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Harbor Hill

    HOUSING

    Harbor Hill Apartments Will Not Be Sold — for Now

    A year-long effort to find a buyer is thwarted by a taxability detail

    By

    PROVINCETOWN — The 28 apartments in the former timeshare complex at Harbor Hill will not be sold by the town — at least for now.

    Eugene Zhukau, an arborist and landscaper, in front of the Harbor Hill complex where he lives. (Photo by Paul Benson)

    That’s the decision reached earlier this summer by the trustees of the Year-Round Market-Rate Rental Housing Trust after a year-long exploration of how to structure the sale.

    Trust chair Austin Miller, who is also a select board member, told the board on June 10 that the trust’s decision came after the town’s bond counsel pointed out an issue with the bonds that financed the purchase in 2017.

    “Because they are nontaxable municipal bonds related to community housing, if the housing were sold, the bonds would become taxable,” he said. The bonds can’t be repaid until June 2027. If the sale didn’t fully cover the outstanding debt, the town would have to allocate more money to pay them off — or reissue them as taxable bonds.

    “This could all come up again in 2027, but it makes very little sense to sell the property prior to that,” Miller told the Independent.

    Not the Usual Affordable Housing

    The trust and the apartments it manages at Harbor Hill represent one of Provincetown’s most unusual efforts to respond to the housing crisis.

    The complex is fully occupied — as of December, there were 46 adults, 8 children, 12 dogs, and 3 cats living there — but because there is almost no state or federal money available for median-income rental housing, the town has borne the costs of the purchase and of maintenance and management on its own.

    Voters endorsed $10.7 million in borrowing to buy the apartments in 2017. Town meeting authorized $310,000 for roof replacement in April 2023, and more maintenance spending is ahead, according to Miller — about a million dollars for exterior walls is next on the list.

    To avoid saddling townspeople with further costs, the trust began researching the possibility of selling the property last August and chose John Ciluzzi of Premier Commercial as its broker in April.

    The idea, Miller said, was to deed-restrict the property to preserve its current mission: year-round rentals for people who earn too much to qualify for state-subsidized affordable housing but who still struggle to find a secure home in Provincetown. Year-round rentals have all but disappeared here, and the median single-family house price in 2023 was over $2 million, according to the Cape Cod and Islands Association of Realtors.

    The trust’s charter is to address the housing needs of people who earn between 80 and 200 percent of the county’s median income; 80 percent of the median is $70,950 for a one-person household or $81,050 for two people, while the 200-percent threshold is $177,400 for one person and $202,700 for two people.

    In preparing to advertise the complex, the trust wanted to leave the specifics of price and deed restriction as negotiables, Miller said — including whether the apartments should be limited to people in certain income brackets or how quickly a new owner would be allowed to raise rents on current tenants.

    How to do that was what they hoped to discuss with Ciluzzi, Miller said: “What are the potential trade-offs between the public purpose of the project and avoiding displacement of current tenants versus how the town can recover its investment and redeploy those funds.”

    Those trade-offs could have been measured in millions of dollars, as strong deed restrictions would likely depress the price buyers might have offered.

    Bringing Management in-House

    The decision to explore a sale had partly come about because the town has had trouble arranging for property management services at Harbor Hill.

    The nonprofit Community Development Partnership was the only bidder on the town’s first request for services in 2018, and nobody bid when the town put out a new request in 2021, said CDP CEO Jay Coburn.

    The CDP’s contract was extended under its original terms several times, but in August that agreement will end, and the town’s newly expanded housing office will handle Harbor Hill’s waitlist and income certifications. The town will seek bidders for a maintenance-only contract soon, Miller said.

    Kristin Hatch, who has been the part-time executive director of the Provincetown Housing Authority since 2018, was hired for a part-time position supporting the trust and the housing office in March. Like Rachel Butler, who was hired by Eastham to help manage that town’s affordable housing, Hatch has years of experience with the arcana of income certification and procurement law.

    “I called Rachel shortly after I was hired, and she said that Eastham had taken property management in-house and was also using rental income from the town-owned units to help pay the salary of a new person in their DPW who does maintenance at their properties,” Hatch said.

    “I think it would take time to do something like that, and we need to go out for proposals for maintenance right now,” she said. “But I do think in-house work is like paying a wholesale price while going out to bid is like paying the retail price.”

    Coburn said that there are risks to towns that go into the property management business, particularly when key people retire. The nonprofit Preservation of Affordable Housing has 30 staffers doing property management on Cape Cod, he said. “There’s redundancy there, a deep bench of people,” which Provincetown and Eastham won’t have, Coburn said.

    HOUSING

    New Roofs Needed Immediately at Harbor Hill

    One insurer dropped the property; the new one won’t insure two of four roofs

    By

    PROVINCETOWN — It’s been three and a half years since the first year-round tenants moved into Harbor Hill, the 28-apartment, four-building West End complex that used to be a timeshare until it went bankrupt in 2016.

    The buildings had not been well cared for; in fact, the manager of the timeshare went to prison for embezzling more than $1.8 million from the property’s accounts between 2008 and 2015. Voters authorized the purchase of the buildings in 2017; the town made an $8.1 million offer at auction in 2018 and was able to make basic repairs to the apartments and get them rented out by the end of 2020.

    Harbor Hill is now occupied by 47 adults, eight children, 12 dogs, and three cats, according to the members of the Year-Round Market-Rate Rental Housing Trust. Around 80 percent of the residents work in the town’s service industry or for local governments.

    The buildings also have some serious structural issues, according to a letter the trustees sent to state Sen. Julian Cyr and state Rep. Sarah Peake earlier this month.

    “The Trust is writing to you in request of any available financial support towards this critical workforce and community housing project in Provincetown, as we are in dire need to preserve the project and prevent it from falling into further disrepair,” said a letter from the current trustees: Nathan Butera, Austin Miller, Louise Venden, Cass Benson, and Doug Cliggott.

    “A recent assessment from a local construction cost expert placed our immediate roofing and sidewall needs at $1.5 million,” the trustees wrote. “The Trust barely has enough funding left to support the cost of only the most critical roof replacements.

    “Similarly situated projects enjoy substantial subsidy and grant funding from state and federal sources,” the trustees wrote, “all of which remain out of reach for Harbor Hill.”

    The Market-Rate Rental Housing Trust is the nominal owner of Harbor Hill, but the town’s voters purchased it by issuing $10.7 million in bonds. The payments on those bonds, about $600,000 per year, come from the town’s general fund. The rents at Harbor Hill, also about $600,000 per year in the aggregate, cover day-to-day expenses, minor repairs, and property management services provided by the Community Development Partnership.

    That leaves major capital expenses unaccounted for, however. Neither the rental revenue nor the already-issued bonds are enough to cover multi-million-dollar capital repairs or improvements.

    “We had an issue in December where our insurer dropped us very suddenly and we had to clamber to find new insurance very quickly,” Miller told the Independent. “And the new insurance wouldn’t cover the roofs. We are now trying to figure out how we can get the roofs replaced as quickly as possible so that we can have them insured again and not have any losses related to that.”

    Miller said there are also issues with the sidewalls and possibly with the foundations.

    “The bottom line is we don’t know all of what needs to be done,” Miller said.

    Voters at the annual town meeting will be asked to authorize $70,000 to cover a “very comprehensive analysis of the state of the property and all of the work that needs to be done to bring it up to par,” said Miller. That $70,000 request is already on the town’s draft warrant for April 3 as part of the capital improvements budget.

    On Feb. 21, the Market-Rate Rental Housing Trust voted to place two more articles on the warrant. The first, for $240,000, would help install two roofs that are needed immediately. (The Trust has about $200,000 in its accounts right now that would also go to this purpose.)

    The second would ask for $1.2 million to take care of a long list of exterior repairs to the four buildings.

    Meanwhile, record cold temperatures in early February wreaked havoc at the complex, Miller said. Burst pipes led to flooding in four of the apartments.

    “We had to move out the tenants from those units pending repairs, which will take many months,” Miller said.

    There were two available units in the complex that were about to be rented to people on the waiting list, so two of the families were moved into those units, Miller said. “We still need to find interim solutions for the tenants of the other two units,” Miller said.

    Insurance is, however, defraying the cost of all this work.

    Assistant Town Manager Dan Riviello told the Independent that the $70,000 building needs assessment is an important step.“We badly need workforce housing, and Harbor Hill serves that need,” Riviello said. “The town has been and is very supportive.”

    Cyr said earlier this week that Harbor Hill was “a remarkable success.”

    “I know at least a dozen people who are instrumental to this town that live there,” he said. “Harbor Hill is a model for what we’d like.”

    Maintenance is one of the realities of owning property, Cyr said, and while it’s taken up resources, Harbor Hill is a worthwhile endeavor.

    Funding sources are hard to find for people earning 80 percent to 200 percent of the Area Median Income, a federally defined measurement used in many housing programs.

    “Most funding goes for new projects, or infrastructure like water mains,” Cyr said. “There are not many existing state and federal programs that provide funding for workforce housing.”

    The Truro Democrat said he and other legislators have filed bills for Provincetown, Truro, Nantucket, and the six Martha’s Vineyard towns that would allow them to impose a real estate transfer tax on luxury home sales.

    “The transfer fee would give them some revenue,” Cyr said. “It may be the best way to close the gap.”

    Provincetown has already approved such a transfer tax, Cyr said, but the trick is getting a bill passed by the state legislature. It’s a solution that is still somewhat in the future, Cyr said.

    This Week In Provincetown

    Meetings Ahead

    By

    Meetings are held remotely. Go to provincetown-ma.gov and click on the meeting you want to watch.

    Thursday, April 22

    • Public Pier Corp. Board, 2 p.m.
    • Planning Board, 6 p.m.

    Monday, April 26

    • Select Board, 6 p.m.

    Tuesday, April 27

    • Licensing Board, 5:15 p.m.

    Wednesday, April 28

    • Local Comprehensive Planning Committee, 1 p.m.
    • School Committee, 4:30 p.m.

    Conversation Starters

    Orleans Housing Asks for $

    Town meeting will begin on Saturday, May 1, at 10 a.m. at the St. Peter the Apostle Church parking lot at 11 Prince St., with a rain date of Saturday, May 8 at 10 a.m.

    Among the 39 articles that may generate interest is Article 9, which asks to use $20,000 in community preservation funds to help the town of Orleans fund a $27.7-million affordable housing project in that town.

    The development by Pennrose, which also built the Village at Nauset Green in Eastham, would have 62 affordable units including 10 that are “workforce apartments,” designated for people earning up to 120 percent of area median income.

    The Orleans Zoning Board of Appeals granted the comprehensive permit for the project last month, said George Meservey, Orleans town planner. “It’s a good project,” he said. “It takes an empty commercial building that was kind of a white elephant and puts it to good use.”

    Pennrose is asking Orleans for $2 million in community preservation funds and $100,000 from Eastham. Five other towns — Harwich, Chatham, Brewster, Truro, and Wellfleet — will be asked to contribute next year, Charlie Adams, regional vice president of Pennrose told the Independent.

    The rental units would be on 3.5 acres at 19 West Road and 10 Skaket Corners, where the Cape Cod Five Cents Saving Bank had its headquarters. It would include a renovation of the former bank headquarters as well as the addition of two separate townhouse buildings.

    Also on the Provincetown warrant are four debt exclusions for capital improvements, the largest of which is $3.5 million to fix chronic flooding of Court Street. This will raise taxes by $55.85 a year for a property valued at $620,500 — the median house price in town. There is also one override for consideration: $136,000 to create a town diversity, equity, and inclusion office. —K.C. Myers

    Not on the Agenda: Harbor Hill

    Last year, there was a warrant article at town meeting to transfer $594,500 from the general fund to the Year-Round Market-Rate Rental Housing Trust. It was billed as annual payment on the bonds that the town issued in order to purchase and renovate Harbor Hill, the bankrupt time-share development that the town turned into market-rate rentals.

    This year, there won’t be such an article, because the bond payments have been reassigned to the town itself, rather than the trust. Instead of transferring money to the trust, the payments will be made directly from the general fund.

    This change was initiated by Robin Craver, who served as town manager for the first half of 2020. At the time, she said the rents at Harbor Hill ought to cover operating costs, but the town ought to cover bond payments.

    “When people talk about the debt service like it’s a subsidy, or an addition, they’re counting it twice,” Craver said. “That $595,000 is your mortgage, basically. You’re actually investing in a property.”

    Craver argued that special tax revenue, such as the short-term rental tax or the marijuana tax, should not be used for bond payments, as that would suggest a subsidy. Instead, the payments should be made in the same way as for other capital projects, Craver said.

    “The debt service to pay the bond for Harbor Hill has been included in the general fund budget, alongside all these other bond payments that we are always making,” confirmed Provincetown’s finance director, Josee Young. “The debt exclusion was voted in February 2017, and you can’t pay something as a debt exclusion unless it’s in the general fund.”

    If new borrowing were to become necessary, such as for renovations, roof replacements, or new construction, then it would require a warrant article. Under the current arrangements, however, the existing debt service won’t be coming up for an annual vote anymore. —Paul Benson

    HOUSING

    The View From Harbor Hill

    Provincetown’s market-rate rental tenants talk about ‘a place that feels like home’

    By

    PROVINCETOWN — Harbor Hill was built as a time-share complex, to host people enjoying a week or two of vacation. After sitting vacant for years, then being bought by Provincetown’s Year-Round Market-Rate Rental Housing Trust, Harbor Hill now has a very different rhythm to it.

    Its 28 apartments are occupied by 44 adults, 10 children, 6 dogs, and 4 cats. There are families and restaurant workers, business owners and town employees. Some people who live there say it feels like the first home they’ve ever had that was really theirs.

    The Independent talked to several residents of Harbor Hill about the building, the rents, and their experience there. Selections from those conversations follow.

    Emily Sgarlat, launch captain, Flyer’s Boat Rental:

    “I feel like it’s our own little community,” says Emily Sgarlat, who lives in Harbor Hill with her roommate Mikey LaBruna. (Photo courtesy Trevor Pittinger)

    “This is the fifth place I’ve lived in six summers. Almost every year I’ve had to find a new place. Even when they work out, you still feel like you’re in someone else’s living room, tiptoeing around their things.

    “This is one of the first places I’ve lived where we could really make it ours, furnish it from the beginning. The rent is more than I’ve ever had to pay, but I do feel like it’s worth it. One of the huge things, each unit has its own washer and dryer. To not have to spend your day off at the laundromat is major.

    “The view is great, the location is wonderful. It was really easy to make it feel homey and comfortable here. I feel like it’s our own little community — we trade spices and cups of sugar. And it’s just a relief to know we can live year-round at the same price.”

    Chris Kosiavelon, restaurant worker and drag queen, performing as Bang:

    Harbor Hill started out as a time share, but, following a bankruptcy sale, it is now a town-owned market-rate rental complex. (Photo Nancy Bloom)

    “It’s nice because it’s more secure. You don’t have to find new housing every six months. I also feel like we got really lucky with this apartment — it’s big and spacious and beautiful. It’s a three-bedroom with vaulted ceilings, and there’s two decks and four bathrooms!

    “I will say, the walls, you can’t hear anything from the apartment next door, they’re solid. The floors though — the people above and below each other can kind of hear everything. It’s been an issue for several different people in this building. When it was time shares, maybe insulation just wasn’t a priority. When you’re here long-term, it’s definitely something you notice.”

    Glenn Koss, bartender, Ross’ Grill and Boatslip Beach Club:

    “Before I moved here, I lived in the same summer place and winter place for three years, moving back and forth. Then I had a year-round cottage, but it was really small. I like how much space I have here. I also really like that the town owns it, and it’s not something that someone can suddenly sell, and turn into weekly rentals. You know how people like to flip homes.

    “I feel really safe here,” says Harbor Hill resident Glenn Koss. (Photo courtesy Glenn Koss)

    “There’s a lot of variation — some of the apartments have pretty new kitchens, and some really don’t. I picked mine because it has a big washer and dryer, and new cabinets that look nice. There’s new carpet and windows in mine too, but they don’t all have that.

    “There’s definitely noise between units. I don’t know if it’s more up and down or side to side, but we can hear each others’ music whenever it’s playing.

    “I feel really safe here. For four years, all my life was in a storage unit in Pennsylvania. Everything is here now, and it feels really good. This place is big, it’s clean, and it’s mine.”

    Trevor Pittinger, co-owner, Provincetown Brewing Company:

    “Even though I’d only been here a year, I really went through the spin cycle, so to speak, of housing. Three of us paid $24,000, up front, for my first summer housing, which was really a glorified bunkhouse. It was a three-bedroom, but it was a bunkhouse, and it wasn’t winterized, so it was really chilly when I first got there.

    “I really went through the spin cycle, so to speak, of housing,” says Trevor Pittinger, who shares his Harbor Hill apartment with João Santos. (Photo courtesy Emily Sgarlat)

    “There’s a huge common deck here that hasn’t really been used yet because of Covid. A couple of grills, and picnic tables. Some folks have started planting vegetables. I believe when the pandemic settles down, this will start to feel like a real neighborhood.

    “To me, it has this Fire Island Pines kind of charm. I feel like I’m on the boardwalk in the Pines when I walk these stairs.

    “It’s still expensive. It’s $2,000 for a two bedroom, and electric on top of that. I’m paying the same amount as I did in New York City. But, for what I have in terms of space, and the view … just to have agency over your own space is a privilege in Provincetown.

    “I would say it’s the first place I’ve lived since I left home for college, that actually feels like my home. I really feel that way. Nothing’s perfect, but I love this place.”

    CIVICS

    Cold Hands, Warm Hearts at Town Meeting

    Provincetown voters gets things done with unusual speed and harmony

    By

    PtwnTM
    On Monday, Sept. 21, 265 Provincetown voters gathered on a chilly late afternoon for a Covid-safe, socially distanced outdoor annual town meeting. (Photo Paul Benson)

    PROVINCETOWN — The long-delayed annual town meeting moved at a brisk pace on Monday, Sept. 21, with the chilly weather perhaps encouraging voters gathered in the parking lot at St. Peter the Apostle Church to reach a consensus.

    The meeting was completed in just under two hours — an achievement for any Cape town, and especially one as prone to contentious debate as Provincetown, where meetings have commonly stretched to two and even three consecutive evenings. The meeting was also remarkable for the level of agreement, with no more than a scattering of “no” votes for any of the articles.

    Article 8, concerning the Gosnold Street dune project, was approved with little discussion, and Article 9, a series of Community Preservation Act grants, including a land acquisition for senior housing at Maushope, was approved quickly as well. The grant of $425,000 will allow the Provincetown Housing Authority to expand its affordable senior housing efforts, according to PHA Director Kristin Hatch, who is seeking to add 10 to 15 units of supportive senior housing on the site.

    Article 11, a $595,000 bond payment for the debt used to acquire Harbor Hill, provoked the longest discussion, beginning with presentations from Nathan Butera of the Year-Round Market-Rate Rental Housing Trust and select board member Louise Venden. Butera’s report included information on the current tenancy of the project — 50 people, including eight children, with the 28th and final unit scheduled to be occupied on Oct. 1 — and on the trust’s efforts to pursue a broad range of financing, ownership, and management arrangements.

    The project is currently in the third year of a three-year management contract with the Community Development Partnership in Eastham. A capital needs assessment identified $800,000 worth of maintenance that ought to be done in the next five years, and the trust is studying whether outside capital can be involved in the project.

    Eight people rose to speak on Article 11, raising questions about the cost structure, and arguing for and against town involvement in middle-class housing.

    A tenant in the building, Jaime de Sousa, was last to speak. “As a resident of Harbor Hill, I encourage folks to support this article and also future articles that have to do with affordable and market-rate housing,” he said. “Studies have shown that as housing availability declines, my entire age bracket is projected to decline. To secure the longevity of Provincetown as we know it, it’s important to have housing for all.”

    A series of church bells rang out in heavy tones while de Sousa spoke. The somber tones seemed to have a settling effect — the vote was called immediately after, and the article passed with fewer than 10 votes against it.

    Article 13 appropriated $12,600 to hire an indigenous peoples consultant, who will help develop at least one public art project and study other forms of representation. Article 14 banned plastic water bottles under one gallon, and Article 15 set the town’s zero-emissions goal into town bylaws. Fewer than 10 people voted against Article 14, and no one voted against 13 or 15.

    Another interesting development at this town meeting was the debut of a group called Four Hundred Plus. On at least three articles, speakers began their public statements with “I stand in solidarity with Four Hundred Plus, an intersectional and intergenerational, queer and allied collective of seasonal, transient, and permanent residents.” Carolyn Clough advocated for Harbor Hill with this identifier, and other speakers rose for the indigenous memorial project and for the zero-emissions bylaw.

    “We started meeting in June, and we’re meeting every Tuesday night at the Provincetown Brewing Co.,” Clough told the Independent. “We’re a collective that’s sick of racism, misogyny, homophobia, transphobia. Instead of celebrating the Pilgrims taking this land, we want to see a new era. We did the Black Lives Matter chalking all over town on Labor Day, and we met on the Sunday before town meeting to go over the articles and see where we wanted to speak.”

    Organized public comments may not be entirely new for Provincetown, but they’re not typical. Town meetings are always a disparate collection of subjects, initiatives, and budgetary housekeeping — and for one to be this short and generally sweet was quite the September surprise.

    TOWN MEETING PREVIEW

    Warrant Articles on Housing and Flood Prevention Face Voters

    Funds for Harbor Hill and Ryder Street dune to be considered

    By

    PROVINCETOWN — Like much of the summer season this year, town meeting in Provincetown is going to arrive later, leaner, and al fresco. Originally scheduled for early April, at the height of the pandemic, it was moved to Monday, Sept. 21, at 5 p.m. and outdoors, to the St. Peter the Apostle Catholic Church parking lot at 11 Prince St. The warrant has been trimmed and adjusted to not be overlong. Even so, voters will be asked to consider some noteworthy articles.

    This map shows parking, check-in, and gathering locations for Monday’s annual town meeting.

    Harbor Hill

    If past is prologue, then the longest discussion will likely be about Article 11, which allocates $595,000 from the general fund for a year’s worth of bond payments for the Harbor Hill market-rate rental housing project.

    In advance of the originally scheduled April town meeting, then-Town Manager Robin Craver argued that the general fund, and not short-term rental tax or marijuana tax receipts, was the right source of money for the bond payments.

    “When people talk about the debt service like it’s a subsidy or an addition, they’re counting it twice,” said Craver. The $10.7 million that the town voted in 2017 was a debt authorization, not an expenditure of cash, said Craver. “That $595,000 is your mortgage payment. It’s not like you’re throwing $595,000 to the wind. You’re investing in a property, and at any point you’ll be able to sell it.”

    There are 28 apartments at Harbor Hill; 25 are currently rented. The Year-Round Market Rate Rental Housing Trust hired two outside experts this year, one to do a capital needs assessment on the buildings, and one to do a financial viability analysis on the project overall.

    The capital needs assessment identified $1.7 million worth of work that is needed over the next 20 years, about 50 percent of it in the next five years, according to the report. The financial viability analysis is just getting underway. It is supposed to assess management costs, maintenance costs, and the potential for other sources of public or private money.

    “We have a broader set of housing needs than just Harbor Hill,” said select board member Louise Venden. “We need to not just think that as long as we can fund Harbor Hill, everything will be OK. If you look at the range of people whose housing needs are not being met — we need to be more careful about how we spend the town’s money.”

    Ryder Street Dune

    Article 8 is a step toward the construction of a man-made dune designed to stop seawater from flooding the center of town via Gosnold Street. In January 2018, a nor’easter pushed a swell of seawater into Provincetown Harbor that, at high tide, flowed over the beach and into downtown. Numerous homes and businesses suffered damage, especially along Bradford Street near town hall.

    The Ryder Street beach without a barrier dune in October 2019. (Photo Paul Benson)

    Conservation Agent Tim Famulare expects the Ryder Street dune project to be mostly funded by state and federal grant money, but that process, while cheaper, can be extremely complex.

    Article 8 authorizes the town to acquire access rights across the beach-facing end of several properties, because the town’s permanent right to access and maintain the dune is a prerequisite for the grants. The article directs the select board to negotiate for the access privileges (or easements) with the landowners and to take them by eminent domain if necessary.

    If eminent domain were used, an assessor or a court would decide the fair compensation to be paid to the land owners. The flood-protection value of the dune could be balanced against any harm to the land owners’ other interests, however. The assessor was still developing formal cost estimates at press time, but they should be available later this week, said Famulare.

    Senior Housing at Maushope

    Buried within Article 9 is funding to acquire land for supportive senior housing. The Provincetown Housing Authority (PHA) runs the Maushope building off Harry Kemp Way, which includes 24 state-subsidized apartments for seniors and people with disabilities. Article 9 includes a grant of $425,000 from community preservation funds for an adjacent parcel of land, where the PHA hopes to build 10 to 15 new units.

    “Supportive housing means there’s laundry services, cleaning services — maybe there’s a common kitchen and somebody comes and cooks dinner,” said Kristin Hatch, director of the PHA. “It’s people who aren’t so sick they need a nursing home, maybe aren’t rich enough for assisted living. It’s been shown there’s better health outcomes when there are more people around, checking in.

    “We see the need here for affordable housing for seniors,” continued Hatch. “We’re a small, state-chartered agency, but there’s a lot of state-level expertise we can draw on to put this project together and find the funding streams.” Affordable housing typically involves combining state and federal grant money, tax credits, financing, and rental revenue streams, which collectively cover the cost of the project. Getting the right parcel at the right price is the first hurdle.

    “It’s all theoretical until you actually have the land to develop,” said Hatch.

    Indigenous Monuments Expert

    Plans for a memorial to the Wampanoag people bogged down in 2019, and select board member Lise King advocated for the town to contract with a specialist in indigenous representation and public art. Article 13 allocates $12,600 for that purpose. The specialist would evaluate possible locations, artists, and budgets, and report back with at least one public art proposal for the town to consider.

    SELECT CANDIDATES

    Incumbent Wants a Larger Vision for the Town

    Louise Venden’s priorities are meeting housing needs and future costs

    By

    PROVINCETOWN — After three years on the finance committee and three years on the select board, Louise Venden is running for a second term. Venden owned a nine-room guest house in Boston before moving to Provincetown full-time, and she worked in real estate financing as well. She describes herself as focused on housing issues, municipal finance, and long-term planning.

    “I think I’ve gained the confidence of other board members in my observations about financial matters,” said Venden. “We need to make sure the budget and other policies we pass conform to a larger vision of where the town is going, what the needs are.”

    Venden cited the town-owned market-rate housing at Harbor Hill as an example of this focus. She joined the board of the Year-Round Market-Rate Rental Housing Trust last year because she was concerned about the project’s long-term financing. Making sure Harbor Hill is sustainable is a prerequisite for other housing efforts, said Venden.

    “We have very dramatic housing needs that are not going to be met by the marketplace here,” she explained. “I am concerned with where we are going on housing in the next three years, and making sure we have the resources to expand housing. Maushope is looking at an expansion — that’s low-income senior housing. We need to move forward with affordable housing at the V.F.W. As a community, we owe it to ourselves to make Harbor Hill work.

    “But we need to make sure this project is healthy, that the numbers are reliable, and that townspeople have confidence in the way we’re going about this,” she added. Venden pushed for a capital needs assessment for the property, to make sure future costs were better understood. She is also interested in finding out if there can be an infusion of private capital while maintaining the existing rental rules.

    Louise Venden. (Photo courtesy Louise Venden)

    A chain of other expenses also concern Venden, including the ill-fated police station plan. “We need to reform a committee of architects, engineers, Chief Golden, and people who have recently built police stations on the Cape, and see what we can come up with,” she said. “I thought the location was a good one,” she said of the site between Jerome Smith Road and Route 6. “The cost was not out of line, if you look at other stations that have been built on the Cape,” she argued. That proposal was sidetracked by a discussion of the V.F.W. site, she said. “I was really disappointed by that — it obscured the issue.”

    Venden wants to see a new police station proposed soon, because a new DPW facility is in line behind it.

    “Truro has a $20 million proposal for a DPW garage, and we have a $14 million DPW proposal,” she said. “I realize it flies in the face of some longstanding traditions, but I would like to see us collaborate on some of these things. I would hope that we could figure out a way to make that work.”

    Long-term planning is Venden’s recurring theme. “We need to make sure we focus the staff on not just this year or next year. We need to think about where to spend our money for the future of this town. We need to support a more diverse and resilient economy. A larger vision of where the town is going — that’s the select board’s role.”

    CIVICS

    Town Meeting Likely to Be Put Off

    Voters will eventually consider Harbor Hill, water bottles, and off-leash beach rules

    By

    PROVINCETOWN — The annual town meeting is unlikely to take place on its scheduled date, Monday, April 6. Gov. Charlie Baker issued an emergency order on Sunday limiting gatherings to fewer than 25 people — an effort to slow the spread of coronavirus.

    Technically, town meetings are exempt from the order, but legislation proposed by the governor outlines a path to delaying them. Town moderators would be able to order a 30-day delay, and select boards could postpone them even longer — past the start of the new fiscal year on July 1. Towns could spend money at the prior year’s budget level until town meeting authorized a new budget.

    If approved, this framework, and the continuing danger to public health, could mean putting off annual town meetings until well into the summer.

    Town Manager Robin Craver said on Tuesday that she will recommend that the select board “cancel” town meeting for now, while the state works on options for maintaining municipal government and services.

    When town meeting does eventually come, Provincetown voters will be faced with decisions about Harbor Hill’s finances, a plastic water-bottle ban, an eminent domain taking for the Ryder Street dune, and a change to the off-leash laws on Provincetown’s beaches.

    Paying for Harbor Hill

    Two articles on Harbor Hill’s finances will generate discussion. The first, an immediate spending authorization on a special town meeting warrant, allocates $100,000 to the completion of the renovation and construction work at the property, which the town voted to purchase in 2017. The second, Article 9 of the annual town meeting, calls for $595,000 from the general fund to be used for the bond payment on the project.

    In a joint meeting of the select board and finance committee on March 9, Craver introduced the articles and explained her reasoning. The $10.7 million that the town voted for in 2017 was not an expenditure of cash, said Craver — it was a vote to authorize debt.

    “When people talk about the debt service like it’s a subsidy, or an addition, they’re counting it twice,” she said. “That $595,000 is your mortgage, basically. This doesn’t go away; it’s not like you’re throwing $595,000 to the wind. You’re actually investing in a property, and at any point you’ll be able to sell it.”

    “It appears to me the rents will be able to cover the operating costs, which they should,” Craver continued. “You will be paying your debt service, which you should. The town owns it. I know there’s been conversations about what other options you might have, such as public-private partnerships, selling some of the portions off, condo-ing it — this also gives you an opportunity to do that.”

    Finance Committee Member Mark Del Franco noted that the project was originally pitched as nearly paying for itself and requiring only around $175,000 a year from the town. At that time, the expansion of the rooms tax to short-term rentals had been seen as a source of funds. Craver recommended against using that tax or the new marijuana tax to pay for Harbor Hill, though.

    Ryder Street Dune

    Another article seeks authorization to purchase or take by eminent domain a series of easements along the harbor between Ryder and Gosnold streets. This stretch of beach was the pathway for devastating coastal flooding in January 2018. The town wants to build a seven-foot dune to prevent the area from flooding again.

    “We have learned that to qualify for grants to cover the construction work, we have to show that we have a continuing legal right to maintain the dune,” Conservation Agent Tim Famulare told the select board in January. “Permission or consent from the underlying property owners is not sufficient. We will need easements that give the town permanent access privileges.”

    The cost of the easements is not yet known.

    Plastic Water Bottle Ban

    A petitioned article from Ted Jones and the environmental action group Sustainable Practices would ban the sale of water in single-use plastic bottles of less than one gallon. Sale of water in aluminum cans, cardboard cartons, and glass bottles would still be allowed, as would soda water and sweetened drinks of all kinds. This same bylaw will be on the town meeting warrant in 11 of the 15 towns on the Cape this year, and its advocates were hoping that Provincetown’s meeting would give them an early and trendsetting win.

    “About 60 percent of the single-use plastic bottle market is for plain water,” said Madhavi Venkatesan, executive director of Sustainable Practices. “Hardly any of them are recycled. Recycling rates are much higher for aluminum cans, and of course reusable bottles filled from the tap are even better.”

    Changes to Off-leash Rules

    An article brought by the animal welfare committee would change the times that dogs can be off leash on town beaches. Currently it’s from 6 a.m. to 9 p.m. for seven months of the year. From Memorial Day to Nov. 1, they can be off leash from 6 a.m. to 9 a.m. and 6 p.m. to 9 p.m.

    The article would apply the summer rules to the whole year.

    LETTERS TO THE EDITOR

    Letters, February 6, 2020

    From Laura Logue Rood, Tom Parker, and Mike Rice

    By

    Harbor Hill: A ‘Failed Project’

    To the editor:

    I read with interest Paul Benson’s article on Harbor Hill [Jan. 30, page 8], which was purchased with great fanfare in 2017. I’m not sure what the town was thinking in purchasing and then planning on subsidizing housing for the middle class. The cry that I’ve heard for years is the need for “affordable housing” and, more recently, low-income housing, given the median income for Provincetown residents is approximately $45,000.

    Last year the town, I thought, wisely approved an additional $492,000 to correct the multiple deficiencies found at Harbor Hill. Now we have to continue to subsidize a failed project. While there may be a Pigouvian tax in economics, there is also the law of misapplied repair: in fixing one problem, you create another. More simply: putting good money after bad.

    Here are some facts:

    $12.7 million in bonds to acquire and renovate Harbor Hill.

    $150,000 annual deficit forecast in February 2017 when they pitched this project. Didn’t happen.

    The Year-Round Market-Rate Rental Housing Trust claimed they could cover this deficit for five years, as they had $1.5 million in the trust. Didn’t happen.

    The town was forced to approve an additional $492,000 subsidy for FY 2020 to complete the renovations and prepare the complex for leasing.

    Rents were lowered significantly to entice people to lease, and the new annual subsidy is still unknown but expected to be at least three times the original $150,000 forecast. Probably $500,000 through FY21.

    As of today, more than $11.2 million has been invested in Harbor Hill. This works out to $400,000 per unit — so far. To me, that’s large. And it’s going to get larger with each passing year.

    Are Provincetown taxpayers OK with subsidizing apartments for people making up to twice the median income? For a single person, that could be up to $127,000 a year.

    Think about it.

    Laura Logue Rood
    Boston and Provincetown

    A Lost Art

    To the editor:

    In your Jan. 16 front-page report on the resignation of Wellfleet Town Administrator Dan Hoort, one sentence didn’t finish the way my mind assumed that it would.

    “He’s very hardworking and fair,” you quoted Justina Carlson saying, “and hasn’t forgotten the fine art of…” my mind assumed: “the handwritten note.” The actual sentence ended: “the beautifully written email.”

    Gentle reminders of aging seem to increase with the years.

    Tom Parker
    Gwynedd, Pa.

    Banning Hydration

    To the editor:

    Banning the sale of single-use plastic water bottles [Jan. 23, page 1] would be detrimental to Cape Cod’s vital tourism economy. After all, being unexpectedly inconvenienced isn’t included in anyone’s vacation plans.

    More important: neither is being dehydrated, which is a public health issue.

    Mike Rice
    South Wellfleet

    THE HOUSING PUZZLE

    Harbor Hill: Why Provincetown Is Subsidizing Market-Rate Apartments

    A bleeding-edge strategy for a pressing housing problem

    By

    The housing crisis is so widely recognized on the Outer Cape that it feels elemental, like the sun, wind, or tide. It’s behind the second question most employers ask in interviews: “What’s your name? Do you have housing?” Tenants pray for the good health of their landlords; owners are proud of the tenants they harbor. Voters have affirmed the importance of affordable housing for two decades, and nearly every select board candidate campaigns on it.

    This article is the first in a series, “The Housing Puzzle,” by Paul Benson, exploring the strategies local governments have developed to address the problem. Some are well known, some are not. Others have yet to be explored. The series will also examine where the money for housing comes from and how it’s used. Understanding what we’re spending now, and on which strategies, can help inform a conversation about what should come next.

    Everyone has a story about housing. If there’s something you think we should cover, email us at [email protected]. 

    PROVINCETOWN — The Year-Round Market-Rate Rental Housing Trust — it’s quite a mouthful. It doesn’t abbreviate well, either: YRMRRHT looks like you fell asleep on your keyboard. It’s no wonder people mostly ignore it and talk about Harbor Hill instead.

    What exactly is the trust? It’s a strategy — a new, locally developed strategy that is responsive to one of Provincetown’s unique problems. Harbor Hill was the first project the trust took on to implement that strategy.

    The town-owned apartments at Harbor Hill are now filling up with tenants at market-rate rents. (Photo Paul Benson)

    A Provincetown Problem

    The trust had to be created by special state legislation, because it addressed a problem that didn’t really exist elsewhere — the nearly complete disappearance of market-rate rental housing. The popularity of internet-brokered short-term rentals (such as Airbnb) blew a hole in Provincetown’s housing market. The money from short-term rentals was so much better than seasonal and year-round rentals — more than double, according to UMass Dartmouth’s 2018 study — that long-term rentals became scarce.

    “We had a crisis, not just in the affordable range, but in the middle, market-rate range as well,” said Doug Cliggott, a trustee and an economist, last summer. “There just weren’t any. We actually had a hard time figuring out what market-rate prices are anymore, because hardly anything is ever listed.”

    Provincetown’s physical situation was a factor. It’s an attractive place to vacation with hardly any free land on which to build. And since both Truro and Wellfleet are also experiencing short-term rental booms, there weren’t many alternative sources nearby.

    The flood of money from weekly rentals had another effect: it could support heftier mortgages. Real estate prices rose in tandem with the income from weeklies. This meant that those who bought when prices were high had to rent weekly just to break even, and that renting out a recently purchased property at year-round rates no longer made financial sense. A rental market with high prices and low inventory is the context in which the trust came about.

    “This may not be widely understood,” said Cliggott, “but we are buying property on the open market, where the sale price is basically set by what you can make on weeklies, and then turning around and renting year-round. If a reasonable year-round rent was enough to cover a mortgage around here, none of this would be necessary, and the market would take care of it.”

    The trust is designed to pull property out of the weekly market, turn it back into year-round rentals, and subsidize the difference. The new tax on weekly rentals has always been a possible source for that subsidy.

    “There’s something in economics called a Pigouvian tax — the idea is 100 years old — where you tax the thing that’s generating a problem in order to pay for the solution to that problem,” said Cliggott. “It doesn’t have to be that, though. It could be just an annual line item at town meeting. Or a slice of the marijuana tax, or whatever else people decide. But we think we can show that, first of all, this is the least heavy-handed way to intervene in this broken housing market. And second, that the cost to the town is not that large and is sustainable — and is outweighed by the public good of having this housing available.”

    Springtime for Harbor Hill

    Harbor Hill was not in the trust’s original plans: they imagined beginning with three or four condos and building from there. But when the 28-unit, 53-bedroom former timeshare hit the market, many people felt the town shouldn’t pass it up. The 2017 vote to buy it was one of the most crowded — and lopsided — in recent memory.

    It hasn’t been a smooth journey since. Title issues and a lawsuit delayed the closing; the first RFP for property management yielded no bidders. The trust had to ask a 2019 town meeting for an extra $492,000 to cover a year of bond payments with no rental money coming in.

    Now, however, renovations are almost done and renters are signing up. Building 5 was finished first; its six apartments were filled by last fall. There are currently six more signed leases, and 10 more applications pending approval, for the 22 apartments that come online in February, March, and April. Applications are being accepted on a rolling basis and can be found on the website of the Community Development Partnership (CDP), the Eastham nonprofit that won the management contract.

    All the remaining units have two bedrooms, with the exception of one A.D.A.-compliant ground-floor studio. The studio is $1,000 a month; the two-bedrooms range from $1,450 to $2,100 a month, depending on floor plans and views.

    “Most of the applicants for the two-bedroom units have been couples, some with children, although we’ve also had some applications from friends forming a household together, each taking a bedroom,” said Jay Coburn, the CEO of CDP “We’d like more people to know that they can form a household with a friend, go through the application process together, and share the rent for the two bedrooms.

    “It is a market-rate project — we’re looking for people with incomes between 80 and 200 percent of area median income,” Coburn added. “It’s nurses, nonprofit employees, town staff, people with a documented ability to pay these rents. It’s a very different kind of housing project — no one in the commonwealth has done anything like this before.”

     

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