Despite neighborhood pushback, BPDA OKs homeless housing in Dorchester hotel

Neighbors expressed concern about drug use and petty crime, but the Comfort Inn on Morrissey Blvd. will join a growing list of hotels converted to “permanent supportive housing” for the formerly homeless

The Comfort Inn on Morrissey Blvd in Dorchester.David L Ryan/Globe Staff/file

Despite harsh pushback from some in the neighborhood, the Boston Planning and Development Agency board on Thursday gave the green light to a plan that will transform a Comfort Inn in Dorchester into housing for formerly homeless people.

The board, citing Boston’s housing crisis and support from residents who spoke in favor of the proposal, unanimously approved the proposal by Pine Street Inn and nonprofit developer The Community Builders to convert the Morrissey Blvd. motel into 99 units of “permanent supportive housing” — studio apartments with 24-hour wrap-around services on site for people emerging from homelessness.

“People experiencing homelessness in Boston deserve the safety, comfort, and stability of a home,” Dorchester resident Peter Meacham said at a public hearing ahead of the BPDA vote Thursday evening. “Approving this project will change the lives for the better of 99 of my neighbors, of your neighbors, and our neighbors.”

But it wasn’t without protest. City Councilor Frank Baker and State Senator Nick Collins, who both represent the neighborhood, condemned the project. Chief among their concerns were the scale of the development, and what they said was a likelihood that housing nearly 100 formerly homeless people at the site would bring an influx of drugs and crime to the neighborhood.

“Clearly we have a crisis in the city that we have to respond to in the city, but I think the issue is how,” said Collins, who argued that nearby residents could be endangered by the project. “The community has overwhelmingly expressed opposition to this.”

Nearby residents protested in December against the plan to turn a Comfort Inn in Dorchester into housing for the formerly-homeless, worried it could bring the sort of crime and drug activity seen around Mass. and Cass to their neighborhood. The project's supporters say such fears are often overblown.Craig F. Walker/Globe Staff

The vote came after opponents of the project protested outside the Comfort Inn earlier this year, citing fears that that stretch of Dorchester will become like Mass. and Cass, the intersection in the South End that has become an epicenter of the region’s drug crisis and the city’s largest homeless encampment.

The version of the proposal that passed on Thursday was scaled down from the original plan, with 11 fewer units and a preference added for residents over age 62, in an attempt to assuage the concerns of neighbors.

The Comfort Inn sits on a concrete island between the six-lane Morrissey Blvd. and the Red Line tracks. It will be the latest in a string of projects converting hotels into permanent supportive housing, a trend that emerged during the pandemic. The projects make sense, homelessness service providers say, because it takes relatively little work to turn a hotel room into a studio apartments, and those renovations are more cost-effective than new construction.

The developers hope to finish work by fall 2024. It is expected to cost just under $50 million.

“We all have a responsibility to step forward and to support our neighbors and family members that find themselves [experiencing homelessness],” said BPDA board member Ted Landsmark. “So I, for one, find it easy to support this proposal.”