06.02.2024

DiZoglio lights up local Dems with zinger | Battle for control at state’s embattled pot watchdog | Mass. housing production law hits big stumbling block | Push to upend voke school admissions fizzles | Quick hits |

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Loving it to death? Progressives are undermining the MBTA Communities Act with unworkable affordable housing mandates, critics say

There’s little enthusiasm for the state’s 2021 housing law on the part of local conservatives, who have lambasted it as yet another example of government overreach in deep blue Massachusetts.

But the centerpiece of Gov. Maura Healey’s bid to ramp up desperately needed housing production now faces an even more serious challenge.

And it’s coming not from Massachusetts Republicans, but from the progressive left, which has been supportive of the landmark housing law.

A growing number of cities and towns are undermining the intent of the law, which was to boost housing production, by layering on expensive affordable housing mandates, developers say.

Amid high interest rates and skittish financing, requiring that 15 percent, or in some cases 20 percent, of all units be sold or rented at well below market rates will make it difficult, if not impossible, to get projects off the off the ground, critics say.

Under the MBTA Communities Act, state housing officials have to sign off on any local affordable housing mandates that rise above the 10 percent threshold.

Jeff Rhuda, business development manager for residential builder Symes Associates, Inc., dropped plans for a small condo project in Arlington after he learned the town had won a green light to push its affordability requirement to 15 percent of all new units.

Jeff Rhuda, business development manager for residential builder Symes Associates, Inc.

That would have meant having to include two affordable units in his potential, small, condo project. With the sale price required to be capped at $250,000, that could have easily meant the loss of hundreds of thousands of dollars for the developer.

“That tips the deal over,” Rhuda told Contrarian Boston. “If adding one or two affordable units takes away tens of market-rate units, then they are defeating the whole purpose of the MBTA zoning.”

“There isn’t a developer out there that will tell you adding inclusionary housing helps housing production,” he added.

Arlington is not alone. Several other towns have also won permission to increase the percentage of their affordable housing mandates, including ultra progressive suburbs like Brookline, Concord, Lexington, Newton, and Wellesley, according to a spokesperson for the state Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities. Cambridge wants to go to 20 percent, with its request now under review.

In order to win permission to increase the mandate, cities and towns have to submit a market assessment from a third party expert, but in some cases, the reports may not take into account current market headwinds.

Jay Doherty, CEO of Cabot, Cabot & Forbes, is also concerned about the growing push by local communities for higher affordability mandates.

Jay Doherty, CEO of Cabot, Cabot & Forbes

He notes that what might have worked a few years ago is no longer feasible, given the tricky new economics of financing and building new housing amid the highest interest rates in a generation and relentless increases in construction costs.

“The cost of financing multifamily projects has soared since 2022, so very few greater Boston multifamily projects are moving ahead, a situation that is not likely to change soon,” Doherty, a major housing developer, tells Contrarian Boston.

Another day, another coup attempt at the CCC: Embattled state pot watchdog plagued by another round of infighting

The Cannabis Control Commission’s first chair suddenly resigned under mysterious circumstances, with the agency only announcing the change when contacted by the local news media.

Brought in to try and reform a dysfunctional agency with a reputation for backbiting and mismanagement, Shannon O’Brien, a former Democratic nominee for governor, fared worse: she was suspended as chair last September over, among other things, flimsy allegations that she had made a racist remark.

Now Debbie Hilton-Creek, the commission’s acting executive director, is the latest to find herself in the crosshairs, as the agency’s penchant for palace intrigue and plotting rears its head again.