Supportive Services and Housing for Residents in Recovery

Thanks to the Lowell Sun for covering the groundbreaking of CBA's 555 Merrimack Street project. Keep your eyes on this exciting project as it progresses!

LOWELL — The Coalition for a Better Acre broke ground Wednesday afternoon at its newest housing project: a 27-unit apartment complex geared toward people recovering from addiction.

Located at 555 Merrimack St., the apartments will join the more than 500 housing units the CBA has built in the past 40 years, the bulk of which are at the North Canal Apartments on Moody Street.

The coalition is an affordable housing and community support network that seeks to develop and revitalize Lowell neighborhoods.

The project is in partnership with Lowell House Addiction Treatment and Recovery — also known as Lowell House Inc. — which will provide supportive services in the form of recovery coaches and a full-time, on-site case manager for future residents. The site will also have a 1,600-square-foot laundry space that will be shared by those living at 555 Merrimack St. and North Canal Apartments.

CBA Real Estate Project Manager Russell Pandres said the new apartments can offer a stable living situation to help people, particularly parents, to get back on their feet and see their children they may otherwise not be able to see.

Pandres added the independence the apartments provide are “conducive to having families” while also addressing a critical issue in Lowell: the opioid epidemic. In speaking with city residents and nonprofit partners, Pandres said the CBA discovered they could help combat drug addiction in the city by building housing.

“What was missing for people going to recovery was housing,” Pandres said. “We know how to build housing, so we wanted to rise to meet that need.”

Lowell House had owned 555 Merrimack St. since the 1980s and used it to house their clinical facilities. But the building fell into disrepair a few years ago, prompting the organization to sell to the CBA with the understanding that it would focus on mental health and substance use recovery.

The original plan was to keep Lowell House offices on the main floor, but the group has since moved next to the Lowell Community Health Center. The CBA plans to demolish the building and construct it from scratch.

Bill Garr, CEO of Lowell House, said the two organizations have discussed the project for about eight years now, identifying early on the need for “sober apartments” as opposed to sober houses and other residential recovery programs where “10 or 15 or 20 other people” share the space.

But for those with families, who already completed that inpatient recovery, Garr said specialized apartments designed for people healing from addiction are vital.

“It’s part of the growth and permanence of people in recovery, to have a home of their own,” Garr said. “You reach a point in your life where you want to raise a family, where you have a partner you want to live with, and they deserve that kind of dignified life that the rest of us strive to have. So, it’s very important that they have this option.”

The CBA purchased the building in November 2017, later securing $2.7 million in state subsidies, nearly $400,000 from the city’s Community Preservation Act funds and HOME Program, $150,000 from MassHousing’s Center for Community Recovery Innovations and $7.5 million in state and federal tax credits.

The project itself will cost about $8.5 million to construct, Pandres said, and will focus on energy efficiency in said construction: the building will be the first in the city to be certified in Passive House standards, which will minimize its heating and cooling load with an upgraded HVAC system and insulation.

Pandres said the CBA expects construction to be completed in July 2023 and to lease out the available units in October that year. Studios, one-bedroom and two-bedroom apartments will be available and will range in price from $1,037 to $1,773 per month.

“There are no apartments that have those kinds of supports in them in Lowell, and they end up relapsing and back into a recovery facility,” Garr said. “I think this is going to be a landmark project.”