MassDevelopment sets $10 million for affordable housing

BOSTON — MassDevelopment a quasi-public state financing agency announced
that it had set aside $10 million for the conversion of contaminated properties
to affordable housing. About 6,000 so-called brownfield sites have been identified
in the state, the Boston Globe reported. The Brownfields Redevelopment Fund approved
by the legislature in 1998 provided $30 million for the cleanup and development
of abandoned toxic sites. But Acting Governor Jane Swift has been persuaded to
allot one-third of the brownfields fund to nonprofit developers who would build
housing on the sites and set aside 25 percent of the housing units for affordable
housing.