Chelsea’s director of permitting and land use planning told the Planning Board on February 24 that nothing near the Fitzpatrick and Prattville public housing developments comes close to 160 feet tall, and that the 160-foot figure written into the new zoning came from the developer’s proposal. The exchange is in the Planning Board minutes attached to the city’s 40R application, printed in the City Council packet for April 27.
“Ms. Ritch asked how tall the existing Housing Authority buildings are. Mr. DePriest said about three stories tall, which is around 30 to 35 feet. Ms. Ritch pointed to the 160 foot height regulation and asked if there is something in the area with that similar height. Mr. DePriest said no and we are responding to a proposal the developer has shown us.”
Sarah Ritch is a Planning Board member; John DePriest is the city’s Director of Permitting and Land Use Planning. The City Council adopted the district four months later without a dissenting vote.
What the ordinance allows
Section 34-189 sets a maximum height of “90 feet; 160 feet for building bordering on the municipal boundary,” and a story limit of “8: 15 for building bordering on the municipal boundary.” The 160-foot ceiling attaches only to buildings along the Chelsea-Revere line, and 90 feet is still roughly triple what stands there now.
Also in that table: minimum density of 20 units per acre, 350 square feet of lot area per dwelling unit, a maximum floor area ratio of 3.0, and 10-foot yards that drop to zero for building sides bordering the municipal boundary. Projects of more than 10 units must make 20 percent of them affordable. Permitting runs through the Zoning Board of Appeals sitting as the Plan Approval Authority, which can waive requirements and impose conditions.
The payments
Asked by staff planner Will Cecio what the city gets from adopting the overlay, DePriest laid out two streams:
“Mr. DePriest explained there are two levels of payments: 1) a payment that is around $3,000 per unit for adopting the zoning and $3,000 for every unit over and above what could be developed under existing zoning. 2) There is also a payment when building permits are given out, we get a payment for each unit over and above the number of units that would have been built under existing zoning. That can be close to several hundreds of thousands of dollars. Also when it comes to height, we are pushing the higher buildings along the Chelsea-Revere boundary to mitigate impacts on the Garfield properties and buffer the impacts from the highway.”
Chelsea’s 40R application, signed for City Manager Fidel Maltez and listing DePriest as municipal contact, puts a number on the bonus. Under “Key Data” it reads: “Estimated # of Incentive Units: 1712” and “Estimated Zoning Incentive Payment: $600,000.00.” The payment schedule on the district summary sheet tops out at $600,000 for districts of 501 or more incentive units.
The case the city made
The record carries the argument for the project too, in the city’s own words. Chelsea Housing Authority Executive Director Paul Nowicki told the board the site is 13 acres and holds 198 units. The town houses, “the Whities,” were built in 1949; “The Brickies” went up in 1951. The only significant modification since was kitchen work in 1986. DePriest said the housing is old, in need of repair, and the Housing Authority’s funding sources are getting cut, and that all current residents will have the option to move back, with market-rate housing added alongside.
Board member Nick Valentine asked what would happen if the board did not approve the overlay. DePriest answered that there would be no incentive for the developers to do the project, that the Housing Authority has no money to redevelop the site itself, and that under existing R1 zoning it would be limited to single- and two-family homes on 7,500-square-foot lots. Nowicki said the Housing Authority would stay in through a 99-year ground lease, as at Central Avenue, and would oversee the public and workforce housing.
The developer and the scale
JJC Company, the Joseph J. Corcoran Company of Quincy, was selected as the development partner, the Sub-Committee on Planning, Development and Transportation was told on February 9. A Department of Public Works letter dated April 16, 2026, addressed to Mary Davis at the Corcoran company’s Hancock Street office and signed by Christopher Barrett, P.E., Deputy Commissioner/City Engineer, states the department’s understanding of the project: “the demolition of the existing Fitzpatrick Apartments, 70 units, and the Prattville Apartments, 128 units and redevelopment of more than 1,000 mixed-income dwelling units.” The letter places the work along Burma Road, Exeter Street, Guam Road and Normandy Road, and says three times that the project “is expected to have a significant impact” on the city’s water, sewer and drainage systems.
Separately, the council on September 14 accepted donations from the city gala held on July 9 under order 26F42, on a roll call of eight in favor and three absent. The donor list of $22,750 includes “Joseph J Corcoran Company $1,000.00.” The proceeds fund the annual Chelsea Day fireworks.
Floodplain
Board member Eric Czernizer asked whether the area floods and whether it sits in a FEMA floodplain. DePriest, per the minutes, “said it is in a floodplain and they did go to the Conservation Commission to get an understanding of the resources they have to address,” and that the developer will have to return for an Order of Conditions once a proposal exists. Most of the site’s drainage runs to two outfalls discharging to Mill Creek.
The vote
The council’s public hearing on Section 34-189 opened at 7:37 PM on June 22 and closed at 7:46 PM. Item 26Z03 then passed on a roll call recorded as 11-0-0-0: Taylor, Recupero, Jimenez-Rivera, Hines, T. Garcia, Teshe, K. Garcia, Santagate, DeJesus, Brown and Robinson. The inclusionary zoning amendment was taken up at the same meeting, immediately after. Our earlier report on the district’s adoption covered the 198 units and the $600,000.
Still unknown
No building design has been filed. The 1,712 incentive units are a zoning estimate, and the record does not say how many units the developer intends to build or how tall the tallest building would be. The density spreadsheet in the April 27 packet is badly scanned: per-parcel acreage is readable, but the totals row and the density columns are illegible, and the district summary sheet gives two different figures for total district land area. DePriest told the board the district is “about 23 acres in size,” the most reliable acreage in the file. Rent levels for the workforce units are not set in the ordinance.
Documents on the Fitzpatrick-Prattville redevelopment, including any design filing with the Zoning Board of Appeals, can be sent to [email protected].