Real Estate Ind. Reps On Boston's Rent Stabilization Cmte.-Pt. 3

Besides including both Housing Forward-MA Executive Director Josh Zakim--whose organization’s treasurer is Chestnut Hill Realty CEO President Ed Zuker--and the president of the Related Beal real estate deal-making firm, Kimberly Sherman, the Boston’s mayor Rent Stabilization Advisory Committee also includes the CEO and President of the Boston Residential Group real estate deal-making firm, Curtis Kemeny, as a member.

And, coincidentally, like Rent Stabilization Advisory Committee Member Sherman, Rent Stabilization Advisory Committee Member Kemeny is also a board member of the Boston Municipal Research Bureau that has, organizationally, long opposed rent regulation in Boston.

In a March 11, 2022 City of Boston press release, the CEO and President of Boston Residential Group and Boston Municipal Research Bureau board member is quoted as saying that “having worked with previous Boston mayors on planning and affordable housing policy, I’m looking forward to being able” to “shape the conversation around rent stabilization.” But the website of Rent Stabilization Advisory Committee Member Kemeny’s firm notes that “Boston Residential Group partners with large, publicly-traded financial institutions to develop properties” and its “team” is “committed to providing superior returns to our investors.”

Among the “large, publicly-traded financial institutions” that Kemeny’s firm apparently “partners with” are the Morgan Stanley Real Estate Fund, Brookfield Real Estate, Cambridge Trust Bank, Boston Private Bank, GMAC Commercial Mortgage, Simon Property Group, Mercantile Trust Bank, Merchants and Traders Bank, PNC Bank, The Carlyle Group and Freddie Mac.

Kemeny founded his real estate deal-making firm in 2003; and, according to its website, the Boston Residential Group “has been involved with the development and management of over 2,000 units valued at $1.0B.” Among the “over 2,000 units” that Rent Stabilization Advisory Committee Member Kemeny’s firm has apparently been involved in either “developing” or managing are units at the following real estate properties within Boston: 381 Congress St.; 55 India Street, 285 Columbus Lots; 319 A Street; 360 Newbury St.; Church Park Apartments; and Olmstead Place in Jamaica Plain.

And, not surprisingly, a Boston tenant or tenant family renting, for example, one of the 196-units of the Olmstead Place apartment building in Jamaica Plain is apparently currently being charged $2,675+ /Month for a studio apartment, $3,200+ /Month for a 1 Bedroom apartment, $4,100+ /Month for a 2 Bedroom apartment and $5,275+ /Month for a 3 Bedroom apartment.

Yet less than 5 months after Curtis Kemeny, coincidentally, gave a $1,000 contribution on Oct. 20, 2021 to Boston Mayor Wu’s 2021 election campaign committee, according to data posted on the Massachusetts Office of Campaign and Political Finance website, the Boston Residential Group’s president and CEO was appointed by the Boston mayor to sit on the City of Boston’s “ Rent Stabilization Advisory Committee”—which in 2022 will only “study” and “be tasked with making recommendations” while Boston landlords continue raising market rents and displacing tenants in 2022, over 140 days after the November 2021 Boston mayoralty election.

According to the City of Boston’s March 11, 2022 press release “rent stabilization would” only just “complement Mayor Wu’s other initiatives to address Boston’s housing affordability.” Yet in New York City, for example “the rent stabilization system is New York City’s largest affordable housing program” because it “protects tenants from the housing market forces that drive displacement and steep rent increases,” despite being “under continuous attack from the real estate industry,” according to the website of New York City’s Met Council on Housing tenant rights movement group.

But instead of, for example, arranging for Boston’s public school buses and their unionized bus drivers to be used to transport larger numbers of Boston’s tenants to the Massachusetts State House to demand that Massachusetts politicians immediately pass legislation in 2022 allowing Boston to re-establish rent regulation in the “Cradle of Liberty,” appointing a “Stalling Rent Stabilization Advisory Committee” that includes real estate industry representatives is apparently all that Boston’s current mayor is apparently yet willing to do to prevent landlords from raising your rent again in 2022. (end of part 3)