No visible support for 45 Townsend at meeting

Yawu Miller

Yawu Miller is the former senior editor of the Bay State Banner. He has written for the Banner since 1988.... VIEW BIO

Nearly two years after Kensington Investment Company proposed a 322-unit complex at 45 Townsend Street in Roxbury, the gulf between the developers’ aspirations and the abutters’ expectations seems to have grown wider.

Dozens of Roxbury residents turned out to a meeting with the developers Monday evening at the Trotter school. In a brief presentation, representatives from Kensington’s team outlined the changes they have made to their proposal for the site of the former Jewish Memorial Hospital, including: a reduction in the overall number of units to 300; the same number of parking spaces — 220 — with the spaces moved underground; removal of the planned café; and a new shuttle that will bring residents to and from the Jackson Square MBTA station in an attempt to mitigate traffic and parking.

The residents at the meeting continued to push developers to scale back the project, arguing that the population density, the size of the proposed buildings and the insufficient parking on the site would make it a poor fit for Townsend Street.

“If we do not reduce the number of units, we will have a design that will be oppressive,” said Louis Elisa, president of the Garrison Trotter Neighborhood Association.

“This development team looks at this site like it’s in Forest Hills or Ashmont,” said Jed Hresko, who sits on the city’s project review committee for the site. “We look at this as a neighborhood of Victorian homes.”

Hresko and other members of the PRC fired off a letter earlier in February outlining their opposition to the project and opposition by community members. The PRC is calling for development of the site to adhere to the neighborhood’s zoning code, which allows three units on a 4,000 square-foot parcel. Under that scenario, committee members said, no more than 166 units could be constructed on the nearly 5-acre parcel — little more than half the 300 Kensington has proposed.

Even with that number, the development would still have greater density per square foot than the Council of Elders Tower on Washington Street, Marksdale Gardens, New Academy Estates and other housing developments in the vicinity.

“The developer proposes the kind of high density / small unit / young-professional-focused / minimal-parking development better suited for a subway station or transit spine,” the letter reads.

City Councilor Kim Janey also weighed in on the project, with a letter dated Feb. 25 stating her “strong, continued opposition” to the project, arguing that the development would be too large for the community and that Kensington has done little to address the concerns of Roxbury residents around parking, traffic and affordability.

“Resident opposition to this project has been loud and clear,” Janey says in the letter. “I continue to stand with the residents in opposition.”

Adding to the list of opponents: building trades members who normally back large projects such as the one Kensington is proposing for Townsend Street. At the meeting, members of the New England Regional Council of Carpenters passed out stickers with the words Kensington Investment Company crossed out with a red line.

Union member Charles Cofield said the union takes issue with Kensington’s selection of Callahan Inc. as the project’s lead contractor, accusing the firm of engaging in a pattern of wage theft and payroll fraud.

“This is definitely not the right contractor to be doing work in this city, in this state or anywhere in New England,” Cofield said.

Liz Skidmore, a co-founder of the Policy Group on Tradeswomen’s Issues, said Kensington’s selection of a non-union contractor would ensure that the project would not adhere to the city’s goals for minority and women participation, noting that there are only 39 non-union women in apprenticeships in Massachusetts, versus 612 in union apprenticeships.

“The non-union sector can’t meet the workforce goals in this city,” she said.

The plans for the 300-unit development were filed Jan. 15, triggering a 30-day public comment period. Boston Planning and Development Agency Project Manager Dana Whiteside said the agency has extended the comment period until Feb. 28.