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Housing tax-break zone for East Somerville and Assembly Square

Updated September 21, 2026

What's happening

The City Council approved the Urban Center Housing Tax Increment Financing zone for East Somerville and Assembly Square 10-0 on September 10, with At-large Councilor Kristen Strezo not answering the roll call (Sept 10 digest). UCH-TIF is a state tool that lets the city forgive part of the new property tax a redevelopment generates in exchange for housing. The Land Use Committee had recommended it 5-0 a week earlier, on September 3, after it sat untouched since the June 18 hearing (Sept 3 digest). Mayor Jake Wilson signed it September 15 as enactment 221212. The zone, plan and form of agreement now go to the state Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities for review.

Approving the zone commits no money. Each future deal needs its own negotiation, a third-party review of the developer's numbers, a Finance Committee review, a Council vote, and state sign-off. Ward 3 Councilor Ben Ewen-Campen, the Land Use chair, said the vote "does not lock us into any decision making" and framed it as the only option besides lowering the 20 percent inclusionary rate or doing nothing. Ward 1 Councilor Matthew McLaughlin, whose ward holds the entire zone, cited a corridor of roughly 70 percent immigrant-owned businesses and at least four projects that have "languished for years"; Ward 2 Councilor JT Scott called it "better than doing nothing."

The story

From a presentation to a proposal

The Director of Economic Development first conveyed the idea to the Council on Feb 12; At-large Councilor Kristen Strezo wanted it in the housing committee too, but Council President Lance Davis sent it to Finance. Economic Development Director Rachel Nadkarni and planner Katherine Wiese presented on March 10: UCH-TIF is a state program for housing in primarily commercial areas, Somerville used it once for 299 Broadway in Winter Hill and got more affordability than usual, and staff were eyeing a broader zone in Assembly Square and East Somerville where nearly 50% of land is surface parking or vacant lots and several housing projects are stalled.

Strezo pressed on the state's floor, 15% of units at 80% of area median income or 25% at 110%, which is far from the 50%-and-below affordability she wants. Nadkarni said those are state minimums, Somerville's 20% inclusionary ordinance already beats them, and the city can negotiate deeper on each project, every one of which needs Council approval. Councilor Jonathan Link asked whether developers would land-bank waiting for a deal; Nadkarni said the plan could carry expiration timelines. Finance Chair Ben Wheeler put it this way on March 12: "This is not a tax cut or a city payment. It's a time-limited reduction of the increased taxes that development would normally generate."

The May 14 referral

The formal request, a zone, a plan and a form of agreement, reached the Council on May 14 and went to Land Use for a hearing. Wiese told councilors the item only defines a geographic area and makes no financial commitment now. Tom Galligani, Executive Director of the Office of Strategic Planning and Community Development, said the program targets vacant lots and vacant commercial space, does not override the 20% inclusionary requirement, and is meant "to reach deeper levels of affordability beyond what our existing inclusionary housing ordinance requires." Strezo asked that the Office of Housing Stability sit in on negotiations; any project-specific agreement would come back through Finance.

The June 18 hearing

Galligani and Wiese laid out the zone: along East Broadway, McGrath Highway and Assembly Row, spanning both sides of I-93. It is 85% commercial, with 59% of leasable commercial square footage vacant or untenanted; long-vacant spaces such as the former Circuit City alone make up 15%, which meets the state minimum, and about 10% of the zone is vacant lots. Exemptions can run up to 20 years on the increment, the added value from redevelopment, not the existing tax bill.

Staff repeated the affordability argument, including the possibility of units below the inclusionary ordinance's 50%, 80% and 110% AMI tiers. Under questioning from Ward 3 Councilor Ben Ewen-Campen, the Land Use chair, Wiese confirmed each project would need individual negotiation, third-party financial review, and separate approval by the Council and the state; she did not think a public hearing would be required for each agreement, though a Council vote would. Two residents spoke, both in favor: Ward 5's Crystal Huff wanted more affordable-housing tools, and Ben Rogan, who has owned a vacant East Somerville parcel for more than ten years, said the zone would help him start a mixed-income building with ground-floor retail on East Broadway.

A scheduling mix-up put the item in front of the Planning Board, which has no role because it is not a zoning amendment; the chair tabled it, took the shelter amendment with the board, and came back to it.

What it does not commit

The practical effect of approving the zone is to make East Somerville and Assembly Square eligible; nothing is forgiven until a specific project returns with a negotiated agreement. That is also the reporter's checklist for any deal that does come: the affordability mix versus the 20% baseline, the term (up to 20 years), the third-party review, and whether an expiration clause guards against land-banking. The fiscal backdrop matters too. Opponents of the Union Square rezoning put Somerville's commercial tax base at 18.8%, and the lab-vacancy hit to new-growth revenue is the FY27 budget's central problem (see lab glut and FY27 budget), so a tool that trades future commercial-zone taxes for housing will be read closely in Finance.

September 3: the committee vote

Economic Development Planner Katherine Wiese told the committee that creating the zone obligates the city to no deal, that each project still needs a public hearing and Finance Committee review, and that zone approval is a required state step before any project agreement. McLaughlin, who said he fought to include East Somerville because of Broadway storefronts abandoned for years, called the zone a compromise between eliminating affordable-housing requirements and doing nothing, and put on the record that he expects the city to negotiate clawback or renegotiation provisions so developers do not get a windfall if the market rebounds. Ewen-Campen's framing was that the city should encourage development during a severe housing-starts downturn without abandoning the 20 percent inclusionary requirement. The vote was 5-0 (Sept 3 digest).

What's next

  • State review and approval of the zone, plan and form of agreement by the Executive Office of Housing and Livable Communities; no timeline is in our sources.
  • The first project agreement, likely the East Broadway parcel Ben Rogan described at the June 18 hearing, returns to the Council through Finance with its own affordability mix, term of up to 20 years, third-party review and, if McLaughlin gets his way, a clawback clause.
  • Related development threads: Assembly Square, 299 Broadway and the zoning tracker.