UnitedHealthcare Provides $5.1M To Build Affordable-Housing Community In Boston's Jamaica Plain Neighborhood For People Struggling With Homelessness

UnitedHealthcare is investing $5.1 million to help finance and build Walnut Avenue Apartments, a new affordable-housing development project that will transform a vacant three-story commercial building into an apartment community with onsite supportive services for people struggling with homelessness. Walnut Avenue Apartments, located in Boston's Jamaica Plain neighborhood, will include 30 studio apartments, a 20-bed medical support facility and an array of onsite social services for residents, providing the means to help lift them out of homelessness. Transitional support includes counseling, assistance in daily-living skills, job-readiness training, home budgeting, case management and crisis intervention. UnitedHealthcare's investment is being made in partnership with Enterprise Community Investment, Inc. (Enterprise), a national leader in the affordable-housing and community-development industry, as part of an initiative by UnitedHealthcare to build affordable housing with supportive services that help people who need assistance live healthier lives. Since 2011, UnitedHealthcare has invested more than $175 million in affordable housing that qualify for federal Low Income Housing Tax Credits to develop new housing communities throughout the United States. UnitedHealthcare and Enterprise have worked together to invest $83 million of those resources in affordable-housing developments in six states, including Massachusetts. “Expanding access to affordable housing is important in breaking the cycle of homelessness and poverty, and helping people live healthier lives,” said Stephen Farrell, CEO, UnitedHealthcare of New England, a UnitedHealth Group UNH company. “Walnut Avenue Apartments will be a tremendous boost to Jamaica Plain, providing affordable housing and services to help people in need.” UnitedHealthcare employs nearly 1,000 people in Massachusetts and serves the health care needs of nearly 380,000 Massachusetts residents, including people enrolled in employer-sponsored and individual plans, Medicare and Medicaid beneficiaries, as well as military service members, military retirees and their families. Enterprise identifies investment opportunities in critical need of financial support and works with developers and other partners to help structure the financial backing needed for construction to begin. For more than 30 years, Enterprise has introduced solutions through public-private partnerships with financial institutions, governments, community organizations and other partners that share its vision that one day, every person will have an affordable home in a vibrant community, filled with promise and the opportunity for a good life. “Enterprise is proud of our partnership with UnitedHealthcare and grateful for its support of affordable-housing communities like Walnut Avenue Apartments,” said Charlie Werhane, president and CEO of Enterprise Community Investment. “At Enterprise, we are committed to ending housing insecurity within a generation, which means no more homelessness and no more families paying more than half of their income on housing. This new community brings us closer to that goal by creating opportunity for so many people and providing them with connections to health care, jobs, good schools and transportation.” Jamaica Plain Neighborhood Development Corp. is developing the property in collaboration with Boston Health Care for the Homeless Program (BHCHP) and the Pine Street Inn.