Dear Billy T and Somerville Speakup Line,

Tufts and developers are taking over Ball Square. Don’t be surprised if the bridge in Ball Square never opens. Just more sinister plans by the city handlers in order to drive out more local businesses and homeowners. They will never reveal themselves directly but look at Davis Square and Union Square as examples. The grant dependent entrepreneurial college students need more experimentation on how to become a failed business owner. Like we need more overpriced garbage. Just more of the same land grab we’ve seen throughout the city. If they don’t get it one way, they will get it another. Tufts has had a master plan to take over Ward 7, and looks like they added Ward 6 to their feeding ground. Where else are they going to house 5,000+ students? They won’t build a new dorm. Faculty and administrators will buy up the housing so they can live next to the campus part time or rent to students. A professor from BU bought a home in our neighborhood for $1.3 million and spent the past year renovating it starting from its frame. Colleges and corporate controlled parties are moving in and taking over. They will hide behind their buyers and LLC’s in order to keep it from public scrutiny. When they can’t unload all the shoddy condos to unsuspecting buyers, they will turn it into section 8 housing so the state can have their scraps. We know how the liberals enjoy living in diversified neighborhoods. This will not be sustainable— it’s only so the few can get rich off our real state. When they are done, they will feed off other cities and towns leaving taxpayers on the hook to pay for it just as they are doing in Somerville.

Judy Locchi Jacobs