The Boston Globe - 13.09.2019

B6 The Boston Globe FRIDAY, SEPTEMBER 13, 2019

Business

By Janelle Nanos

GLOBE STAFF

C

AMBRIDGE — On

Monday afternoon,

Marc Najarian stood

by the door of his

store, acting like a

pallbearer at his

own funeral. “Hi. Ya

heard?” he asked his Fresh Pond

Market patrons before envelop-

ing them in his arms.

Every grocer knows his expi-

ration dates, and Marc Najarian

is no exception. So the septuage-

narian and his brother Crosby

were busy consoling longtime

customers as news spread that

their family-owned market in

the Huron Village neighborhood

of Cambridge would be closing

this weekend.

“Oh Marc, what am I going to

do, what am I going to do?” cus-

tomer Barbara Riley wailed,

tears brimming, as she em-

braced him by the checkout

counter. “Do you still have chick-

en? I’m coming in twice this week.”

For almost a century, Fresh Pond Market has

been more than a grocery store to this Cam-

bridge enclave. It has been a social hub serving

both the professors of Brattle Street and the blue-

collar workers who live on the North side of Hu-

ron Avenue. And while a great deal has changed

in the village — the average home price is cur-

rently $1.5 million — the store feels frozen in

time.

“Everything is always the same as it’s always

been,” Marc Najarian said as he wandered up one

of its four aisles.

Marc Najarian, 73, and Crosby Najarian, 68,

decided to sell the store while they were still in

good health, and plan to travel and spend time

with family. The duo listed it for $7 million and

say a deal is in the works to sell to the owners of

Formaggio Kitchen, the specialty food store that

has operated for 40 years up the street. Formag-

gio’s owners, Ihsan and Valerie Gurdal, were hes-

itant to say much until a sale is

finalized, but the couple has filed

paperwork to transfer owner-

ship of the store’s liquor license.

Valerie said she and Ihsan

live in the neighborhood and re-

alize the importance of continu-

ing to operate a market in the

space.

“We have to make it a mar-

ketplace that sells toilet paper

and detergent and a butcher

shop,” she said. “That’s what’s

there, and that’s what the neigh-

borhood wants.”

The 4,000-square-foot store

was built by the brothers’ Arme-

nianimmigrantgrandfather,

Nish Semonian, in 1922. His

daughter, Margaret, and son-in-

law, Leo Najarian, eventually

took over the business. (Many lo-

cals still refer to it as “Leo’s mar-

ket.”) Julia Child used to buy

meat from the butcher counter.

Yo-Yo Ma is a frequent shopper.

Musician Peter Wolf and actor

John Malkovich often wander in.

The store’s 10 employees greet their regu-

lar customers by name, carry groceries to their

cars, and make home deliveries if someone’s sick.

There are house accounts that have been open

for decades. The brothers keep dog biscuits by

the front door and hand out boxes of raisins to

kids. Marc keeps a stash of $2 bills in his wallet

to hand out to customers on their birthdays.

“It’s a regular family,” said John Lavigne, a

butcher who works alongside Crosby at the meat

counter.

Family is important to the brothers: The mar-

MARKET, Page B

PHOTOS BY CRAIG F. WALKER/GLOBE STAFF

Crosby Najarian moved his 1951 Chevy

pickup, a vehicle that’s emblamatic of the

soon-to-be-closed Fresh Pond Market.

Time to check out

Cambridgemarket,aneighborhoodiconfor

nearlyacentury,isclosingasownersretire

‘Mymotheralwayssaidtotreatthecustomers

likecompanycomingintoyourhouse.’

MARC NAJARIAN, being greeted by longtime customer Diana Garthwaite (below) after

word spread this week that family-owned Fresh Pond Market in Cambridge is closing

By Tim Logan
GLOBE STAFF
Long a place for the young, the
Brookline campus of Newbury Col-
lege will now become a place for the
old.
The now-closed college has sold its
10-acre campus on Fisher Hill, near
Route 9, to Welltower, a firm that in-
vests in senior housing and assisted-
living developments, for $34 million,
according to deeds filed in Norfolk
County. It’s one of the final steps in
the winding down of the liberal arts
college, which closed at the end of
classes this spring.
Newbury is the latest in a string of
small colleges to shutter in Greater
Boston amid mounting financial pres-
sures and declining enrollment. But,
like nearby Mount Ida College in
Newton, it was sitting on valuable real
estate. Tucked in a neighborhood of
million-dollar-plus homes near Cleve-
land Circle, Newbury’s campus
sparked interest from a wide range of

potential buyers, but also faced poten-

tial limitations on what could be built

there.

“It was very, very competitive,” said

Chris Sower, a senior vice president at

real estate firm Colliers, who brokered

the sale for Newbury. “At the end, it

came down to a couple of different po-

tential uses.”

The bidding was won by Welltow-

er, a publicly traded real estate invest-

ment firm that partners with develop-

ers of senior housing, rehab facilities,

and outpatient medical offices. Its

precise plans for the site were not im-

mediately known; Welltower did not

respond to messages seeking com-

NEWBURY, Page B

Newburycampussoldfor$34m,seniorhousingplanned

COLLIER’S INTERNATIONAL

The shaded area is an aerial view of Newbury College’s Brookline campus, which was sold this week to

senior housing developer Welltower. Welltower has offered to sell part of it — the lower shaded area west

of Fisher Avenue, which bisects the ten-acre campus — to the Town of Brookline.

By Andy Rosen

GLOBE STAFF

The Massachusetts Gaming Com-

mission on Thursday refused to recon-

sider its 2016 denial of a proposed ca-

sino in Brockton, leaving no project

with a clear path to approval for the

state’s final resort casino license.

Mass Gaming and Entertainment, a

venture backed by Chicago real estate

magnate Neil Bluhm, had sought to re-

introduce its plans for a $677 million

casino at the Brockton Fairgrounds in

light of the legal struggles of the Mash-

pee Wampanoag tribe, which has been

trying for years to build a $1 billion ca-

sino in Taunton.

But in a 3-1 vote, the commission

declined to review the plan for a sec-

ond time. Cathy Judd-Stein, the com-

mission chairwoman, said she had not

seen “sufficiently changed circum-

stances to warrant a motion for recon-

sideration at this time.”

She left the door open to a future

bid, however, perhaps as part of a wid-

er search to bring a full-fledged casino

to the region south of Boston.

Still, the decision came as a disap-

pointment for Brockton, which has

looked to the project as an economic

catalyst. Mass Gaming and Entertain-

ment had projected that the casino

would create 1,800 permanent jobs

and contribute millions annually to a

city sorely in need of tax revenue.

At the hearing, Brockton Mayor

Moises M. Rodrigues implored the

commission to give the casino plan an-

other look and said a rejection would

be “a severe miscarriage of justice

when it comes to providing the fourth-

largest city in Massachusetts with re-

sources and opportunities.”

“That’s all we’re asking for,” he add-

ed.

Representatives of Mass Gaming

and Entertainment told the commis-

sion that restarting the bidding could

mean years of delay.

“I don’t know how long you expect

CASINO,PageB

Brockton

casino

planstill

ano-go

Regulatorsdecline

todoasecondreview

By Priyanka Dayal McCluskey

GLOBE STAFF

Health insurance premiums for

hundreds of thousands of residents

buying coverage through the Massa-

chusetts Health Connector will rise 4

percent on average next year, officials

said Thursday.

The increases will vary across

plans, with some premiums dipping

slightly and others rising nearly 10

percent. Most people covered on the

state health insurance marketplace re-

ceive subsidies to offset those increas-

es.

Nine insurance companies are of-

fering 56 different plans to individuals

shopping for 2020 coverage, about the

same number of options available

now. For a 42-year-old individual in

Worcester who doesn’t receive any

subsidies, the average premium for a

midtier plan will rise to $473 per

month.

“Our product shelf is generally very

stable,” Louis Gutierrez, executive di-

rector of the Health Connector, said at

a public meeting Thursday. “Overall,

the changes in premiums reflect a

strong, established market.”

In 2019, premiums for Connector

plans increased an average of 4.7 per-

cent. This followed a disruptive period

when the Trump administration sud-

denly yanked federal payments that

CONNECTOR, Page B

Healthmarket

premiumsto

rise4%in

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CHESTO MEANS BUSINESS

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