Letters: Proposal an insult to community

Posted 3/17/21

In a meeting with East Mermaid residents recently, the Goldenberg Group unveiled its plans for the Blossom//UCP site.  Their cheery drawing showed a sprawling, 250-unit behemoth of an apartment building, plopped on a property zoned for residential use.

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Letters: Proposal an insult to community

Posted

In a meeting with East Mermaid residents recently, the Goldenberg Group unveiled its plans for the Blossom//UCP site.  Their cheery drawing showed a sprawling, 250-unit behemoth of an apartment building, plopped on a property zoned for residential use. Their rendering had almost nothing neighbors said they wanted and everything we feared.  More shockingly, however, this image—which outraged us all—was boldly, proudly titled “COMMUNITY,” implying we were it and it was us.

Community—like passion—has been co-opted by businesses and ad agencies. You can’t propose or pitch without it.  Airlines, salesmen, banks bandy it about.  It’s the avowed raison d’être for countless strictly profit-driven businesses.  It works: We’re all community members; we want our communities attended to.  Repeat it enough, it’s bound to thrill someone.  True, the word has meaning still, as in “community center,” where real people do real things.  But too often it’s just an open sesame, a sign proclaiming, “I’m a good guy,” even when the proclaimer’s interest is only self-interest.

The Group may argue in the abstract that its project is dazzling, cutting edge, well-intentioned, a sure benefit to the community.  But it is a grotesque proposal for this neighborhood.

It will cause irrevocable harm.  It will devastate my immediate community and likely the communities on surrounding streets.  It will harm the greater Chestnut Hill community by depriving its variance process of credibility.  One must show hardship to get a variance.  What possible hardship can the Goldenberg show proving that this project, and only this, is possible on this site?  A variance of this magnitude, if granted, will say to every homeowner around, “This can happen to you the next time someone with deep pockets suddenly appears.”

I urge the Goldenberg Group to rethink its plans. 

Kristoffer Jacobson
Chestnut Hill

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