Court fight pitches a different vision for Shawmut housing proposal

Kudos to the Globe’s Shirley Leung for delving into a controversial city decision (“Good guys v. good guys: In Dorchester, a school’s unique mission clashes with the need for affordable housing,” Business, Jan. 23). However, the central issue is not education vs. housing. We are all pro-housing. Epiphany School has appealed the Boston Planning & Development Agency’s approval of Trinity Financial’s planned 72-unit housing development next to the school because we and Trinity have two different visions of housing.

An alternative plan put forward by the community, through the group Build Together: Shawmut, allows the school the room for growth as well as 32 new affordable housing units. Yes, the number of units is fewer than Trinity’s proposal, but these would be larger units, designed for families, and they would be homeownership opportunities and not rental units, so as to build wealth in the community. This plan has the support of abutters and its petition has generated more than 1,000 signatures.

With our alternative vision, the city can ensure the growth of an outstanding school that serves, at no cost, Boston’s neediest families while still creating many new units of transit-oriented, affordable housing.

JOHN KENNEDY Needham

The writer is a member of the Epiphany School board.

Yes indeed, it is “good guy vs. good guy,” but the approved housing development near Shawmut Station is not a good fit. The project as proposed is a better fit for a commercial district such as Dorchester Avenue, where Trinity Financial has previously developed a successful large residential building.

Since the city routinely approves large building developments through variances of existing zoning laws, available land, such as the Fitzpatrick Brothers Auto Body property, tends to be valued with the expectation of a large development. Developers can then only propose a large-scale project to support the cost of such valued land.

The expectation that the city will approve a large development benefits the landowner and large-scale developers but at a cost to neighborhoods that are willing to welcome a more appropriately sized housing development.

ROBERT LIND Dorchester

The writer lives in the Ashmont section of Dorchester.