The Longfellow Area Neighborhood Association (LANA) met for its regular bi-monthly meeting last Monday and discussed a somewhat controversial topic: the development at 1400 Centre St. (known during the development process as 100 Weld St.).

The project, originally proposed by developer Gary Martell and owned by Horizon Development LLC, was first brought to the community more than a decade ago, approved by the then Boston Redevelopment Agency (that became the Boston Planning and Development Agency, which then became the Boston Planning Department). BPD granted its permits in 2016, and it was completed by 2021.

Since then, the owners of the 29 condos have sued the owner and developer over what they called shoddy workmanship and unfulfilled promises concerning drainage, trash storage, structural integrity and more.

But also included in the original plan were promises for the owner to contribute and fund road and sidewalk improvements to the area around Harry’s All American Grill and Yucatan Tacos, which have not been forthcoming. This, despite the fact that at least some of the community support for the project originally hinged on the developer redoing the sidewalk upon which the project impinged at the corner of Centre and Weld.

LANA Board Member Julia O’Brien brought this issue up with Mayor’s Office of Neighborhood Services Roslindale Liaison Josh McCorkle towards the end of the meeting last Monday.

“Where is the developer responsibility follow-through for Centre and Weld?” she said referring to the project. “It was a controversial project in many ways, but nonetheless it has been built over the sidewalk, the city released its easements over the sidewalk, and the developer was committed to making sidewalk and intersection improvements, the developer posted a bond, and LANA has had two public meetings and sent two or three letters on this subject, and it has been a real dereliction of follow-through on the city’s part to make that developer live up to his promises, which included the sidewalk, some tree planting, some improvements around the building in terms of landscaping, and some improved pedestrian crossing and safety measures around those islands. I’ve been really disappointed in the city’s response to this.”

McCorkle said he would follow up with the city and try to find out.

“I’m definitely aware of the issues with that developer not doing what they said they were going to do,” he said. “At the back half of last year, it was my understanding that the city was going to take up the responsibilities of what the developer didn’t do, but I need to follow up and find out what the status of that is.”

O’Brien intimated that this might not be good enough.

“It’s really annoying that my taxpayer money is going into doing something that that developer should have done,” she said. “The city has continued to allow that developer to do other projects, and I find that at best disconcerting, and at worst, something worse than disconcerting. I hope we can follow through on that.”

McCorkle said he agreed. “It’s really frustrating to see how that developer has treated the neighborhood after that construction,” he said.

LANA Chair Kathleen McCabe lamented the fact that city left LANA to do the public process portion of several items within the development and Public Improvement Commission (PIC) process for the public realm improvements listed above with no movement.

“We have gotten nothing for it,” she said. “It’s a pretty sore issue, and it’s also not fair to the people who bought homes in that building… So anything you can do to move Boston Transportation, not just on Centre/Weld, but on Walter and Robert signals project, please do. It seems to have been vaporized and is not on the bidding and construction schedule, but it’s got to get on.”

McCorkle said he would follow up on that as well and pointed out that the Street Cabinet has a new interim Chief taking over from former Chief Jascha Franklin-Hodge.

“I will reach out and see what I can find out there and hopefully prop things along,” he said.

Also at the meeting, State Rep. Bill MacGregor’s representative Michael Giordano said the Department of Conservation and Recreation (DCR) has been working with Little Amigos Daycare to facilitate better traffic flow. DCR ran into some issues for its Centre/Walter intersection reconfiguration during the planning stage (if you haven’t notice, it’s being built right now) when the Trinity Lutheran Church and the Little Amigos Daycare it houses were basically cut off from northbound traffic, requiring anyone coming from the south – either from Centre or Walter – to go up Centre Street and pull a u-turn to access the property.

The light there only allows traffic into Sophia Snow Place, and while some talks were going back and forth to allow the church an easement, Sophia Snow stated that such an increase in traffic would create a danger for the seniors living at Sophia Snow.

“(DCR) is looking at one final potential model that might be able to get some more access to the church,” he said.