Patrick Moloney and Colm O’Shea have spent the last nine years deciding what to do with the old metal former sound stage building they bought in 2017 for a reported $900,000.

Their third proposal was filed with the Boston Planning Department on Aug. 3 for a five-story, 28-unit apartment building designed by Lucio Trabucco.

This seemed to have caught the Stonybrook Neighborhood Association (SNA) off guard; members expressed surprise at their Aug. 11 monthly meeting when someone casually mentioned the notification at the end of the meeting.

“They have to come back to SNA,” said Caliga. “It’s an extremely new proposal. Entirely new concept.”

But actually, it isn’t.

Jay Walsh, consultant for Moloney and O’Shea, gave almost the exact same presentation to the SNA on June 9, 2025.

“This is preliminary, no filing yet,” Walsh said.

“We will get back to you with our thoughts,” SNA member Alcurtis Clark responded.

The only changes are the building is five stories, and the affordable units have increased to five. Walsh explained to The Bulletin on Aug. 12 the apartments – mostly one bedrooms – were increased in size.

A Planning Department small project Article 80 public meeting is scheduled for Aug. 27.

If the past is prologue, the height will bother the SNA, but a public meeting breaks with SNA protocol. There is increasing frustration about this within the SNA, and it came out at a candidates forum with Rep Samantha Montano on Aug. 11.

“Developers are beginning to skirt the Article 80 process requiring community engagement,” Clark told Montano. “Very disturbing. We heard on July 2 that developers are not required to come to neighborhood associations.”

“Eighty-four Stonely. Nine units up to 28,” she said. Clark was referring to the first proposal in 2017 of nine units to be built in the existing metal building.

This was revised to 18 units in 2024 and 28 units in 2025; all of these plans were reviewed at SNA meetings, as reported by The Bulletin.

What seems to vex the SNA the most is that the Boston Planning Department did not do due process with them, to which SNA feels entitled. The Article 80 meetings are held publicly, but apparently the SNA wants its own meeting.

The SNA has requested that the comment period be extended beyond the posted date of Aug. 27 to Sept. 2, and that Moloney and O’Shea present at the Sept. 14 SNA meeting. The Planning Department has agreed to extend the comment period to Sept. 2.

Two days later on Aug. 13, the Planning Department posted a notice of an 84 Stonely Rd. Article 80 meeting for Aug. 27.

But then on Aug. 23 the city postponed the meeting until further notice.

The project notification form (PNF) goes to unusual lengths in the customary review of public meetings – which is usually just a calendar of dates – to explain their efforts.

“Community engagement has been a central component of planning 84 Stonely. We made sure to review community input for prior development proposals.”

“We made sure the project aligns with neighborhood priorities. Since 2023, the development team has actively reached out to stakeholders… numerous discussions with SNA… actively engaging with abutters and the MBTA.”

The PNF states that 84 Stonely relates to the proposed extension of Stedman Street in the development of 75 Stedman St.

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In November 2021 Moloney and O’Shea proposed a three-story, 120,000 -square-foot self-storage building at an SNA meeting; “we anticipate submitting the PNF before the end of the year.”

The five-story 84 Stonely will have frontage on both Stonely Road and Stedman Street with four residential units on he ground floor, six units on the second floor and 18 apartments on floors three-to-five.

No parking is provided because, as the notification states, the housing is near Forest Hills bus, subway and commuter rail stations.

The PNF states that the building sits on a rhombus-shaped site and fills out the property line. Trabucco’ s design is another long box of corrugated metal and clapboard broken up with alternating five-story bays with wide windows.

“The building is aligned with 76 Stonley in height, siding, fenestration and trim.”

Also designed by Trabucco for a different set of developers, 76 Stonley was the first building on the 2.5-acre light industrial lot dominated by a fuel depot and auto garages between Brookley Road and the Arborway bus yard.

Vociferously opposed by SNA when first proposed at a Doyle’s meeting in 2015, 76 Stonley was completed in 2019 with an SNA victory: the apartments were reduced from 31 to 28.

Since then two other residential buildings have been completed and occupied – 50 Stedman and Brookley Flats – bringing a total of 74 new units to that corner of Stonybrook.

According to the PNF, the total development cost is $8 million and is expected to be completed at the end of 2028.

O’Shea could be excused for the year-long delay in filing the PNF for 84 Stonley.

He has completed the restoration and enlargement of the circa 1841 Fowle-Davis house at 305 Chestnut Ave., one of the oldest houses in Jamaica Plain.

O’Shea bought the house in 2022 for just over $1 million.

O’Shea and MDJ architects carefully and meticulously restored the Greek Revival main house with a rooftop lantern and added a 40-foot complimentary-designed addition at the rear for four condominiums for total of six condominiums.

As the long-vacant house continued to deteriorate, O’Shea struggled unsuccessfully for over a year with neighborhood opposition and an apparently unfriendly Jamaica Plain Zoning Committee.

Three meetings with JP Zoning ended in three deferrals.

O’Shea took his proposal directly to the ZBA anyway and was approved on June 4, 2024. Work began in May 2025 and is now complete.