The Hathaway apartments nears the end of its time in Zoning

The developers of The Hathaway, a proposed 40B apartment building, have updated the project proposal after having a private meeting with Zoning Board of Appeals Chair Michael Medeiros and Town Counsel Susan Murphy. 

Developer Philip Cordeiro is now proposing a 280-unit apartment with 398 bedrooms, down from the initially proposed 300-units. 

“This is a scale down from what they submitted before, so we don’t know if it’s a better plan than when they submitted,” said Zoning Board of Appeals member Halim Choubah. “It’s improved over what they showed before.”

The deadline to close the public hearing for the Hathaway was extended to Thursday, Aug. 27 to allow the developers time to resubmit their waivers, and give Murphy time to finish a list of draft conditions. 

The developer’s representative Mark Donahue presented three things they changed about the proposal to answer public concerns regarding height, parking and water and sewer.

The three buildings abutting Eisenhower Road have been shortened; the front building would be three stories, and the back two would be three stories in the front and four in the back. The other three buildings would stay four stories in the front and five stories in the back.

The plans now have a total of 425 parking spots. The original plans had 341 spots with 131 “banked” parking, which would not be built unless needed. 

The developers got rid of the banked parking, and moved the parking on the southern side to add additional parking. This also removed impervious surfaces, giving more spaces for seeding. 

Originally, the team was asking for an offset of water and sewer fees and to not have to pay the water and sewer fees in entirety for the affordable units. They would also put $40,000 toward replacing the North Pump Station, which is estimated to be about 25% of the material costs. 

They would also pay $30,000 to a traffic improvement fund and a total of $5,000 to the abutters on Eisenhower Drive, to improve their lawns for additional privacy. 

They also withdrew the billboard and the recreational court that they were going to share with the church next door. They would be keeping the irrigation well for their sprinklers system.

“They … made substantial concessions that weren’t before us until today,” said Zoning Board of Appeals member Alvin Youman.

Despite these changes, residents still raised some concerns, such as why the other three buildings couldn’t be shortened to three and four stories. 

“The fact that the town infrastructure, traffic, schools, sewer and water can’t really support this project doesn’t matter because it’s coming down from the state?” asked resident Jean Ricardi.

She continued, “The more residents they pack into the town, the more we can’t meet the 10% of affordable housing because they keep increasing the population, so will we ever … get there?”

Medeiros said this could cause the developers to bring the issue to the state, who would approve it without the conditions the Zoning Board would enforce. 

One resident from Eisenhower Street hired a lawyer to represent them, and paid to re-do the wetlands studies. Murphy clarified that the Board can only read these studies and cannot have them peer reviewed. Medeiros agreed to this, but added that the studies will not be presented during the next zoning meeting. 

The developers granted a two-week extension on the condition that Murphy have the draft conditions finished, and that the resident's studies not stretch out the meeting. 

The Board will likely close the public hearing during this next meeting.

“I think that the halfway discussion is an example of when the process works,” Cordeiro said. “The Hathaway comes forward with that well thought out plan, talks with the town in advance, hears the concerns, incorporates those into the design and then enters into the public hearing process, where not only board members but members of the public have a chance to see what the proposal is and then be able to compromise.”