Boston Trailer Park Residents Take Ownership

Boston, MA-   CDI congratulates the residents of Boston Trailer Park in
taking ownership of their community!  The purchase culminated a 20+ year
struggle by the residents of Boston’s only manufactured home community to
gain long term security and affordability of their community. The community
was created in 1947 and has just over 100 units, and is located on VFW
Parkway in West Roxbury. The tenant association was incorporated in 1987
and spent much of its early years in litigation with its owners, who saw
other purposes for the land. Their initial battles led to a transitional
ownership by a non-profit, and finally to resident ownership. The purchase
was assisted by the City of Boston, The Boston Redevelopment Authority,
with financing including The Cooperative Fund of New England (CFNE); CDI
has provided business training and has pledged long term support of the
association as a part of it New England Resident Owned Communities (NEROC)
initiative.

Ask your Rep. to attend briefing on Urban Co-ops!

Representatives Chaka Fattah (D-Penn.) and Jo Ann Emerson (R-Mo.) will hold a congressional briefing on “The Role of Cooperatives in Rural and Urban Communities,” on Mar. 29, 2011, from 2–3 p.m. in room 2362-B of the Rayburn House Office Building in Washington, D.C.

This event will provide members of Congress and their staff with the opportunity to hear from practitioners, advocates and academics about the challenges facing cooperatives across all sectors of the economy and the need for federal policy to support these unique business entities.

Ask Your Representative to Attend!

Please ask your representative to attend this briefing. Click below to access a customizable message that you can send to your representative. http://www.ncba.coop/ncba/what-we-do/public-policy/calls-to-action/864-call-to-action-ask-your-representative-to-attend-co-op-briefing

NYT article features CDI work with Manufactured Home Park Co-ops

In today's New York Times, Loren Berlin published "At More Mobile-Home Parks, a Greater Sense of Security", a look at the growing movement for residents of manufactured home parks to form nonprofit cooperatives that purchase and manage the operations of the parks in which they live. The Cooperative Development Institute is proud to be a certified technical assistance provider with the ROC USA Network, which is spearheading a nation-wide initiative to secure such resident-owned communities. Our New England Resident Owned Communities program, begun in Fall 2009, has already helped one park convert to resident-ownership, and is working with Wamsutta, the park in North Attleboro, MA featured in the NYT article, to complete their purchase this Spring. There are hundreds of manufactured home parks throughout New England, housing thousands of largely lower-income individuals and families, and apart from New Hampshire, where the ROC concept was launched, very few are currently resident-owned. Resident-ownership ensures that the land remains in use as a manufactured home park, keeps lot rents from increasing too much over time, and gives residents a direct say in park maintenance and infrastructure.

For more information on how residents can form a cooperative to purchase and manage their park, or for information on the benefits to park owners of selling to residents, contact our housing program manager, Andy Danforth, at adanforth@cdi.coop or 401-439-9795.

Photo: Alice Sadoski, resident of Wamsutta Mobile Home Park
Photo credit: Erik Jacobs for the New York Times