Greater Lynn Senior Services (GLSS), the Saugus Housing Authority, and the Board of Directors of Indian Rock Supportive Housing will hold a ground-breaking ceremony for Sachem Manor, a supportive living complex designed for elderly residents on Wednesday, May 7, 2008, at 3 p.m. at the project site located at the corner of Denver and Talbot streets in Saugus. Funding for the project is being provided by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), the Community Economic Development Corporation, and the Massachusetts Department of Housing and Community Development.

In 2005, GLSS and the Saugus Housing Authority were awarded a $2,576,900 grant from HUD (Section 202) for the construction of housing for very low-income elders, age 62 and older. The 20, one-bedroom units of affordable housing will be built on Denver Street on a site generously donated by the Town of Saugus to the Housing Authority. The facility will be designed to allow residents to “age in place,” serving those still able to live independently as well as the very frail. In addition to funding construction, the HUD grant will subsidize rents for five years so that residents will pay only 30 percent of their adjusted incomes as rent. Sachem Manor will be co-owned by the Saugus Housing Authority and Indian Rock Supportive Housing, Inc., a non-profit group made up of local residents, with GLSS serving as the project’s sponsor.

The HUD grant was part of $643.6 million awarded nationwide by HUD in 2005 under the Section 202 program to assist very low-income elderly. The Saugus project was one of only four in Massachusetts selected for funding. To be eligible for assistance, a household must be classified as “very low-income” which means an income less than 50 percent of the area median. In Saugus, the very low income limit for a one-person household is $28,950.

“The fact that we are finally able to break ground on this project is a major accomplishment for the Town and great news for its elderly residents,” said Steven Whitehurst, Executive Director of the Saugus Housing Authority. “This type of housing is desperately needed in our community.” He noted that the Housing Authority’s Board of Commissioners has been working to develop affordable housing on the Denver Street property for a number of years. Whitehurst described the Housing Authority’s partnership with GLSS—the non-profit agency that provides a broad range of services to the elderly and disabled in Saugus, Lynn, Lynnfield, Nahant, and Swampscott—as a perfect match. “Sachem Manor uniquely fits our mission of providing services that allow seniors to living independently in community settings for as long as possible,” said Ron Airey, Executive Director of GLSS.

GLSS is the federally designated non-profit Area Agency on Aging and the Aging Services Access Point for the communities of Lynn, Lynnfield, Nahant, Saugus, and Swampscott. The organization provides a broad range of services—everything from homecare to transportation to home-delivered meals and more—to eligible residents age 60 and older and the disabled in those communities. The Saugus Housing Authority administers both federally- and state-funded housing programs for the elderly and families in that community.