Pittsfield, MA–Construction is underway on the $15.5 million transformation of the historic A.H. Rice Silk Mill on Spring St. in Pittsfield into 45 units of affordable workforce bshousing.
Jon Rudzinski, founder of Rees-Larkin Development, (RLD) says the historically sensitive renovation of the 66,100 sf building is scheduled to be completed in July. He noted that the finished building will contain 19 one-bedroom, 19-two bedroom, and seven three-bedroom apartments.
Forty-three of the apartments will be available at an affordable rate to working individuals and families at 60 % of the area medium income (which is currently about $49,000 for a family of four).
The developer is Pittsfield-Silk LLC, a partnership between RLD and Howland Development Company. The Architectural Team is the project architect, Keith Construction, Inc. is the general contractor and Berkshire Housing Services, Inc. is the property manager.
Rudzinski says the biggest challenge to the project early on was resolving a conflict between the requirements of historic preservation and the need to remediate a brownfield area that included a portion of the original 90,000 sf building.
As soon as that problem was overcome, financing was assured, permits were obtained and work commenced.
A former senior vice president at WinnDevelopment, Rudzinski founded Rees-Larkin Development in 2008.
Between 1997 and 2008 he was directly responsible for the successful completion of 20 housing developments, totaling over 3,000 units with a combined development
cost of over $270 million.