qualify for the needed square footage, the BHA claims ownership of a large area of the MBTA parking lot, even though they don't intend to, and apparently are unable to legally build on it. So while the full parcel just barely qualifies under zoning rules (which already allow considerably more density than anywhere else in the surrounding neighborhood), about 20 percent of the property will be fenced off from the project, creating an even denser development. In addition, the BHA plans to take some of the public transit spaces for tenant parking.
There are a whole host of other concerns with this plan: How will this impact traffic at an already congested corner where the BHA plans three driveways? How many residents will be allowed to live in each unit, and how will they be screened? Will any open space remain for all the children who will live there? How many public transit parking spaces will be lost, and why are we reducing public transit parking spaces at the same time we are building new ones in other parts of the city?
No agency should be able to come into a neighborhood and subject it to such a poorly conceived project and then refuse to meet with the community.
While we realize this is a state project that the City Council does not have a vote on, we expect that as our elected representatives that they and the city government will take the time to study the troubling details of this project and the negative effect it will have on the neighborhood. If they too agree that it's a fatally flawed plan, it is their duty to help us find a way to challenge it.
John Hall - Montserrat Neighborhood Group, Beverly