Massachusetts state officials wrote Friday to Winthrop town leadership notifying them that the town is officially regarded as violating 3A, the 2021 state law that requires Boston-area communities to expand their zoning for multifamily housing.

The state secretary of Housing and Livable Communities, Edward Augustus Jr, in a letter addressed to Winthrop’s town manager, said the town has not created the necessary multifamily housing zones nor made any request of the state to evaluate its plans for doing so.

For Winthrop residents, the repercussions of their town government’s actions include legal fees and the potential loss of millions of dollars in state grant money.

The state law does not actually require Winthrop to add any new housing, because the town already has so much multifamily housing that it could meet the terms of 3A by simply rezoning areas of the town where that multifamily housing exists.

But the Winthrop Town Council has refused to take that step, instead succumbing to pressure from political activists working across the Boston area who have argued that making a show of rejecting the 3A law somehow represents an important assertion of local independence. In reality, the state constitution has long given the state government the right to direct local zoning laws, and court rulings have upheld that right.

Mr Augustus, a former city manager of Worcester and a former Massachusetts state senator, cited those court rulings in his letter to Winthrop leadership. He did not immediately threaten Winthrop with a cutoff in state funds, though Winthrop already has lost at least one state grant for flood mitigation that was won by Revere – a coastal city that is in compliance with 3A.

And Winthrop’s own town officials – including leadership of the police, public works and health departments – have publicly admitted their concern about the town being harmed by the Town Council’s political positioning on 3A.

The town health department, in particular, gets about two-thirds of its budget from state sources.

Other state funding that Winthrop could lose as a result of its failure to meet the 3A requirements include:

• Community Planning Grants, EOHLC,
• Massachusetts Downtown Initiative, EOED,
• Urban Agenda, EOED,
• Rural and Small Town Development Fund, EOED,
• Brownfields Redevelopment Fund, MassDevelopment,
• Site Readiness Program, MassDevelopment,
• Underutilized Properties Program, MassDevelopment,
• Collaborative Workspace Program, MassDevelopment,
• Real Estate Services Technical Assistance, MassDevelopment,
• Commonwealth Places Programs, MassDevelopment,
• Land Use Planning Grants, EOEEA,
• Local Acquisitions for Natural Diversity (LAND) Grants, EOEEA, and
• Municipal Vulnerability Preparedness (MVP) Planning and Project Grants, EOEEA

Four members of the nine-member Winthrop Town Council have stood against 3A compliance, denying the council the necessary majority, given the council has one vacancy. They are Jim Letterie, Rob DeMarco, Patrick Costigan and Suzanne Swope. Mr Letterie is the Town Council president, who has said that he’s prepared for Winthrop residents to pay the costs of non-compliance. And Ms Swope is the parent of a leader organizer of efforts across various towns aimed at convincing communities to reject 3A compliance.

Their position of defying the state has been encouraged by state Representative Jeff Turco, who has proposed repealing or revising 3A to specifically exempt Winthrop and other small towns from 3A – even though the law was passed almost unanimously by the state legislature and it already gives Winthrop an effective exemption through its ability to rezone areas of town to match their existing multifamily housing reality.

The decision of Winthrop town leadership to fight a state law for political purposes, rather than accept the effective exemption available to it, is posing a clear threat to the budgets and well-being of taxpayers, said Cassie Witthaus, a member of the community group Winthrop Working Together.

“The choice to fight, what amounts to us as recognizing existing apartment buildings, will have far reaching financial impacts on the taxes for our entire community, as well as our ability to address flooding and other infrastructure needs long term,” Ms Witthaus said.