The Somerville Redevelopment Authority (SRA) conducted its regular business at its latest meeting on Tuesday September 10.

By Fred Bernardin

On Tuesday September 10 at 5:30 p.m., the Somerville Redevelopment Authority (SRA) held their monthly meeting via Zoom. The meeting was hosted by the City’s Economic and Development Planner, Ben Devers. SRA Members Philip Ercolini, Iwona Bonney, Ben Ewen-Campen, and William Gage were present; SRA Member Christine Stone was absent. In addition, the meeting was attended by Special Counsel Catherine Lester Salchert.

After the roll call, and the unanimous approval of the minutes from the June 11 meeting, there was no public comment. Devers gave an update on the city’s progress on the recruitment of a member for the vacant spot on the RDA and indicated that the final approval steps would be completed soon, and that this new member would be able to join as early as next month’s meeting. He also mentioned that the reappointment of eligible board members would take place in January.

Most of the following public portion of the meeting covered the Union Square Revitalization Plan (Transformation Area #1, Parcel D-2).  This included a PowerPoint presentation of the project’s status provided by Greg Karczewski, the president of US2. US2 oversees developing USQ, a project underway to complete commercial lab space and residential housing at 10-50 Prospect St. Karczewski admitted that the Lab spaces have been slow to attract tenants due to the economic conditions but did point to the fact that all 90 of the affordable housing units were now occupied. Most of the remaining 360 market-rate housing units are also now occupied. There will be a tour of the parcel provided by Karczewski to the SRA the week of September 16 (the exact date had not been set).

SRA Member Ewen-Campen clarified the parking availability for the residences, which is 1 space per 4 units; Karczewski responded this target was defined by the city to encourage occupancy by tenants who will make full use of the Union Square Station located at the western corner of the D-2 parcel. Ewen-Campen also asked about street-level retail and Karczewski responded that the eventual occupancy was flexible at this point but that the goal was to provide several small locally owned businesses.

The SRA is scheduled to complete the Certification of Compliance process by Friday October 18; Devers indicated that he would resolve some ambiguity about the inclusion of the D-2 parcel’s open space in this certification.

The rest of the meeting provided an update on the 90 Washington Street Redevelopment. One of the take-aways was the fact that the project will be leaning more towards residential and retail development and less towards preserving parking.

The SRA went into executive session at 6:11 and returned at 6:26, at which point the meeting was adjourned. The executive session, closed to the public, discussed the legal case (Cobble Hill Center LLC v. Somerville Redevelopment Authority) filed after the taking of about 4 acres by eminent domain as part of the 90 Washington Street Redevelopment project.

Although recordings of the SRA meetings are generally posted within a couple days, as of writing the recording of the Zoom meeting was not yet available. The October SRA Meeting has also not been scheduled as of this time.