Overhaul set for old bathrooms
City commits $77.5m for fixes, upgrades at BHA developments
Many of the bathrooms in Boston's oldest public housing project, Mary Ellen McCormack in South Boston, still have fixtures dating to its construction in 1936. Hot and cold water flows into the sink from separate faucets, a violation of modern building codes. The bathrooms lack vents, making mold a common problem. When the shower handles break, they cannot be replaced - no one sells the parts anymore.
Today, city officials will announce a commitment of $77.5 million in bond money to overhaul bathrooms in McCormack and two other public housing projects that predate the Second World War, in South Boston and Charlestown. The money also will pay for a laundry list of other long-deferred maintenance at 22 projects throughout the city.
The bond issue amounts to a necessary gamble, officials said.
The city is pledging about one-third of its annual federal funding for public housing, about $8 million a year for each of the next 20 years, to borrow as much money as it can right now. The rationale is simple: The city needs as much money as it can get upfront to keep its public housing in livable condition.
"The amount of funds we are getting from the federal side is not sufficient to keep pace with the aging of our buildings," said Boston Housing Authority administrator Sandra Henriquez. "In order to keep as many units as possible online, we decided that we needed to do this now."
The hope, said Henriquez, is that the federal government will increase total funding for public housing in time to keep Boston from facing an even greater funding shortfall in the 16 years between the time the last of the bond money is spent and the time the last of the bondholders are repaid.
The money will only pay to renovate about half the bathrooms at the three public housing projects. It will only address a small portion of the maintenance needed at all of the city's housing projects. But it is the most the city can borrow against its future allocation of federal funding.
"This is a one-time, partial solution," Henriquez said. "It's not quite a finger in the dyke, but it really is, 'How do we do the most emergency items and infrastructure now?' "
Binyamin Appelbaum can be reached at bappelbaum@globe.com.
