LYNN — National Park Service approval clears the way for Lynn Housing Authority & Neighborhood Development (LHAND) to assemble financing for its $22.4 million plan to convert the South Common Street armory into veterans housing.
The approval allows LHAND to receive a $4 million federal historic tax credit for the armory project. The money will be matched with state historic tax credits and a low-income housing tax credit similar to the one LHAND used to help construct the Gateway North housing complex on Washington Street.
Tax credits can be sold on the financial market and public agencies frequently use them to help pay project costs. Federal officials initially denied a tax credit application for the armory project in August, 2019. LHAND appealed the denial and the denial was overturned in June subject to Park Service approval.
“This was a huge hurdle especially after the denial and the appeal process,” said LHAND manager for planning and development Jeff Weeden.
Plans call for transforming the armory’s cavernous “drill shed” where National Guard soldiers once stood in formation into 25 “micro unit” residences lining the drill house’s 127-foot-long walls.
An additional 12 units will be built in the armory’s three-story “head house” with its distinctive turrets, and the adjacent garage will be converted into six more units.
Once completed, the renovation will feature common areas for residents to socialize in.
The armory conversion ranks among LHAND’s most ambitious projects — smaller in scope than the 71-unit Gateway project but rivaling the former St. Jean Baptiste Church complex conversion into housing 14 years ago.
Built in 1893, the hulking Romanesque Revival architecture building with its brick towers was the home of the 101st Field Artillery, a unit tracing its roots back to the pre-Revolutionary War “South Regiment.”
Last used as a meeting place for local Registry of Motor Vehicle road tests, the 36,000 square foot armory ended up on the state’s property list and Lynn’s legislative delegation helped LHAND take control of the building in 2018.
The armory has not remained empty and unused during the planning and financing assembly phase for the veterans’ housing. A movie company filmed part of the Ryan Reynold’s movie, “Free Guy” in the drill shed and Lynn public schools are using the garage for storage.
Once financing and design work for the project is completed, renovating the armory into housing will take about 18 months, Weeden said. He credited U.S. Rep. Seth Moulton, a veteran, Mayor Thomas M. McGee’s office, the city’s legislative delegation and the Historical Commission for helping make the project possible.
“We’re a ways away from construction, but we are on our way,” Weeden said.
