Lawrence Partnership
This past week, I attended the ceremony delivering the $100,000 check to another business in Lawrence. For this occasion, it was Universal Auto Repairs on Haverhill St. and José Rosario was very appreciative of the assistance he has received allowing him to hire three additional mechanics and expand his business.
José was thrilled to see Mayor Daniel Rivera in his establishment. He went on and on hugging him and praising him because when the mayor was elected he told José that he would help him – and he finally came through!
I loved seeing his happiness and gratefulness but I would like to clarify how that loan happened.
Originally, the idea of creating an organization similar to the Lowell Plan came from Lane Glenn, president of Northern Essex Community College. Several businesses in the community joined the group and the Lawrence Partnership was born.
Soon thereafter, it was decided to hire someone to manage it and Derek Mitchell was a star from the beginning of his interview. He is great at raising funds and gaining friends for the organization. Four local banks guaranteed $250,000 for low-interests loans to create a fund of one million dollars for low-interests loans and the City of Lawrence committed $100,000 to cover loses in case a loan doesn’t fulfill its obligations. Lots of progress is being made and now, four additional banks are willing to contribute to the betterment of our community providing loans.
The main purpose of this effort is for businesses to grow and increase employment opportunities for our residents – like what Universal Auto Repair is now doing!
Politicians are ready for the photo ops but they had nothing to do with these loans.
Rent increases in Lawrence
Voices keep raising over the way rents keep going up in this city and the only explanation seems to be supply and demand. Available apartments are few and knowing that, landlords are asking for exorbitant rents. With the new increase in the property taxes, you may rest assured that landlords will take advantage of that to go sky high.
Often, the cry is calling for rent control and I want to clarify that situation since there is nothing anyone could do.
In 1994 voters in a state-wide referendum approved the elimination of rent-control policies in communities across Massachusetts. Rent control lasted for nearly 30 years in Boston, Cambridge and the nearby suburb of Brookline. But the frustrations of landlords, together with scandalous stories of well-heeled public servants living in cheap flats, eventually took their toll. The newly adopted law states that under Chapter 40p the Massachusetts Rent Control Prohibition Act, no city or town may enact, maintain or enforce rent control of any kind…
There are other measures that could be taken to alleviate the high cost of rental but if a particular city of town decides to adopt some form of rent control, “compliance on the part of property owners as to the rent control regulation… shall be entirely voluntary and not coerced, and the property of a person or entity declining to have his or its property subjected to such regulation shall be wholly unaffected…”
Chapter 40p continues, “A municipality adopting such regulation shall compensate owners of rent controlled units for each unit in the amount of the difference between the unit’s fair market rent and the unit’s below market, rent controlled rent, with such compensation coming from the municipality’s general funds, so that the cost of any rent control shall be borne by all taxpayers of a municipality and not by the owners of regulated units only.”
That sounds to me like the adoption of Section 8 in later years.
