A Guest Blog Post by Joella Orozco, Housing Development and Community Building Co-op,
Fenway Community Development Corporation
When I first started by co-op at the Fenway Community Development Corporation (Fenway CDC), I did not realize just how strongly Northeastern University’s influences the Fenway’s housing market. I thought I was relatively familiar with the Fenway—after all, I lived in the neighborhood as a freshman. But as I speak with resident leaders, people who love their neighborhood and have seen their community members be displaced, I realized how little I understood about the University’s impact on housing.
Through the Co-op in Service to our Neighbors’ program, Northeastern places six students in different community-based organizations to support their work. Through this program, I’ve spent the last six months immersed in the work of a community-based organization that fights to keep the Fenway affordable and to amplify residents’ voices. Fenway CDC and Ward 4 both align in their commitment to champion progressive housing policies that create true affordability and listens to the needs of residents. Fenway CDC has held listening sessions with resident leaders, and a top issue for them is concern over how Northeastern’s rapid growth is reshaping their neighborhood. Again and again, residents have expressed how this growth is driving up rents and putting pressure on already limited housing options. This issue extends beyond the Fenway, and to all the Ward 4 district, as it houses Northeastern’s campus.
A Decade of Growth, An Insufficient Dorm Supply
Every ten years, Boston’s major institutions, including Northeastern, submit an Institutional Master Plan (IMP) outlining their development goals for the decade ahead. These plans are reviewed by the City’s Planning Department and the public. The IMP lays out where and how the University plans to build, including new dorms. Since their last 2013-2023 IMP, Northeastern’s undergraduate student population has increased by 24 percent. Their last IMP promised to house 67 percent of its undergraduate population, which Northeastern failed to achieve. Initially, Northeastern proposed a goal of 60% undergraduate students living on campus. After community and political pressure, Northeastern recently announced a new goal of 65% of its undergraduate students on campus by 2035. We are appreciative of this update and are still hoping to get closer to our ask of 75% students living on campus. Not only is there insufficient student housing, but they have also decreased their target percentage since their previous IMP, implying that housing their student population is not a top priority in this new IMP. Not to mention, the graduate student population has skyrocketed, increasing 145.7 percent in the last 10 years—yet not a single graduate student bed exists on campus.
This continuous growth has very real consequences. A 2023 analysis by the Mayor’s Office of Housing found that average rents are $200 higher per month in neighborhoods with a high density of students—such as the Fenway, Mission Hill, Allston, and Brighton. As the student population continues to grow without the supply of dorms keeping up, students are naturally pushed off campus, placing pressure on an already expensive rental market.
Transient Populations and Neighborhood Identity
Only first- and second-year students are guaranteed on-campus housing options, so upperclassmen often live off-campus for their remaining years at Northeastern. Despite Boston’s high rents, many students have little trouble with affordability, as a 2023 study found that over half of Northeastern’s student population come from families among the top 10 percent of household incomes in the country. When students do secure an off-campus apartment, they tend to rent short-term, switch apartments frequently, and do not form a lasting connection with the neighborhood that they live in. Their presence, though unintentional, can contribute to the gentrification of the neighborhood, where longtime residents who are often working-class, immigrant, or people of color are displaced from their neighborhood as transient, wealthy populations move in. When long-time residents can stay in their neighborhoods and thrive, they create a sense of rootedness from neighbors who know each other and invest in their shared environment, preserving their neighborhoods’ identity.
The Most Sustainable Solution?
Northeastern needs to house a higher percentage of its student population to help alleviate pressure on the rental market. Over the past months, resident leaders have said that they would like to see Northeastern commit to house 75 percent of students housed on campus in the next ten years. Fenway residents have said they appreciate the presence of students in the neighborhood but do not want to compete with them when it comes to housing and want to hold Northeastern accountable for its effect on their neighborhood. Residents want a relationship of trust and accountability, something that is not new, but has been a years-long grievance with the University. Northeastern has made some strides forward in creating meaningful connections with the community—my co-op at Fenway CDC, funded by the University, is a testament to that. However, Northeastern is contributing to a city-wide housing crisis with little plans to reconcile its impact in the next ten years, and it has been an ongoing issue. Northeastern’s development has been a source of frustration for Fenway residents for years and years; however, the issue has sparked recent interest with Northeastern’s new IMP, which allows them to directly express to the University their wishes for the future of their community. Therefore, it is imperative that Northeastern commit to the health of the community by hearing residents’ needs and housing more of its student population than their current IMP proposes. Increasing on-campus housing is the most urgent and necessary solution for the issues that Northeastern has contributed to.
How to Take Action
It is imperative that The City hears from community members about Northeastern’s expansion. We hope that through the IMP process, more neighbors will get involved to ask Northeastern to be a good neighbor by submitting a comment to the Planning Department by May 16th. Email the Planning Department project manager, Quinn Valcich at: quinn.w.valcich@boston.gov and share your feedback.
Fenway CDC is asking for Northeastern to:
- Increase on-campus student housing goal to accommodate 75% of Northeastern’s undergraduate students by 2034.
- Contribute $1M annually for the next ten years to the Neighborhood Stabilization Fund.
- Develop a meaningful PILOT agreement by negotiating in good faith with the City of Boston.
Northeastern’s next decade of development is being discussed right now. With our voices, we can advocate for it to reflect respect and a responsibility to the communities that make Boston a home for all of us.
To learn more, visit: fenwaycdc.org/institutional-accountability
To read the original article published in The Fenway News, visit: https://tinyurl.com/FNMay
Photo: Matthew Modoono, Northeastern University
