The opening of the first affordable housing project permitted after the passage of the Affordable Housing Overlay in 2020 was in the spotlight at an event for the release of the Affordable Housing Trust’s latest five-year report.
A raft of the city leaders, officials, developers and others engaged in affordable housing in Cambridge gathered at the building, 52 New Street, next to Danehy Park. The building was funded in part by the city’s Affordable Housing Trust, which the City Council established in 1989 to create and preserve affordable housing in the city.
“Housing affordability is the defining challenge facing our community,” said Mayor Sumbul Siddiqui at the event, also calling housing “the issue that defines our work together as a council.”
Siddiqui noted she grew up in affordable housing, the Fresh Pond Apartments on Rindge Ave., a renovation of which was one of the projects completed during the last five years. She called the work of the Trust important because it made Cambridge a place that more people could call home.
The 52 New Street building will add 106 rental units — 22 one-bedroom apartments, 62 two-bedroom apartments, and 22 three-bedroom apartments — to the city’s housing stock. Potential tenants applied last summer, were selected by lottery in September, and are expected to move in in mid-April.
City Manager Yi-An Huang, who is also the managing trustee of the Affordable Housing Trust, said 52 New Street will open “at a time when housing costs greatly exceed most people’s ability to afford it, both in Greater Boston and nationwide.”
He noted that the annual Cambridge survey of residents gives respondents the chance to say what is their biggest issue, and roughly 40 percent say affordable housing. The second most important issue typically draws less than 10 percent of responses.
He also noted that the ratio of what home prices to average household income in the Boston area in 1980 was three, meaning careful budgeters could save a down payment in five to six years. That ratio in greater Boston is now six, he said, and “Cambridge as a city is over 10.”
He framed the city’s investment in affordable housing as a driver of making the city accessible to a larger group of people.
“Housing is inherently about community. it’s the door into whether you get to be a part of this city,” he said. He said this was true for his own parents, who lived in Rindge Towers when they first moved to the area, something they hadn’t told him until he became city manager.
The Affordable Housing Trust report noted that the city invested $181 million in various types of affordable housing in the last five years, creating or preserving more than 900 units. Another 1,000 units are in development. In that span, the city has spent an average of $250,000 per unit.
Those numbers represent a substantial jump over what the Trust started out investing when it was established in 1989. Susan Schlesinger, who has served as a member of Trust for 36 years, held up a photocopy of its first report, issued in 1993. “In the first four years of the trust: it funded nine projects, with 54 units, 119 [single room occupancy units], and 10 beds. We spent $611,000. The big news was that the city manager was going to give $1 million to capitalize the Affordable Housing Trust.”
Over time and under city managers such as Richard Rossi, who was in attendance, and Louis DePasquale, Cambridge ramped up that investment. The city now is committed to investing $40 million per year on affordable housing.
The developer of 52 New Street said the city’s consistent investment meant “for the first time in my career we were able to move more quickly than a private developer,” said Carl Nagy-Koechlin, executive director of Just a Start, a nonprofit focused on developing housing and job skills. It was able to quickly bid to purchase the property, which cost $9 million. “That sounds like a lot for one acre of land, but when you can build 106 apartments on it, that’s just critical.”
Just a Start is also working on projects across from Lesley University’s Porter Square facility and on a lot in Central Square. Nagy-Koechlin said changes to permitting through the Overlay and follow-on city ordinances “has created a very predictable, nearly risk-free and expeditious process” for developers.
Also speaking at the event was Delfine Masongo, who moved to Cambridge from Kenya in 2008 and has lived primarily in affordable housing in Cambridge or Somerville ever since. She said when she received a housing voucher from Cambridge, it was life-changing for her. The city’s affordable housing “did not just give me shelter but took me as whole person and molded me,” Masongo said.
“Cambridge has given me wings,” she said.
A stronger
Please consider making a financial contribution to maintain, expand and improve Cambridge Day.
We are now a 501(c)3 nonprofit and all donations are tax deductible.
Please consider a recurring contribution.