Suggested reading for Monday's Harvard Allston Task Force meeting

The Task Force meeting on Monday (6:30 @ the Allston-Brighton Career and Business Center, 367 Western Avenue) will focus on Community Benefits that Harvard will provide to our community. Here are a few different sources of background on the subject:

http://www.agassiz.org/images/mou1103.pdf (pages 8-9) - A 2003 Agreement between Harvard and Cambridge's Agassiz neighborhood. In exchange for construction of 252,000 sq ft of new science buildings, Harvard provided more then $2,5000,000 of benefits. The combined size of these three projects is less than 1/2 the size of the Western Ave Science Complex.

The 2003 "Letter of Commitment" between Cambridge and Harvard for the 300 units of graduate student housing being built near the former Mahoney's site in Cambridge's Riverside neighborhood. As benefits to the community, Harvard is building 34 units of affordable housing, and donating 3/4 of an acre to Cambridge to create a public park. Harvard is also spending $780,000 on design and landscaping to create this park and giving $50,000 to Riverside community organizations.

Harvard Magazine stories from July 2007 and September 2005 that include updates on these projects.