BOSTON—Coinciding with the celebration of Bunker Hill Day, the Boston Housing Authority has issued a Request for Proposal to preserve and rebuild the more than 1,000 units at the Bunker Hill public housing development here.
BHA officials say the RFP is part of its intent to upgrade and make its affordable housing stock more sustainable in the face of federal housing cuts.
“It's imperative that we think outside the box to preserve our existing affordable housing as well as develop new housing to meet the future housing needs of all of our city's residents,” says Boston Mayor Martin J. Walsh. “I'm excited because this project has the potential to meet the housing needs of people from a broad spectrum of economic backgrounds.”
The BHA selected Bunker Hill as one of the initial candidates for an RFP issuance due to current market conditions and the potential opportunity for the preservation or replacement of all of the existing 1,100 very low-income units in the development with little or no public subsidy. The RFP to developers also includes the potential for additional units at the Bunker Hill development. BHA officials say that the creation of a mixed-income development would add affordable workforce and market rate apartments, and additional income to help sustain the low-income units over the long term.
The creation of additional market rate and workforce housing will further Mayor Walsh's goal of creating 53,000 new units of housing by 2030, they say.
“We look forward to receiving creative ideas that will preserve and protect our affordable housing resources for the future,” says BHA administrator Bill McGonagle. “We are proceeding in this manner to ensure that our current residents and future residents of the city in need of affordable housing have this valuable resource to call home for generations to come.”
The deadline for responses to the RFP is Friday, August 14. A selection committee comprised of residents of the Bunker Hill public housing development and BHA staff will review the proposals and select a developer. BHA and the selected developer will hold a series of resident and community meetings, as well as design charrettes as part of an open, public, neighborhood planning process that is expected to begin this fall, the BHA states.
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