Superior Court Judge Sarah Weyland Ellis denied the request of the developer of 1740 Massachusetts Avenue that she order the city of Cambridge to issue it a building permit. She did, however, order the city to “render a decision” on the permit by Friday, Nov. 6.
Ellis’s decision, dated Oct. 22, was a single handwritten paragraph. It came three weeks and three days after a Sept. 29 hearing involving the city and Old North Development, the developer of 1740 Mass. Ave.
After the decision, Old North principal Adam Siegel said, “We’re just going to see what the city produces and we’ll continue the process.”
Asked if Old North had sought anything further from the city since the hearing, Siegel declined to comment. A spokesperson for the city said Cambridge was aware of the order and the requirement.
The city has so far declined to begin formal processing of Old North’s building permit application because it has not cleared the Housing Department’s pre-review step. The Housing Department has withheld that approval because Old North has refused to sign the city’s affordable housing covenant at the building permit stage. Old North says its lender, Cambridge Savings Bank, has refused to authorize signing the covenant at the building permit stage, and that the proper time is after the building is constructed: at the certificate of occupancy stage.
As part of its refusal to start formal processing that led to the filing of the lawsuit, the city has also refused to accept Old North’s payment of the $450,000 permitting fee. It’s not clear whether Judge Ellis’s order will cause the city to accept that fee or if the city will simply deny the permit for failure to obtain Housing Department sign-off, failure to pay the permitting fee, or for some other reason. The city spokesperson also declined to comment on this question.
Building permits in pre-review are not available in the city’s open data portal or otherwise publicly available online, but summary information about them is now available on the Cambridge Housing Development Dashboard. Permit 1215527, for 1740 Massachusetts Avenue, is listed as “Active,” which includes pre-review and under-review building permits, as well as issued building permits for active projects.
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