Updated Sept. 11, 4:11 pm.
In what may be a first for the Vineyard, Edgartown is in talks to utilize privately owned apartments for affordable housing — a move that would bolster its subsidized housing inventory and give it reprieve from Chapter 40B developments.
The desired units are a part of a development proposed to be built on 238, 240, and 242 Upper Main Street called “Housing Behind the Dairy Queen.” The site is across the street from Stop & Shop, and the project proposal includes 15 year-round rental units.
At the Martha’s Vineyard Commission’s (MVC) continued hearing of the project on Sept. 3, Doug Sederholm, West Tisbury commissioner, said the Edgartown affordable housing committee is under negotiations with the project developers to come to a “buy down agreement” for four units. Sederholm explained the idea is that the town pays the difference between what the developer would have made with a market rate and a subsidized rate, in this case 80 percent of the area median income. In Dukes County, that’s $74,800 for a one-person household.
As of last week’s meeting, no agreement was official yet. Both parties plan to return with an update by Oct. 1, when the project is scheduled to be reviewed again by the MVC. A representative of the affordable housing committee was not immediately available for comment. Geoghan Coogan, the attorney representing the project, said his client was in favor of the deal, but details were being finalized.
Coogan said the idea is that while the units are privately owned, the town would have control over the parameters of who gets to rent them. The proposed agreement is similar to a lease.
Melissa Vincent, chair of the Edgartown affordable housing committee, said no other Vineyard town has made such an arrangement with a private developer before. She said that Upper Main Street has become a “hot spot” for development, including the expansion of the Stop & Shop, but there hasn’t been a “betterment to the residents” of Edgartown.
Vincent said the plan is to acquire the four units by utilizing the Local Initiative Program, a state initiative that supports the creation of affordable housing. All 15 units can be counted in the town’s subsidized housing inventory, even if not all of the units are affordable, through the program.
“That allows us to have at least one year of ‘Safe Harbor’ from any new 40Bs coming into the Town of Edgartown,” Vincent said. “Safe harbor” is a status that can block 40B developments and is achieved when at least 10 percent of a municipality’s housing stock is deemed affordable or a town is working toward bolstering affordable housing through a housing production plan.
Chapter 40B, on the other hand, is a state statute created in 1969 to bolster the development of affordable units amid a national housing shortage. It gives developers more leeway in local zoning and incentive if at least a quarter of units in a proposed project are designated as affordable.
Usually, Chapter 40B projects are reviewed by the local zoning board of appeals, but the Island has a unique setup where the MVC is also involved as a regulatory body. This authority, however, was thrown into flux after the Massachusetts Affordable Housing Committee determined in April that the planning body didn’t have the jurisdiction to rule on Chapter 40B developments.
Local select boards have called on a reversal of the state ruling, saying the MVC has preserved the Island from overdevelopment. In Edgartown, the most recent case surrounding 40B projects was regarding Edgartown Gardens, a 60-unit development proposed near the “triangle” that was unanimously rejected by the MVC last fall.
The cost of the four units depends on a market analysis from the applicants, Vincent said, and may require funding to be approved at the annual town meeting in the spring.
Editor’s note: Updated with clarification about the proposed agreement from Geoghan Coogan.
