10/10/2019

Boston's Public Housing Goes Private: Why The City Is Teaming Up With Developers

wbur|October 08, 2019 Miranda Suarez

Emilia Perez moved to the Orient Heights public housing development in East Boston in the '90s, and she looked forward to a possible revamp of the property.

"I was happy every time people would say, 'Oh, they be doing the new buildings,'" she says.

That redevelopment — the demolition and rebuilding of 331 public housing units — is finally underway. Perez moved to a different part of Orient Heights during the first phase of construction, and some of her neighbors decided not to move back in when their new homes were completed, she says.

But now Perez has a new townhouse with built-in air conditioning and a good kitchen — which is important, because she likes to cook.

"I like what I see," she says of the reconstruction so far. "Everybody wants something new."

In this case, Trinity Financial, a private developer, is doing the construction, not the Boston Housing Authority, the agency in charge of the city's public housing. The company has undertaken similar projects for several other BHA sites...click here to read more.