Harvard Street Health Center Breaks Ground on 49,000-Sq.-Ft. Building on Old Road

Street view of Blue Hill Avenue in Boston (file photo). Photo: Magicpiano / Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 3.0).

Harvard Street Neighborhood Health Center has broken ground on a 49,000-square-foot, three-story building on Old Road that will replace its aging home on Blue Hill Avenue, across from Franklin Park Zoo, the Dorchester Reporter reported. Leaders gathered on Oct. 29 to turn the first shovels of dirt, and construction is expected to take 18 to 24 months.

A bigger home for a Blue Hill Avenue clinic

Harvard Street began operating in 1968 and moved into its current Blue Hill Avenue building seven years later, which puts it there for roughly half a century. Over that time the center has offered primary care, women’s health, behavioral health, dental care, cancer screening, podiatry and a pharmacy, among other services, according to the Reporter.

The center has outgrown that space. CEO Charley Murphy said the board first asked him to pursue a new building 12 years ago; he later left the CEO job and then came back to see it through. Murphy described the current building as lovely in its day but said it is “old and leaks and is beyond its time.”

City Councilor Brian Worrell, who lives nearby, said the new building doubles the center’s clinical space and will let it serve thousands more patients each year. He called the groundbreaking a big day for Blue Hill Avenue. Board Chair Bonnie Brathwaite said the project was long overdue and would improve the experience for current patients while making room for many new ones.

Projects like this one are a staple of Boston local news, where a single building can change how a whole stretch of a neighborhood gets its health care.

Two phases, with housing to follow

The Old Road building is phase 1. Phase 2 calls for new construction on the health center’s Blue Hill Avenue properties that would combine health center functions with more than 100 affordable housing units. The partner on that phase is The Community Builders, a nonprofit housing developer.

The Reporter did not say what will happen to the existing health center building once phase 2 begins, and no schedule for the housing phase was reported.

The housing piece fits a broader push for affordable homes in nearby neighborhoods. The Boston Report recently covered new affordable rentals in Roxbury and a groundbreaking in Mission Hill, and a scaled-back Christopher Street apartment plan in Fields Corner.

How the project is being paid for

The financing draws on several sources, according to the Reporter:

• New Markets Tax Credits, arranged through The Community Builders, MassDevelopment and South Shore Bank.
• About $20 million in tax-exempt bonds, purchased by South Shore Bank.
• A capital campaign, with donations from Boston Medical Center and the late Richard Slifka, founder of Global Petroleum.

The article did not give a total project cost.

Who was there and what comes next

Board members Ed Gaskin, Jheanell Daye, Paula Josephs and Brian Shelly helped shovel the first dirt alongside Murphy and Brathwaite. Michael Curry, president of the Massachusetts League of Community Health Centers, also attended. The ceremony included a moment of silence for the late board member Eileen Kenner.

Commodore Construction is building the center, with Dan Hudd representing the firm. Pre-construction work has already started, including blocking off part of Old Road, so neighbors should expect construction activity in the area. If the 18-to-24-month timeline holds, the new building would open sometime in 2028.

The groundbreaking took place Oct. 29; the Dorchester Reporter published its account Nov. 4. The 2028 opening estimate is The Boston Report’s, based on the reported construction timeline.

Sources

• Dorchester Reporter: Harvard Street Neighborhood Health Center breaks ground on new building on Old Road