Published February 11, 2021
By MAUREEN DOHERTY
NORTH READING — Pulte Homes of New England will seek a variance before the Zoning Board of Appeals (ZBA) tonight (Feb. 11) to add a fifth story to the final four buildings of its nine-building condominium complex at 104 Lowell Road.
Originally designed to be a maximum of four stories in height, Pulte is seeking relief from the zoning requirement under section 200-40B (2)(e) that limits the stories of the buildings to four. Pulte’s application noted that adding one story to each of these four buildings will not violate the height restriction of 60 feet under the town’s Zoning Bylaws as the alterations would make the buildings a maximum of 59 feet, 4 inches — eight inches under the zoning limit.
As currently designed, all of the units at Martins Landing are sold at market rate but are age-restricted to 55-plus. The original plan approved by the town has 450 total units. By adding the additional story to Buildings 260, 280, 300 and 320, there were be 13 additional units per building for a net gain of 52 market rate units.
In its application Pulte has cited its reasoning for seeking the additional units as a means to recoup its losses — estimated to be between $8 to $12 million — for asbestos remediation on the site of the former state tuberculosis hospital. Through no fault of either Pulte’s or the town, the applicant states that this hardship was brought on by the demolition of the old buildings on the site by a state contractor back in 2007, which was 10 years prior to Pulte’s purchase of the property for about $30 million in 2017.
“It has become apparent that, through no fault of Pulte Homes of New England or the town of North Reading, the site contains ACM (asbestos containing material) due to the Commonwealth’s failure to properly abate the ACM prior to the demolition of structures at the J.T. Berry Center in 2007-2008,” the applicant states.
Subsequent to Pulte’s purchase in 2017, the state Department of Environmental Protection (DEP) required Pulte to test and now remediate the 27,000 cubic yards of contaminated topsoil “because of the discovery of the building pieces of ACM left over from the demolition.” Pulte maintains that these fragments were buried in the existing topsoil at the site and were “not visible to the town’s environmental consultant, Pulte’s environmental consultant, (and) the LD subcontractor at any point before or during Pulte’s site development…”
Select Board weighs in
This matter was discussed at length at Monday night’s Select Board meeting and it was ultimately decided that the board would write a letter to the ZBA and Pulte Homes with regard to the impact 52 additional market-rate units will have on the town’s obligation to provide one affordable unit of housing for every 10 new market rate units built in town.
Select Board member Stephen O’Leary said this request will set the town back by another five units, in addition to the 45 units the town already needs to offset under the original agreement. He also maintained that Pulte had been given plenty of opportunities to do its “due diligence” in assessing the potential presence of ACM on the site given its prior use.
O’Leary said the ZBA is not obligated to provide the requested relief but if that board was to entertain the variance he felt it would not be “unreasonable for us to request an additional 20 percent affordable units to assist in the town’s affordable housing needs at a minimal impact to their bottom line.”
“Another 52 units of 55-plus housing is a good deal for the town, but we still have a moral obligation to meet,” O’Leary said, noting that the addition of 10 units of age-restricted affordable housing would be “wonderful.”
O’Leary and Select Board Chairwoman Kate Manupelli are the only two current members of the board who participated in the original negotiations with Pulte Homes when the town put out its Requests for Proposals (RFP) for the site. The two applications submitted by Pulte were $18 million for a complex built under Chapter 40B or $30 million for the age-restricted 55-plus proposal, which the board ultimately accepted.
Manupelli agreed that a “fairly lengthy due diligence process” was built into the negotiation process with Pulte Homes “…and if I am recalling it right it was extended more than once.”
Select Board member Vincenzo Stuto, who is the board’s liaison to the Community Planning Commission, was familiar with the application due to the CPC’s past discussions on it. He cautioned against the unintended consequences of the town getting a reputation of being difficult to work with the business community when situations such as this arise.
The board members ultimately agreed to send an advisory letter to the ZBA requesting that a variance not be agreed to unless at least 20 percent of the additional units are affordable.
Manupelli said they want Pulte to come to the hearing prepared to say what they are willing to offer. “We were the board that considered the responses to all the RFPs and this was the project that was accepted,” Manupelli said.
