“What makes the project relevant now is the need for housing,” he told the Globe.
Projects such as these are far from new, but the repurposing of vacant mills into residential properties has taken on a fresh urgency.Massachusetts needs to build nearly a quarter of a million new homes over a decade to address a severe housing shortage in the state, developers and municipal leaders say.
“The housing crisis is increasingly acute. It’s bigger now than it was five, 10, 20 years ago. So we have a capital C crisis,” said Larry Curtis, chairman of Boston-basedWinnDevelopment, which has converted nearlytwo dozen mills in Lowell, Holyoke, and elsewhere in Massachusetts over the last four decades.
Old mills, though difficult to develop, have some built-in benefits.Theyoffer available building stock, in a state where land for big, newprojects can be hard to come by. And repurposing long-vacant buildings into residential or commercial properties can skirt the kind of NIMBY communityopposition that cansometimes derail new construction, according to Curtis.
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Jessica Rudden-Dube, executive director of Preservation Massachusetts, said that some of the easier mill projects have alreadybeen converted. But improvedincentives from the state have encouraged developers to repurpose those that still remain.
For her organization, the projects are a way to preserve history and build new housing at once. “It’s sort of a no-brainer if that space is historic and can be preserved in its historic character but serve a new purpose,” she said.
Two decades ago, New Bedford conducted an inventory of about a 100 of its mills and changed zoning laws topermit their development into housing or mixed uses, said Jennifer Carloni, director of city planning. A lot of them have found new uses, such as the Kilburn Mill that overlooks Clarks Cove. It’s now home to artists, antique vendors, a cafe, anda bookshop, along with yoga studios, gyms, and other small businesses.
But a few New Bedford millsremain untouched, awaiting builders with enough wherewithal — and deep enough pockets — to tackle challenging environmental conditions.
“We have the policies and the procedures in place that are ready to go when any one of those properties wants to be developed,” Carloni said.
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A ballroom at Kilburn Mill in New Bedford, which now houses more than 100 small businesses. David L. Ryan/Globe Staff
The housing shortage in the state is making some developers take on even complicated projects, according to Quentin Ricciardi, CEO of real estate firm Acorn Inc., whose company has repurposed mills in New Bedford.
“With so much demand, some of these mill properties are now coming back into focus,” he said.
Glassman bought his power plant buildingin 2019 for $350,000. It will be, to put it mildly, challenging to make apartments out of a boiler room at the back of his building, a turbine room in the middle, and office spaces at the front.But there are high ceilings and wide windows that open up to the view of the Acushnet River.
Glassman and his partner in the project, Lisa Serafin, are looking into state and federal tax credits for historic rehabilitation projects,and willtake out a loan against expected rent revenues. They hope to secure financing and permits soon, then begin construction next year.
Glassman owns two other former mills in New Bedford. An old leather lamination plant now houses Darn It, his apparel repair business, and awarehouse operation. A few minutes away is Hatch Street Studios, a 130,000-square-foot old yarn-spinning mill that has become a working space for sculptors, painters, woodworkers—even a clown school.
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“There’s so much history with these buildings and in the city of New Bedford,”Glassman said, ”it would be a shame if people started knocking these down to build up something else.”
“We’re a community that is ever changing, always taking our assets and making the most of them,” New Bedford’s Carloni said.
An interior view of the former power plant and offices in New Bedford, Glassman’s current project. David L. Ryan/Globe Staff
WinnDevelopment has completed historic reuse projects across Massachusetts. They include the repurposing of mills in Lowell, such as at the historic Boot Mill Complex, that have created nearly 600 units of housing in all. In January, the firm finishedtransformingan alpaca wool mill in downtown Holyokeinto 88 unitsof senior housing.
The largest such projectin Taunton, the Whittenton Mills, involves 42 acres that was vacant for more than a decade. Work has finally begun after years of trying to attract developers, said Jay Pateakos, executive director of the Taunton office of economic and community development.
The plan is to create 390 apartments, as demand has grown with the arrival of a new commuter rail and new residents relocating to Taunton, after being priced out of elsewhere in the state.
“Housing is number one, especially affordable housing,” Pateakos said. “A lot of these mills make excellent apartments, so we look at it, and we try to create some housing opportunities.”
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The Whittenton Mill industrial property in Taunton, photographed in January. Jonathan Wiggs/Globe Staff
In Fall River, officials say renovating the old mills can have a multiplier effect on the local economy by creating jobs for people working on the projects and byattracting deep-pocketed new residents to live in the city.
Mayor Paul Coogan acknowledged that it is tough work. But developers regularly come to the city inquiring about them.
“They’ve had good success here, and they come back and they [say] ‘Look, what else do you have?’” he said.
“Some people that are holding on to these old mills want more money than I think they’re worth, and that a developer is willing to commit to,” he added. “But if we can put together a deal … it turns around a neighborhood.”
Omar Mohammed can be reached at omar.mohammed@globe.com. Follow him on Twitter (X) @shurufu.
The increasing gas prices are having an impact on landscaping businesses in Massachusetts, and it may mean customers have to pay more.
Gas prices continue to climb across the country, and the average price of a gallon of regular in Massachusetts was $3.93 on Monday, according to AAA. That is up 13 cents from last week and 78 cents from one month ago.
It’s an extremely busy time for landscapers. Spring cleaning is underway, which means lawnmowers, blowers, weedwhackers and trimmers are in overdrive. Andrew Pecorella runs his own landscaping business serving areas like Natick, Framingham, Brookline and Newton. He says the increasing cost of gas prices is impacting the industry.
“Everybody wants their properties looking well so if it has to go up, then my prices are going to have to go up a little bit,” Pecorella said.
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He uses diesel for his truck and premium fuel for his landscaping equipment. He goes to the pump every day to fill up. He’s noticed a big increase since last spring, which is why he has to charge his customers more.
“Mostly been saying to them that prices are going to have go up a little bit, mainly because of my cost of fuel and cost of materials,” Pecorella said. “Because the materials have to get to the yard and that costs more money for them to ship it to the yard and make the mulch and make all the products. It costs money. It costs fuel.”
He says fuel, materials and equipment costs are making it challenging, which is why he’s cutting it close to make sure he’s being fair to his customers and also being business savvy. He says if he has to drive further, it will cost more.
He’s been in the landscaping business since 2010 and started his own business in 2018. He says he loves his job even when it’s hard to predict how much things will cost each year.
“It’s just one step at a time, do the best that you can, and try to make sure all your customers are happy,” Pecorella said.
WORCESTER, Massachusetts (WBZ) — A potentially rabid fox attacked a woman in Worcester, Massachusetts Friday in an incident that was captured on video.
It happened at about 7 a.m. on Esther Street. Video shows the fox running at the victim repeatedly while she tries to fight it off.
Witness Dahnyel Swenson said she saw the victim “running up the stairs, hitting it with the pocketbook, screaming” and she “got pinned against her home trying to fight this medium-sized fox.”
The fox then dragged the woman to the ground.
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“It lunged at her so fast … she didn’t know which way to go,” said Swenson, who lives across the street and said she had just warned the victim about a recent fox sighting in the area.
Swenson said she noticed that the victim pinned the fox to the ground, so she and her daughter rushed to help. Swenson’s daughter managed to trap the fox with a green recycling bucket until the first responders arrived.
“There’s a hole in the bucket, so I had to get a rake because it’s viscous, it’s trying to come through the hole,” Swenson said.
Swenson grabbed a rake and a green recycling bucket, and her daughter managed to trap it under the bucket until first responders arrived.
The victim was hospitalized because the bites to her ankle and both hands drew blood, police said. Swenson said her daughter also went to the hospital because she had gotten blood on her during the incident.
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“We’re taking all the precautions. Now she’s going through all the rabies shots series for the next week,” Swenson said.
The animal was euthanized, and its remains have been sent to a Webster Square Animal Clinic for rabies testing.
Worcester police said that hours earlier, someone reported that a fox tried to bite them near Gibbs Street. An animal control unit responded, but didn’t find the fox.
Head coach Bill Belichick of the North Carolina Tar Heels responds to questions during his press conference following their loss to the NC State Wolfpack at Carter-Finley Stadium on November 29, 2025 in Raleigh, North Carolina. (Photo by Lance King/
North Carolina Tar Heels head football coach Bill Belichick was sued Thursday over an alleged incident at his Massachusetts home in June 2024.
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In a complaint filed in Nantucket Superior Court, painter Andrew Jackson named Forty Five Fair Street LLC — a company managed by Belichick — alleging that unsafe construction practices created hazardous working conditions that led to his fall and resulting injuries.
What they’re saying:
“As a direct and proximate result of the fall, plaintiff sustained serious bodily injuries including a severe right ankle injury, together with pain, disability, medical expenses, lost wages, and other consequential damages,” the lawsuit stated.
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Dig deeper:
The filing states that Jackson received workers’ compensation benefits after the fall but “retains his rights to pursue this third-party negligence action against non-employer responsible parties.”
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It also alleges that Belichick’s company was responsible for ensuring the construction site was maintained in a safe working condition.
“Defendant breached its duties by, among other things: a. causing, permitting, or allowing unsafe conditions to exist at the premises; b. failing to maintain the work area in a reasonably safe condition; c. failing to inspect the premises adequately; d. failing to remedy hazardous conditions it knew or should have known about; e. failing to warn Plaintiff of dangerous conditions; and f. otherwise acting negligently in the ownership, operation, management, supervision, maintenance, and control of the premises.”
According to the Nantucket Current, which first reported the lawsuit, Jackson is seeking nearly $300,000 in damages.
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Fox News Digital has reached out to Belichick’s representatives for comment.
Belichick purchased the Nantucket property for $4.8 million in 2024, according to Boston.com.
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The Source: FOX News contributed to this report. This story was reported from Los Angeles.
