by John Osborn ·
Friday, September 13, 2024
If Gov. Maura Healey’s economic development bill passes later this month with its provisions for more housing at Devens, the state will seek to build first in areas already zoned for residential development, not in Vicksburg Square—which is not.
Interim MassDevelopment CEO Dan O’Connell made the statement last Wednesday, Sept. 4, at an in-person appearance before the Devens Committee, which meets monthly in the agency’s offices on Andrews Parkway. MassDevelopment is the agency responsible for redeveloping the former U.S. Army base and providing services to its residents and businesses.
Passage of Healey’s economic development bill, now stuck in a six-member joint committee of the Massachusetts House and Senate, would authorize the spending of millions of dollars to support the growth of biotech and clean energy businesses in Massachusetts.
But both the House and Senate versions passed in July (H4804 and S28679) would also eliminate the 282-unit housing cap at Devens and create a working group mandated to come up with a plan for more housing there, with particular attention to the quadrangle of abandoned U.S. Army barracks at Vicksburg Square. Advocates, including the Devens Framework Jurisdiction Committee, have proposed that up to 400 multifamily units be built there.
Acting CEO O’Connell told committee members last Wednesday that housing was likely “the highest and best use” of Vicksburg Square, noting that the recently passed housing bill doubled the tax credit for restoring historic buildings such as Vicksburg Square, which is listed on the National Registry of Historic Places. The larger credit should make the economics of redeveloping more attractive, he said.
But redevelopment of Vicksburg Square requires that the area—currently an Innovation and Technology Center district—first be rezoned for residential development. And the law that governs redevelopment of
Devens, Chapter 498, requires that any change to zoning be approved by majority votes of the town meetings of Ayer, Harvard, and Shirley, and that the language of the article presented to voters be approved by MassDevelopment, a process that could take months. O’Connell signaled that given the state’s housing crisis, the agency wanted to move more quickly.
“I think immediately on passage of the economic development bill and the lifting of the cap, our intention at MassDevelopment would be to look at areas already zoned for housing at Devens,” O’Connell said. The Devens Enterprise Commission, which would be the permitting authority for any such development, estimates that 85 to 90 acres are available, much of it located near Grant Road and Adams Circle, and housing could be built in those areas without a vote of the towns.
O’Connell said the agency would look for interest among developers for either single family housing, “which has been such a success here,” or “multifamily rental units that could be workforce housing for the growing workforce at Devens.” He added, “We hear from a number of the new companies, Electric Hydrogen, Commonwealth Fusion Systems, that their employees love Devens ... They want to live near where they work so they could walk or bike to work.”
O’Connell’s appearance last week was his first before the Devens Committee, a five-member board elected by residents to advise MassDevelopment on its governance of Devens. He was accompanied by Meg Delorier, interim executive vice president for Devens, and by the department heads of fire, police, public works, and recreation. Approximately a dozen residents were present either in person or remotely for a lively Q&A session on issues from traffic to future governance of the region to the lack of progress on 46 units of multifamily housing at Emerson Green.
O’Connell said NOW Communities, Emerson Green’s developer, understood that it could not proceed with the final phase of its project until the multifamily dwelling, now a gaping hole, is built. “We won’t let them do anything until they finish their commitment. They owe us 46 units and they owe us a park,” he said, though he offered no timeline for when construction might start.
“I think we’ve shown NOW Communities that we’re serious about how they need to proceed on the multifamily units before they are able to do any additional single family housing, which I think has been a good and profitable business for them. And so we’re going to hold their feet to the fire on that, and we would not consider them for additional [projects] unless they’ve met all their commitments.”
But O’Connell was optimistic about both passage of the economic development bill and the prospects for more housing. He said he had met with Healey shortly after the Democratic Convention in August, and that she assured him the leaders of both the House and Senate had committed to calling the Legislature back for a formal session to pass the bill later this month—or in early October.
“I think there’ll be quite a bit of interest from the development community in Devens,” O’Connell said. “Interest rates are finally looking like they’re going to drop a little bit. But it’s been a tough time for the industry, especially the residential housing development industry. I think our timing could be really good here in terms of the cap being lifted and the economics of creating housing getting more attractive for the development community.”