Over the last 50 years, Massachusetts has focused on high-income job creation. It started with the “Massachusetts Miracle” and continued with the growth of Kendall Square as a technology hub. The latest addition to our “brain factory” has been the boom in biotechnology and the lab space that has come with it. Somerville, too, has joined to feed the demand for industries. Primarily through Assembly and Union Square areas, we have added 12,000 new jobs to Somerville since 2010. It’s no wonder we want those jobs: commercial uses bring in far more tax revenue than residential ones.
All these new jobs have brought many new people to our area, many of them highly paid. They also need somewhere to live, and they often want to live in communities like Somerville, close to their jobs and well-served by transit. This has caused a significant demographic shift in historically low- to mid-income communities like Somerville.
But that change is not over. In fact, all the pieces for further change are already here. Regionally, we have built over 17 million square of excess lab space. In Union Square area alone, there are three giant brand new empty lab buildings. Once they find tenants, each of those buildings will bring new employees who want to live nearby, increasing competition for the same stock of housing in the city. Those labs are, in effect, a ticking time bomb of demand for more homes.
The good news is that, with the lab market stalled for a few years, we have time to help defuse it by allowing the construction of new housing.
New homes create new space for new residents, even if they are “luxury” homes. In addition, those high-end homes prevent high-income new residents from outbidding current residents who want to stay in their current homes.
Those expensive homes also create cross-subsidized Affordable homes. That means that by building new housing, we can increase the number of people who can live here no matter how much they make. They will truly keep Somerville a place for everyone.