MONDAY, JUNE 30, 2025
Dear Cambridge and Somerville Constituents —
Today, I am on Beacon Hill for final votes on the FY26 state budget. It's the first time in memory the budget will be done on-time — part of a commitment from Beacon Hill leaders to improve legislative efficiency and transparency.
Budget highlights include an outside section that will impose a ban on forced, tenant-paid broker fees. This is a significant milestone for housing justice in our Commonwealth. It's an idea I first introduced with my bill, the Tenant Protection Act, and it gained momentum in recent years as city councilors and Governor Maura Healey started pushing for it.
I have more to say about the budget (my post on the House version is posted here) — but right now, I want to highlight the incredible story of the End End House — and offer some perspective on the fight that's broken out among local nonprofits as a deal to secure its future hangs in the balance.
The incredible story of the East End House and the effort to secure its future
Founded 1875, the East End House is East Cambridge's only multi-service organization, providing day care, after school programs, a food panty, community meeting space, and robust programming for seniors.
88% of East End House clients are people of color, and half the families served have incomes under $20,000. 42% of its clients live in East Cambridge; 38% of its clients live in The Port, Cambridgeport, and Wellington-Harrington neighborhoods; and the remaining 20% live on the other side of town.
The heartwarming stories of disadvantaged kids who have come up through the East End House and gone on to success are legendary. So are the experiences of local seniors and immigrant families who maintain connections to the community and get help with groceries thanks to East End House programs.
However, as this beloved institution celebrates its 150th anniversary this year — it's future is in doubt. It's building on Spring Street is terribly overcrowded and falling apart. It is thought the building could become uninhabitable within 3 to 5 years. I've been to the East End House countless times and worked closely with its leadership and have witnessed with my own eyes the dire need for a new facility.
Enter BioMed Realty — perhaps the most respected real estate developer in Cambridge. BioMed has maintained a deep partnership with the East End House that goes back decades. When BioMed purchased 320 Charles Street with plans to build a new commercial laboratory building in the East Cambridge neighborhood — there was an opportunity to leverage the deal to secure the future of the East End House.
BioMed did everything we ask developers to do. Starting last year, they hosted multiple community meetings — their initial proposal faced scrutiny and was deemed too big for a neighborhood setting — so they incorporated feedback from Dennis Carlone and others on design revisions to create significant new open space and tree canopy. Ultimately, this "upzoning" is fairly modest — a 2-to-3 story building will be replaced with a 3-to-4 story building (plus mechanicals).
At the center of the BioMed proposal is a commitment to deliver $20 million to the City of Cambridge to help secure a new building for the East End House. In addition, the proposal will provide $10 million to the City's Affordable Housing Trust and numerous other payments and benefits, including to other nonprofits. Moreover, the East End House is committed to building a new facility and redeveloping its existing property as housing, thereby further addressing the most difficult issue facing our community.
The local neighborhood groups — the East Cambridge Planning Team and the Linden Park Neighborhood Association — never shy about criticizing new development — are strongly supporting the deal. In the current commercial real estate market, it's almost a miracle this deal is even on the table — and yet, if it wasn't for the opportunity to support the East End House, it's likely there would be much stronger neighborhood opposition to the biolab, a big fight with abutters, and possibly no deal at all.
On May 20th, the City Council's Ordinance Committee voted unanimously to recommend passage of the proposal. At that meeting, Councillor Ayesha Wilson declared, “This is community engagement at its finest.” And Mayor Denise Simmons said she was fully ready to support the deal, noting how it's more than just a win for East Cambridge, it supports the city at large.
On June 9, the City Council voted to 9-0 to grant initial approval of the deal and pass it to a "second reading" — and this evening, it will appear on the council's agenda as Unfinished Business Item #6 for final passage.
The campaign by other local nonprofits to halt the deal
Last week, I was at the State House when I received a text message from the Community Art Center:
Slow the $20M Deal that cheats the Port Community of needed investment! 💪⚠️
We urgently ask that you read and sign the attached petition that would pause a $20M development deal that deprives the Port Community of community benefits. Please help us take action to assure that investment in our city is equitable, and that the most diverse neighborhood in Cambridge sees investment in its own: child care, community centers, arts & culture, youth programs, and accessible public spaces! Thank you!
The CAC petition claims the East End House deal was worked out "quietly behind closed doors" with "minimal public input" and "overlooks the broader needs of our community."
Meanwhile, three other local nonprofits — the Dance Complex, CEOC, and the Cambridge Community Center — distributed petitions and messages of their own and joined in calling on the council "to delay the inequitable disbursement of over $20 million." The CCC petition calls on the city council to delay tonight's vote and reopen the process. It criticizes the deal for not being transparent and "leaving grassroots organizations and historically marginalized communities behind..."
As State Representative, I have worked to deliver state funds directly to the Community Arts Center and the Dance Complex, and I have always worked to support our nonprofit community. And yet, I believe the campaign by these nonprofits to rally opposition to tonight's vote is misguided.
By Friday morning, it became clear the deal to secure a future for the East End House was on the rocks. So, for the better part of the next 48 hours, I was on the phone with numerous government colleagues and community advocates, as well as nonprofit leaders on various sides of the matter. I also went back and watched the recording of the May 20th public hearing to make sure I fully understood the details of what was on the table. A lot of correspondence on the matter was forwarded and shared with me as well.
These conversations and the related correspondence left me deeply concerned. I found there was an effort to denigrate the East End House, to personally attack its leadership, and to divide our community on racial lines, pitting neighborhoods and nonprofits against each other. There were outrageous accusations of corruption, betrayal, and malfeasance. This effort struck me as crass and misguided — misrepresenting the facts and threatening to cause irreparable reputational damage to the East End House (and perhaps to our entire nonprofit ecosystem).
Yesterday morning, I wrote to the Cambridge City Council and called on them not to reward these divisive tactics. Today, I posted that email to my website. But before I even had a chance to post the email, the group of opposing nonprofits issued a rebuttal to my email and distributed it out to various email lists. Clearly, there's a lot of information to unpack.
Reflections on this unfortunate situation
While I am troubled by the fight that has emerged over the East End House deal, I still empathize with the leaders of the other nonprofits and take their concerns seriously.
Nonprofits such as the CAC, the Dance Complex, and the CCC have long served our community and are based in old buildings that are in serious need of renovation or renewal. Their leaders have every reason to be frustrated. After all, over the past several decades, there's been tens of billions of dollars of commercial real estate development in our city — untold fortunes have been made, great wealth has been extracted — and yet, the city has too often failed to achieve equity — and too many of our nonprofits are working out of inadequate facilities and struggling to survive.
The city's Community Benefits Fund doesn't even allow for spending on capital improvements (a structural issue that ought to be addressed). A lot more can be done to ensure greater equity in development deals across the board.
That said, I stand by my position.
I think efforts to cast this as a "backroom deal" that undermines the goal of equity are misinformed. And I think the longstanding partnership that's been established between the East End House, BioMed Realty, and the East Cambridge neighborhood is something to be celebrated and replicated.
If the roles were reversed — and if a developer proposed a new biolab in the Port Neighborhood — and if neighborhood residents strongly backed the deal because it would provide a transformative opportunity to the Community Art Center — and if, at the last minute, the East End House demanded the deal be put on hold and renegotiated — then I would be calling on the city council to pass that deal to help the CAC, and I would call efforts to block it misguided.
Ultimately, this is not my decision. It is in the hands of the city council. I continue to support the basic premise of the East End House deal, for it is similar to a community benefits agreement whereby the neighborhood directly impacted by the development is working together to address a critical priority. I also think it's possible for the developer to maintain its commitment to the East End House while finding ways to offer more to other nonprofits, now and in the future. Whatever happens here, we still must find more ways to ensure all of our multi-service organizations get the support they need.
For my part, I will continue fighting for equity in every government decision and will continue to stand for a community where we lift each other up, not tear each other down.
Yours in service,
Rep. Mike Connolly
