The faces of affordable housing
By Steve Landwehr, Staff writer
Salem News, NH
IPSWICH - Martha Frost has an important, rewarding job. She works with frail, elderly patients who can’t pay for the medical services they need without going into a nursing home.
“I firmly believe in helping people stay in their own homes,” Frost said.
But Frost, 47, has never owned her own home.
Like many social service workers, she doesn’t get paid a lot of money - she figures if she’s lucky she might be making $40,000 a year within the next five years. That’s well above the poverty line, but nowhere near enough to fulfill her dream of buying a house in her hometown of Ipswich.
Frost’s is one of the affordable-housing stories that seldom gets told.
When many people think about who will move into affordable housing, especially in a small town like Ipswich, the often-unspoken message is that they aren’t the kind of people you want living in town, much less next door, said Jack Meaney, executive director of the YMCA of the North Shore.
Meaney is at the center of the controversy in Ipswich surrounding the YMCA’s plan to build affordable apartments. The town has approved the plan, but opponents are appealing in court.
Opponents, Meaney said, have contended that families who would live there would have children with special needs, unduly burdening the school system.
Frost isn’t surprised by that kind of talk. She heard it when Agawam Village, a subsidized housing complex, opened in Ipswich in 1979.
“There was the same kind of resistance, the same fear - that the wrong kind of people would be living there,” Frost said.
Career change
In fact, she says, people who are looking for affordable housing in the North Shore’s notoriously expensive market tend to be people like herself.
Frost, who graduated from Ipswich High in 1977, will be getting her master’s degree in social work in May, but she’s had to pile up significant student loans to do it.
She had a much more lucrative job after she got out of college, working in marketing for Sheraton Resorts and Hotels. But after nine years there, she had a life-changing experience.
“My sister became terminally ill, and I spent seven months as her medical advocate,” Frost said. “It motivated me to sacrifice - and it was a huge sacrifice - to go back to graduate school.”
Four years ago - six months after she enrolled in graduate school - her sister died.
“It gave me the jump-start I needed,” Frost said. “I didn’t want to look back and think about what I could have done.”
Now, she drives a car with 208,000 miles on it and lives with her mother in the house where she grew up. But her mom is 77 and thinking about downsizing.
“My true love is working with seniors, but I’ll never make a lot of money,” Frost said.
Frost would like to stay in town, where she has friendships that go back to third grade - and the YMCA apartments would fit the bill perfectly. She would have her own place and could begin putting money away to buy a home.
“I look at newspaper ads every day, and I think, ‘I can’t afford that,’” Frost said. “I would be able to afford Powder House Village.”
The cost of housing could well determine whether she stays in town, or even in Massachusetts.
“Would I move out of state? It’s something I think about,” she said. “It’s too expensive here, and I can always find clientele.”
Lifeline
Chris Thibodeau also has an important job - keeping kids from drowning by teaching them how to swim and acting as a lifeguard at the YMCA in Ipswich. For her, an affordable apartment would be more than a way to build a nest egg; it would be a lifeline.
Thibodeau and her two sons moved to Ipswich in February after she and her husband separated last year. They owned a home in Gloucester but made no money when it was sold - yet that house continues to be an albatross.
Thibodeau, 43, can’t apply to buy an affordable home for a low-income family because they are restricted to first-time homeowners, so a Powder House Village apartment would be a good choice for her.
Her take-home pay is $1,500 a month, and rent for her apartment eats up $1,200 of that. She gets about $13 a month in food stamps and occasionally has to use a food pantry to get by.
“Another $100 a month (in expenses) would do me in,” Thibodeau said.
Her boys have adjusted well to Winthrop School and love being able to see their mom at work at the Y after school, she said. She loves her job and said she was welcomed with open arms when she moved to town.
She would readily apply for an apartment at Powder House Village and wants to stay in Ipswich, but affordable housing is a critical issue.
“Could I move to New Hampshire or Maine?” she said. “Yeah, I could, but my friends and family are here. And I don’t want to drag my kids away from their grandparents.”
What is affordable?
At Powder House Village in Ipswich, 10 apartments would be reserved for people making less than 30 percent of the median income in the metropolitan area. For a single person, the maximum income would be $17,363; for a family of four it would be $24,240.
The remaining 38 apartments would be priced as affordable by people making less than 60 percent of the median income. For a single person, the maximum income would be $34,725; for a family of four it would be $48,480.
Income figures are based on median incomes in 2005 according to the Citizens’ Housing and Planning Association.
Powder House Village status:
The Ipswich Zoning Board approved the YMCA’s 40B Powder House Village project in the fall of 2004. Opponents filed lawsuits over the board’s decision; their suits were dismissed, but they have appealed. The case remains in Salem Superior Court.
Published: January 04, 2007, Salem News, NH