For the last 18 years we have run a business right across from the Hope Street parking lot. We have watched the lot change uses and the neighborhood adapt. While our customers from all over the valley, and New England have had a difficult time navigating the loss of the Hope Street public parking lot, the struggle of our community to find housing in Greenfield has been even more challenging. This is why we support the sale of the Hope Street lot to be developed for mixed-use commercial and housing, and will be voting “No” on the ballot question on Nov. 4.

Believe us, that our business depends on our guests being able to get here and park reasonably close, but we have not had access to that parking space since 2020. Our guests and staff have learned over the last few years to use the mostly free parking garage, which is just behind us on Olive Street. (The app-based payment process and minimal signage is a big turnoff in the garage and needs to be addressed by the city! Could really use a few new accessible parking spaces while we are at it.)

That said, we know that we lose guests when people cannot easily gain access to our front door, and this is a significant issue for our business. In that time, however, the inconvenience of missing the Hope Street parking spaces remains and the lack of housing in our city continues to grow.

We know that Greenfield’s housing shortage is real. The city’s own housing plan says we need more than 3,000 affordable units across Franklin County. There are a few other downtown residential developments coming online in the next year, but that will only put a dent in the demand. Rents have shot up, the average one-bedroom apartments are now over $1,400, if you can find one. For a lot of our community, including our own staff, that’s out of reach. Keeping the Hope Street lot as parking doesn’t solve that problem. Allowing for the potential of building homes does.

We certainly care about the needs of our customers, and in turn, the livelihood of our staff, but we also care about our community — and about the long-term health of Greenfield. Allowing the Hope Street lot to be turned into housing will help all of us. That’s why we support housing, not parking, and will be voting “No” on the ballot question on Nov. 4 to rescind the City Council’s vote to surplus the land so the city can move forward into the future.

Jim and Maggie Zaccara live in Greenfield.