The non-profit agency looking to build an affordable housing development off Reed Street plans to appeal the Planning Board’s decision to reject the project.

While Community Housing of Maine is looking to try and keep the project alive, Roger Dolloff, who has lived on Reed Street since 1940, said the neighbors on Reed Street plan to keep fighting to stop the project from being built.

The Planning Board voted, 4-3, against the final site and subdivision plans for Clearwater Bend, a 23-unit affordable housing development. Cullen Ryan, executive director of Community Housing of Maine, said the board decided not to approve the project based on concerns over increased traffic in the neighborhood.

Planning Board members Luc Bergeron, Brian Beattie, Anna Wrobel and Rene Daniel voted against the project. Chairman Ed Reidman and members Chris Parr and Greg Blake voted in favor of the project.

The board’s decision to vote down the project came as a disappointment to Ryan, who said that Community Housing of Maine had worked on the project with the city for about two years. He said the city staff had given the project their endorsement.

“They thought this was an excellent proposal,” Ryan said.

City Planner Brooks More said that he was not aware of any endorsement given by any member of the city’s staff to the project, saying the staff does not make endorsements of projects put before the planning board. “We typically don’t endorse projects,” More said. “We try to remain neutral.”

Dolloff said the news that this project has been in the works for two years came as a surprise to the neighborhood. “We didn’t know anything about it until just a couple of months ago,” he said.

The proposed project would have consisted of five two-story buildings containing 20 townhouse-style rental units along with three handicap accessible units, with 60 percent of the available land left as open space. In addition to the housing, the development would also have parking for 45 cars and a community building with function rooms, laundry facilities and management offices. Ryan said the development was intended to be “workforce housing,” designed for working families earning between $21,000 and $43,000 a year.

In regard to traffic, Community Housing of Maine had a traffic engineer study the project. Ryan said that study concluded that the project would not have a major effect on traffic in the area.

Dolloff said he believed that the project would add up to 100 car trips per day on Reed Street as people who live at Clearwater Bend travel to and from work. “It would generate quite a bit of traffic,” he said. “It would be significant.”

Dolloff added that the traffic study performed on behalf of Community Housing of Maine was done in February, and it did not reflect the heavier summer traffic that travels on Route 302 in the summer. While Dolloff said the study did give an estimate for the increased summer traffic, he said he felt those projections were not as accurate as if the study were done in the summer.

In addition to concerns over increased traffic, Dolloff also said he had a problem with the location of the development. He said the parcel of land intended for Clearwater Bend is a landlocked parcel with no way to access Route 302 without going down Reed Street, which is presently a dead end street. Dolloff said the proposal called for the removal of a house at the end of Reed Street, so the street could be opened up for access to the new development.

“It doesn’t fit the land they want to put it on,” he said.

Besides greatly increasing the traffic on Reed Street, Dolloff said the neighborhood was concerned that the housing project would bring problems to the area such as increased crime and safety issues as well as lowering the property values for the neighborhood. “We worry about the value of our homes,” Dolloff said.

Ryan thinks that the project would not have a major effect on the surrounding area and the concerns voiced by the neighbors are more about the nature of the project. “We think it’s a total ‘not in my backyard’ issue,” he said.

Dolloff said while affordable housing is needed in the city, a project such as Clearwater bend is much better suited for a parcel of land that would allow for direct access in and out, rather than placing it on land that would force more traffic onto a residential street such as Reed Street.

“Most of us in the area agree that affordable housing is needed (in Westbrook),” Dolloff said. “But you have to have a decent place to put it. If they had a proper piece of land for it, fine. But this is just too invasive (for the Reed Street area).”

Ryan said that his agency was going to try and keep the project alive. “We have an obligation to the workforce in Westbrook. They need the housing,” he said.

Ryan said that if this project were blocked, other non-profits would shy away from building affordable housing in Westbrook because of the difficulties that Community Housing of Maine has had over Clearwater Bend.

“We’re not going to stop fighting,” Ryan said. “Because we think that they made a mistake. It was so apparent that it met all the requirements. We’re a small non-profit. We fight for the little guy all the time.”

More said that Community Housing of Maine has a couple of avenues that it can use to try and bring the project back. He said that at the next regular meeting of the Planning Board, they could ask for a reconisderation of the vote to reject the project. More said that one of the four members who originally voted to reject the project would have to make the motion for the vote to be reconisdered by the entire board.

Community Housing of Maine could also choose to file an appeal in court. More said that the organization would have 30 days to appeal the vote of the Planning Board.

While Community Housing of Maine is vowing to attempt to resurrect the project, Dolloff said that the Reed Street neighbors would continue to fight to stop the project. “From any way you look at it, it’s a bad situation for us,” he said.