Boston Housing Authority wants $30M to redevelop Roxbury site

The Boston Housing Authority has applied for a $30 million Choice Neighborhoods grant from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development to revitalize the Whittier Street public housing development in Roxbury.

The application follows a community process which culminated in a "plan for transformation" for the site and the surrounding neighborhood, according to the mayor's office.

"The Whittier Choice Plan is ambitious and seeks to bring a comprehensive approach to revitalizing the Lower Roxbury neighborhood," said Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh. "We're looking forward to presenting a winning proposal to HUD so that we can fulfill the potential for the Whittier Street area and its residents."

The transformation plan is divided among four key areas: housing, neighborhood, people and jobs and economic opportunities. Here's a breakdown of those plan areas:

- Housing: A plan that will bring $300 million in new housing investment, replacing 200 units of deeply subsidized housing and adding 350 new units of moderate and market housing, totaling 550 new units of housing, to create a vibrant new mixed-income neighborhood which will not displace current residents.

- Neighborhood: A plan that is knitted into the broader Roxbury Master Plan, with targeted investment in infrastructure, public safety, walkability improvements, and community facilities that support and emphasize breaking the isolation of Whittier Street residents.

- People: A plan that addresses community transformation and opportunity and not just physical improvements, where the Whittier community is a connected community whose members enjoy a broad spectrum of quality programs and services, and have tangible pathways to educational and economic opportunity.

- Jobs and Economic Opportunities: A Project Labor Agreement that will create hundreds of good-paying union construction jobs as well as increased opportunities for public housing and low-income residents to enter into the Building Pathways program, which provides pre-apprenticeship training and guaranteed placement within the building trades following graduation.

The plan was financed with a $300,000 Choice Neighborhoods planning grant through HUD. If funding is approved for the Whittier Street plan, the Preservation of Affordable Housing and the Madison Park Development Corp. will act as co-developers on the project, with MPDC and the Boston Redevelopment Authority leading the process for the plan's neighborhood goals.

"We really want to improve people's lives in a comprehensive way through housing but also through insuring they have the supports they need to learn, grow, and improve their economic circumstances," said BHA Administrator Bill McGonagle. "This plan, if implemented, would transform Lower Roxbury and the lives of the people who live there."

Boston won $20.5 million Choice Neighborhoods implementation grant in 2010/11 in the Woodledge/Morrant Bay area of Dorchester.

Source: Boston Business Journal