Efforts to build senior housing on land next to Hildreth House lost momentum last week when the Housing@Hildreth House Committee declared it will not have the information it needs to prepare a proposal for selling a portion of land in time for April’s Annual Town Meeting.
Chairman Rick Maiore of the housing committee reported the delay at the Jan. 20 Board of Selectmen meeting. The board had hoped to receive sufficient information by Feb. 9 to draft an article asking the town to transfer a portion of Hildreth land to a developer to build senior housing. Instead, that vote will have to wait until a Special Town Meeting in the fall. In addition, he said, legal complications had arisen with a Municipal Affordable Housing Trust grant that was to have paid for an engineering study on the property in exchange for the inclusion of two affordable units. Maiore told the board that because the grant fell through, no affordable units are currently planned for the project, which will make the land more valuable to a developer.
The planned engineering study, estimated to cost $30,000, will determine options for the housing’s location and number of units and the location of an access road, Maiore reported. It will include a topographic field survey showing 2-foot contour intervals and two or three plans with footprints for up to 20 stand-alone or duplex units. The study will produce a site plan that could go to the Planning Board for preliminary site approval. Committee member Victor Normand told the selectmen that preliminary approval would make the project more palatable to developers in a town that tends to “take its time” approving projects.
Selectman Ron Ricci acknowledged that the initial timetable for information gathering was aggressive, and the selectmen agreed that it would be better to present more detailed information about the project to a fall Town Meeting. A request for proposals for the engineering study has already gone out, and proposals are due back Jan. 26.
Last month, the Municipal Affordable Housing Trust voted to grant the money for the study in exchange for written confirmation that the project would include two affordable units. But Town Counsel Mark Lanza informed the housing trust that its funds could not be used for a project unless 25 percent of the housing was affordable, which would have required one or two more affordable units. The committee decided to ask the selectman for funds from the town’s Rantoul trusts instead, and the project will include only moderately priced housing, as it originally did.
The selectmen voted 3–1 to pay for the study with $20,000 from a trust left by the late Albert Rantoul for the selectmen’s use and $10,000 from a second trust set aside by Rantoul to benefit elderly residents. Selectwoman Alice von Loesecke was absent. Selectwoman Lucy Wallace cast the negative vote, saying that the entire amount should have come from the general trust, which has a balance close to $200,000. The other Rantoul trust has only $29,500, and Wallace said that it is occasionally used to fund needs that arise for senior services. If the project moves forward, the money used for the study will be repaid to the two trusts from any profit realized by the town.
