LYNN — The City Council approved a petition to redevelop a Boston Street warehouse property into four apartments and a garage Tuesday night.
The plan from Pedro Maldonado, of Winthrop Property Services, would add two stories to the building at 426 Boston St. and create four residential units, all two bedrooms, with the required six spaces (or 1 ½ requirement per condo unit) of on-site parking. Two people will also be able to park in the garage, according to his attorney, Sam Vitali.
Winthrop Property Services bought the property last fall for $460,000, according to The Warren Group. The company borrowed $514,000 for the purchase and renovation of the 3,320 square-foot warehouse.
Vitali said the area has a long history as a heavy industrial district, but it has changed. There’s a brand new gas station going up around the street and the new Market Basket is around the corner.
He said the building has been there for more than 50 years and has had many uses. At one point, Vitali said, it was a two-family dwelling. He said the proposal was to change the character of the use, which required Council approval.
Vitali said Maldonado also plans to take down the fence that’s close to the nearby Hibernian Hall.
City Councilor Rick Starbard said his concern was snow mitigation, with how snow would be piled up around the corner and affect parking.
City Councilor John “Jay” Walsh said the building has been vacant for about a year.
“We need more housing in the city and it sounds like it would be a good fit to take a building that no one’s in and renovate it into something that will be utilized,” Walsh said.
Walsh said there’s been some renewed interest in the area since the Market Basket was recently built. He said the area is primed for a rejuvenation.
The Council also voted to put a demolition order in for 7 Fuller St. after a tour of the single-family home in November by the city’s deputy building commissioner, Clint Muche, and a city inspector revealed jugs of human waste, mounds of trash, drug paraphernalia, piles of unwashed clothes and no running water.
Walsh previously said that neighbors have complained for two years that the place has been used as a place to buy drugs. He said on Tuesday that there’s been a recent drug bust at the property, adding that the house is in really bad condition and it’s dangerous.
In November, Lynn Police raided the home — three men and a woman were arrested after police seized more than $10,000 in cash, large amounts of heroin and cocaine and Clonazepam pills. The house has been condemned by the city’s inspectional services department.
In other news, the Council is looking into implementing one-sided parking during snowstorms for public safety in the wake of the four-alarm fire that ripped through a Broad Street apartment building late Monday afternoon, leaving 28 people homeless and one woman injured.
The issue was raised by City Councilor Richard Colucci, who suggested that the Department of Public Works should look into it.
“We just had a major fire in the city and a lot of the fire apparatus couldn’t get the down the street so this is a big problem,” said City Councilor Buzzy Barton.
City Council President Darren Cyr said there is an issue right now in the city with parking. He said it’s unsafe the way people park, adding that they don’t use common sense, especially on a lot of the side streets.
James Lamanna, the city’s attorney, said he would look into whether there was an existing ordinance that calls for odd-sided parking one year and even-sided the next during certain months that was at the discretion of the commission — he thought there was one.
The Council voted to send a letter to the DPW commissioner Andrew Hall asking him to implement one-sided parking in Lynn for public safety reasons if there is an existing ordinance.
