Thomas Breen photo
809 Chapel St.
A New York-based landlord whom the city has repeatedly cited for not taking care of his Fair Haven and Westville properties plans to build 11 new apartments downtown on Chapel Street.
At the regular monthly meeting of the Downtown-Wooster Square Community Management Team (DWSCMT) on the second floor of City Hall, local building code consultant and former city building official Andy Rizzo told neighbors that his client, Great Neck, N.Y.-based landlord Edward Roubeni, is in the process of converting the second and third stories of a former bank building at 809 Chapel St. into 11 market-rate apartments.
Andy Rizzo.
Three of the apartments will be two-bedrooms, said Rizzo. The remaining units will be efficiencies no larger than 500 or 600 square feet each.
Roubeni’s holding company Yosheph Mashbir Bapaz LLC has already secured site plan approval and a 0‑parking-requirement special exception for the project, Rizzo said. Demolition at the site is “99 percent completed,” he added. “We’re going to start framing by next Monday.”
Roubeni was not present at Tuesday night’s meeting.
Tuesday night’s Downtown-Wooster Square Community Management Team meeting.
In addition to 809 Chapel, Roubeni owns a one-story commercial building at 873 – 887 Grand Ave. and a two-story commercial building in Westville at 781 Whalley Ave. / 50 Fitch St.
Over the past two years, the city’s anti-blight Livable City Initiative (LCI) has repeatedly cited Roubeni for violating the city’s anti-blight and property maintenance ordinance for both properties and then for not paying the concomitant fines.
In Nov. 2017, Roubeni filed a lawsuit against the city, accusing city officials of acting with “unclean hands” in their alleged selective enforcement of anti-blight laws against him.
In Aug. 2018, the city slapped a $50,100 lien on Roubeni’s Grand Avenue property for unpaid anti-blight fines.
According to the state judicial website, Roubeni’s lawsuit against the city is set to go to trial on June. 26.
Metro Star Plans Mini-Sized Market-Rate Apartments
Metro Star Properties Director Trajah Buxton and local attorney Gregory Muccilli.
Also on the agenda at Tuesday night’s DWSCMT meeting was the Milford-based developer Metro Star Properties, which shared its plans to convert a garage at 260 Crown St. into six market-rate, “efficiency” apartments.
Metro Star Director Trajah Buxton said that the six apartments, added to a Crown Street building where they have already built out 12 apartments, will be studios between 430 and 450 square feet each.
“They’re small,” he conceded. He said Metro Star also plans to convert the groundfloor space at 260 Crown into a restaurant, though they have not signed on with any particular restaurant yet.
Caroline Smith and Anstress Farwell.
New Haven Urban Design League President Anstress Farwell expressed concern that smaller and smaller market-rate apartments like these could wind up inflating the housing market.
“A lot of people think that tiny units will lead to affordable housing,” she said. But, she worried, these small market-rate studios, if priced too high, might drive up the going market-rate rents for one-bedrooms, two-bedrooms, and so on.
Buxton did not share how much these new Crown Street apartments will go for. But, he said about Metro Star, “we’re huge proponents of affordable housing.”
“Have you produced any in this city?” Farwell asked in response.
No, Buxton conceded; 260 Crown St. is the only property Metro Star owns in the city. And, he said, the cost of development was too high to allow for the inclusion of “affordable” units.
“This is a very costly project,” he said.
Correction: The original version of this article incorrectly included a photograph of 813 Chapel St. rather than of 809 Chapel St. The replacement photograph now correctly shows the red brick 809 Chapel St. at the corner of Chapel and Orange.