Behind the Mask of Mission Hill
Recent development in Mission Hill blazes a trail for three new mixed-use buildings along Tremont Street — The Tremont, Valor Apartments and Laneway, each one tracing back to real estate agent, Mitchell Wilson.
Wilson’s latest projects on Tremont Street leave community members frustrated with its towering architectural structure, inability to provide home ownership, exclusion towards low to medium income level residents and attractive pull on college students entering the neighborhood. Mission Hill natives and long-term residents battle with the demographic of college students domineering the neighborhood because of their negligence and lack of contribution to the longevity of Mission Hill. This is caused by students’ s removed connection to the community. In addition, the increase of students into the neighborhood has drove rent prices sky high — like its buildings — making it difficult for lower income families and elderly residents to remain in the neighborhood.
“I tell people Mission Hill is becoming a country full of strangers,” said 90-year-old Mission Hill native John Cosgwell.
The retired Boston police officer of 40 years, was born on Roxbury Crossing inside his parents’ three story home that ironically sat next door to a Police Station. “When I think of my childhood it’s nothing like today … it was all families and children, watching them, seeing them grow up and stuff like that.”
Cogswell’s “woman friend from church” recently moved into a new sky-rise residential building on South Huntington Avenue to which she told Cosgwell, “Its about 50 people living in that building and there’s only two people I can say hello to … they’re all strangers … I don’t know them, they come and they go, they don’t even say hello in the morning. It’s not a neighborhood anymore.”
Charmaine Cudjoe, who lived in Mission Hill for over 20 years from Jamaica, has been mistreated by the affordable housing management in effort to force her and her three children to move. “I’m 60, I work very hard in this country to make sure that I never take any handouts and when I had my son with special needs, he’ll be 17, and I had to stop work, I was treated like dog … The management here, they don’t care about us.”
On the corner of Delle Avenue and Parker Street, sits the neighborhood corner store which has been apart of the community for over 40 years catering to mostly those pertaining to the Hispanic and non-white members of the community. Only recently has the corner store encountered difficulties with having their liquor license suspended multiple times.
“The reason why mostly all these problems been happening is because the neighbors been giving a lot of complaints, because they buy liquor here but instead of going home, they stay around here and because of that they are trying to make his life miserable,” said Ramon Torres, who has been employed their for over 25 years.”
Having their liquor license suspended dramatically affects their numbers in sales. Cudjoe, who lives three doors up the street, believes this is an act of to clean out members they don’t deem fitting to the community.
“The way that a neighborhood is taking shape explains who they are catering to, they are not random or neutral but connected to class inequalities,” said Sarah Mayorga-Gallo, sociology professor at UMass Boston.
The Boston Planning and Development Agency held a public meeting earlier this year at which Wilson and his team presented their proposal for the demolition of 11 Burney Street in exchange to construct a 5-story commercial and residential use building, also know as mixed-use, with a shared community space, called “Laneway”. A clear divide between the opposing and supporting views took the room within minutes of Wilson’s presentation.
“I can’t go through another three years of construction,” said Anna Bowers, resident of Mission Hill for more than 25 years. “It’s been one after another … It’s wonderful if you have a penthouse, other than that you are being looked down on.”
Members of the younger generation view this project as attractive. “Me and my wife just moved out here and we love the developments going on. What these people are trying to build here is family-friendly,” said Matthew O’Connor, resident for almost 2 years and currently expecting his first child.
Mission Hill residents associated with the earlier generation immediately dismissed the idea and demanded that developers, such as Wilson, refrain from encroachment into residential areas of Mission Hill — this includes Burney Street. The counter argument, however, brought by business owners and young families, saw the project as an opportunity for the community to string in new revenue and increase foot traffic that will facilitate in achieving crime shrinkage within Mission Hill.
“One of the takeaways that I’ve learned [over the years] is never stop having the public involved in it,” said Wilson. “There is never going to be a project no matter how big or small that everyone is going to think it’s the greatest thing since slice bread.”
As a real estate agent, developer, property manager and real property owner, Wilson started his real estate company, New Urban Partners LLC, in 2006. Currently he obtains partial ownership to three new projects in Mission Hill, The Tremont, Valor Apartments and The Laneway. The Tremont and Valor Apartments, both of which are currently move-in ready, have a combined total of 84 residential units and sits upon 45,505 square feet of land.
“The proposed [Laneway] project includes 31 rental units, of which 4 will be designated as income restricted, and 6 garage parking spaces. The proposed project incorporates 1,900 SF of ground floor restaurant space and a new laneway concept creating 2,853 SF of open space for recreational activities and outdoor seating,” as stated on the Boston Planning and Development Agency website.
Growing up in a two-parent home, Wilson embodied family values at an early age. In High School, Wilson completed 60 plus hours of volunteer with Habitat for Humanity along with spending countless days by his father’s side as his apprentice fixing boats. It was shortly after then when Wilson knew he had knack for building quality work and serving the community.
Wilson went on to graduate from the University of Miami where he studied international business. Soon after graduating, he flew to Boston to accept a job preposition with a small family-run business property management and leasing company. About five years later,Wilson went on to create his own business. I’m building a portfolio in hopes to develop something to pass onto my daughters,” said Wilson.
The South Florida native has owned a total of 29 different properties in Mission Hill, five of which sits on Tremont Street. Recent developments in the last five years may have an indirect correlation to the displacement of elderly and low to medium income members of the community. However Wilson does not believe he is contributing to this unfortunate reality as he claims to have a wide variety of tenants throughout Mission Hill. “I have people who range from 60 to 70 years of age, all the way to undergraduate students. I have families with kids, babies,” said Wilson
In areas in which Wilson wishes for community members in need of affordable housing, he makes up in donations. With funds left over from profits, Wilson donated $10,000 to the Tobin Community Center and as a result the community gained a remodeled gymnasium and new equipment. “We are willing to make additional money set aside to benefit the community,” said Wilson.
Wilson also covered the entry fee for 40 kids from different rival areas and 7 chaperones to take a trip to the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, MA. “That’s just the carrots, the next step with these 40 kids from these rival neighborhoods is getting all of their parents in one room, trying to get their fathers and see where there fathers are involved, with the little black and Latino boys its really the father figure that’s really apart of the impact of a lot of these boys going astray because these fathers are not involved,” said John Jackson, administrative coordinator at the BCYF Tobin Community Center.
In addition to donating, Wilson’s project will create job opportunities. “A report I’ve got from the last builder, claims that 192 construction jobs, once [Laneway] is ingoing to completion and then there after will be created, I was talking to Milkweed, they said this building will create 20 to 25 jobs and addition to that I will have management and maintenance that will create more jobs.”
As new development projects begin to take form in Mission Hill, members of the community would benefit from implementing programs that assist in maintaining the needs of the neighborhood during times of new development and gentrification.“For example, DSNI is an example of a group that came together to stop gentrification and provide affordable housing by creating a community land trust, they were able to develop new housing that did not lead to displacement or gentrification” said Mayorga-Gallo. “By mandating affordable housing as part of development, cities can make sure that the wealthy are not the only ones able to live in the neighborhood.”