By Linda Scott
Watertown Resident
A long-time resident and respected Watertown businessman wrote a response to my recent Watertown News letter on the proposed 4 or 5 story parking garage to replace the CVS open air parking lot. He wrote about Watertown Square not being a destination: “We don’t even have a post office anymore which I consider a must have convenience which attracts people to any City Center.“
Sorry. We have squandered our ability to have a post office in our city center, and for what? Here’s a bit of the history:
April 11, 2023
I refer you to an April 11, 2023 letter that I wrote concerning this topic to Watertown News, entitled “How will Main Street Project Impact Post Office, the Square & Affordable Housing?” In it, I ask the question: Where’s our post office going?
I’ll quote part of the answer:
“When asked, and they are asked quite frequently by residents, the developers just shrug their shoulders and say that they’re in negotiations. Not a very comforting response. A concerned resident has contacted Senator Markey’s office, and their response after looking into the matter is that it’s going nowhere, as far as they can find out. According to them, it will have different hours because of the construction, and people will have to be told about these hour changes.”
“O’Connor Capital Partners says one thing. Senator Markey’s office says another. How can plans be approved when a very big piece of the use of this building, which could change the design considerably, is not already settled upon?”
I wrote that three years ago, and apparently, the needs of the developer trumped our community’s need for a post office in Watertown Square … we’ll figure it out later, seemed to be the City’s sentiment. Well, now is later, and we have our City government to blame for the predicament that we’re in.
Here’s the link to the whole Watertown News letter:
October 16, 2023
The thought was we were sacrificing our post office for “affordable housing.” It was considered a noble goal at the time. So much so that Brett Buehrer, Senior VP of O’Connor Capital, the developer of this property, went before our Watertown Affordable Housing Trust to ask them to write a letter to the Post Office expressing the need for this building and the adjacent townhouses for housing.
He also mentioned that there were members of the community housing group (Housing for All Watertown (HAW)) writing letters of support as well … since “affordable housing was desperately needed,” said Brett in his most caring and concerned tone of voice.
Here’s a link to my Watertown News letter with the whole conversation that happened that night between Brett and the Trustees:
Or, you can opt to watch this conversation: http://vodwcatv.org/internetchannel/show/2814?site=3. Start at minute 22:00
The end result? The Watertown Affordable Housing Trust agreed to write the letter. I filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request with the Post Office on this matter.
There were many pages that were redacted, but the Trust’s letter is there. The FOIA documents show that the Post Office has an official letter from the Watertown Affordable Housing Trust dated November 7, 2023.
There is another interesting e-mail dated October 19, 2023. The sender is blacked out, but the recipient was Kurtis M. Bullard, Project Manager, real estate acquisitions for the Post Office. The message:
“Morning Guys … The mayor of Watertown is going to make [Blank] and I move down to Greensboro to harass you, Kurtis. Can we discuss today?”
That is the only mention of City of Watertown officials that I can find other than the Affordable Housing Trust.
My overall read of the documents seem to indicate that the Post Office wanted to move to a permanent location, not back and forth, which I don’t believe is unreasonable of them.
At any rate, score one developer; zero post office and community at large. As the Watertown Staff member from the Department of Community Development and Planning (DCDP), Larry Field, said at that October 16th meeting in order to convince the Trustees who weren’t sure about a letter:
“Well, I think the purpose of the letter, as I understand it, is to facilitate the process. The Post Office has to make its decision, and it is in the best interest of the City and the project for them to make its decision on a timely basis, you know, based on the facts, and if it works out for them, that’s great and that’s what we want. But you know, we don’t need to get into that. We need to get into encouraging them to be working on this.” We encouraged them alright … right out of our city center!
Carolyn Gritter, in her response to Charlie Breitrose’s May 14th article on the setbacks to getting our post office back: https://www.watertownmanews.com/2026/05/14/setback-in-effort-to-bring-post-office-back-to-watertown-square/#comment-77455 correctly relates all of the details of a meeting she had with George Proakis, our City Manager.
I was one of the other residents there, approaching Mr. Proakis with concerns about the potential loss of the post office. His response was tepid, at best. Please see her comment in full at the above link.
At that meeting, he asked if we’d be fine with a small post office, where you can simply mail things and buy stamps. (No passport services, etc.). He said that his community had that, and it seemed fine. I just looked up his community. They have a full service post office, so I don’t understand what he was talking about.
At that meeting, as I recall, George Proakis assured us that everything was under control. He said that when he wants something, he pursues it till it’s accomplished. He gave an example of another community that he worked for where he got an act of Congress to get what he wanted.
November 19, 2025
By the way, an update. Brett Buehrer is still a busy guy. On November 19, 2025 he went before the Watertown Zoning Board of Appeals with a “minor modification.”
One of the townhouses on Cross Street was presented in prior plans as an affordable condo. He was changing this now, according to him, because of market conditions.
He, of course, went first to the Watertown Affordable Housing Trust for their blessing. He got it again.
So, what was going to provide “a missing piece of the puzzle” (Chair Melissa SantucciRozzi’s words) in the Square, was about to be changed. A rare opportunity, home ownership of an affordable unit, has disappeared. See the link below for Brett’s conversation with the Zoning
Board of Appeals: http://vodwcatv.org/internetchannel/show/4227?seekto=153&site=3
We’ve been lead down a false path. Does anyone think that the current Federal administration will look kindly on our City’s request? If you do, I’d like to borrow some of your optimism, because I’m kind of short on that right now.
So, the giant building overshadowing our library is due to open soon. Most of the units (121 of 142) will be market rate, which will be far out of reach of most Watertown residents. The other 21 units are designated as being “affordable,” which in this case means many single potential renters
will be required to make no more than 80% of area median income, $96,000 a year. If it’s a couple, $109,700. Some singles and families will apply for apartments that require 65% of area median income. But no one will qualify with less money than this. See HUD table: https://www.huduser.gov/datasets/il/il2026/summary?year=2026&reporttype=hmfa&states=1&counties=0100199999&hmfa=METRO14460MM1120
The building was christened “Elysian” at the ground breaking. Elysian, meaning “a place or state of perfect happiness, peace and bliss. It’s synonymous with paradise, utopia or heaven.” (Merriam Webster)
You be the judge. Are we in heaven yet?