Rent Control Rules Stymie Tenants' Mobile Home Park Purchase

NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — The Mobile Home Park Rent Control Board on Monday wrestled with the question of how it could accommodate a request from residents of the Wheel Estates park to facilitate their purchase of the property.

Park residents are looking to exercise their right under Massachusetts law to match an offer by a third party to purchase the park. Wheel Estates' owner, Rochester, N.Y.,-based Morgan Management, has signed purchase and sales agreement from Connecticut's Real Estate Seekers LLC for a reported price of $2.73 million.

The Wheel Estates Tenants Association wants to match that offer with the help of a low-interest loan from a New Hampshire-based non-profit called Resident Owned Communities USA.

The problem is that ROC USA's financing arm wants a guarantee that the park's rents will be high enough after the sale to pay the interest on the note.

While members of the Rent Control Board appeared generally to support the idea of resident-ownership at the park, they were reluctant to commit the board in writing to a hypothetical rent increase. But the board agreed to take up the issue again on March 13.

The clock is ticking.

The purchase-and-sales agreement with Real Estate Seekers was signed on Dec. 27, giving the tenants group a March 27 deadline to have its financing in place in order to supplant the Connecticut firm as the buyer.

"You're asking us to sign off on a 15-year plan," Chairman Wayne Wilkinson said. "Unfortunately, this model doesn't fit with the way the Mobile Home Rent Control Board operates. The way we are set up is the petitioner petitions us for an increase, but the board sets the rate."

Tenants Association President Sandra Overlock and Vice President Jesse Martinez presented their request to the board along with ROC USA's Mary O'Hara and a representative from Shelburne Falls-based non-profit the Cooperative Development Institute.

O'Hara explained that while Massachusetts, New Hampshire and Vermont have laws that on the books supporting resident-ownership of manufactured home parks, the technical support and financing available through ROC USA is a recent development.

Since it was founded in 2008, the non-profit has helped facilitate resident purchases of five parks in Massachusetts, according to its website, rocusa.org. CDI has worked with seven successful conversions, including three in Vermont.

O'Hara and CDI's Andrew Danforth noted that while that is true, the law does allow for a return on investment, and in this case the "landlord" would be a non-profit, an association of resident owners, who would not seek any return on its investment.

North Adams Administrative Officer Michael Canales noted that the commonwealth specifically encourages resident ownership of parks. Since such ownership arrangements are only possible through loans, it seems antithetical to have a city ordinance in opposition to those loans, Canales said.

Mayor Richard Alcombright, also in attendance, said he understood the difficulty of working within the city's ordinance but urged the board to "think outside the box."

Board member Joseph Gniadek expressed opposition to the idea of setting a rate to cover loans that include both the purchase price and $1 million in capital improvements. Gniadek noted that the Rent Control Board has been burned before by owners who sought increases to cover future improvements and then never completed the work.

Board member and City Councilor Marie Harpin said she was disappointed more residents of the park were not present at Monday's meeting.

Overlock said the tenants have had "many successful" meetings about the idea of resident ownership, and 101 of the park's 185 occupied homes have paid a $100 membership share to be part of a cooperative. More people are signing up every day, Overlock said.

"They want to have a say in what needs to be done," she said. "We've been 20 some-odd years waiting for these projects to be done.

"They're all excited about getting this park be resident owned."

MCLA Class of 2024 Told 'This Is Your Time'

By Tammy DanielsiBerkshires Staff
05:22PM / Saturday, May 11, 2024

Commencement speaker Shannon Holsey shares some advice from her father: 'My dad always said if you're not hitting a few guardrails, you're not going fast enough.' See more photos here.

NORTH ADAMS, Mass. — Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts awarded 175 degree and certificates at the college's 125th commencement ceremonies on Saturday. 

 

Keynote speaker Shannon Holsey, president of the Stockbridge-Munsee Band of Mohicans, said past graduations have occurred during periods of peace with little fanfare. But not so for the class of 2024. 

 

"Your class has come of an age and a moment of great conflict in our nation and for the world," she said. "A rare inflection in points in history where the size and scope of the challenges before us require that we remake our world to its renewed promise. That we align our deepest values and commitments to the demands of the new age. It's a privilege and responsibility afforded a few to a few generations. And for that task that you're now called to fulfill is huge."

 

Holsey told the class not to wait to share their opinions or ideas or to shape the world. Punctuated by applause at several points, the Native American leader said this is a world that "aches under the weight of violence, instability and threats to global order" and invests more in wars and weapons than education and health care. 

 

She referenced the experience of her own nation, dispossessed from the very land that she stood on and reduced from thousands to hundreds as they were forced to move farther west.

 

"This day of all days, is one of my birthright and seems most fitting that this place is a perfect space to celebrate and honor my ancestors who sacrificed so much to be here," Holsey said. Past leaders had seen education as a countercheck for "adapting and understanding a complex system that wasn't necessarily designed for indigenous people."

 

"I have learned that diversity in human experience gives rise to diversity in thought, which creates distinct ideas and methods of problem solving. The power of differences can make us smarter and more creative. If we accept the differences are OK," she said. "The world doesn't need more people trying to fit in like a cookie-cutter sameness."