To the editor:

I’m offended to see the harsh treatment of community advocates in the recent opinion pieces “Methinks they doth protest too much” and “‘Keep Lynn affordable’ means keep it poor and underfunded.”

The authors seem to want to sow division by calling their neighbors ignorant about how development works or looking for reasons to complain. This is the kind of polarizing rhetoric that segregates our city in exactly the opposite way from what those of us advocating for affordability are calling for.

If there had been a public hearing about the $45 million tax break for the South Harbor development, you would have been able to hear that we weren’t asking the council to vote no on the development — just to postpone their vote until they could hear from their constituents and negotiate further with the developer.

As Councilor Nicole McClain explained in the City Council meeting, it’s not that we don’t want a nice waterfront park, restaurants, and Target — which is what most councilors were focused on as our community benefit. It’s that we want Lynners to be able to live there too.

Being inclusive means doing our best to make new development meet the needs of our poorest and our more affluent. To bring us together rather than drive us apart.

The average Lynn renter earns just $37,000 per year, well below the level of South Harbor’s affordability level. For the past three years I have been knocking on doors in Lynn and talking to people about the issues they are facing. Lynn renters are in crisis: apartments in disrepair, rent increases of $500 per month, evictions with no cause provided by the landlord.

When their apartment is too expensive or unsafe, where will they go?

So when you see me protesting the South Harbor Development, it’s not that I don’t want funding for our schools or nice parks. It’s that I am always thinking about how every decision we’re making as a city should be helping address such an acute crisis in our city.

If advocates hadn’t rallied, they might not have secured a last-minute change to the project that gives Lynn residents preference for the affordable units. With a little more time for negotiation, maybe we could have found other ways to help more people hurting in our city from the housing crisis.

I love Lynn, and I love living here. I don’t think of us as “poor and underfunded,” I think of us as a truly diverse community with people from all backgrounds and incomes. It’s up to us to make sure all the people in this wonderful community can thrive, not get pushed out. Hateful words in this paper’s opinion page may try to divide us, but I believe we can do better.

Eileen McGivney