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EASTON – A local developer will be bringing an innovative concept in affordable housing to downtown Denton.
Fello Communities is investing in a housing project designed to allow employees to live closer to their workplaces or seniors to age in place in the quaint town and seat of Caroline County.
Hillsboro resident Ross Benincasa has been Senior Vice President of Community Development since 2024 and works out of the non-profit organization’s newly remodeled offices on Brookletts Avenue in Easton. He is passionate about providing opportunities for Mid-Shore residents to live where they work.
Fello Communities is now able to offer a “large number of services, including housing” in a wider geographical area, Benincasa said. Fello Communities was originally part of the Arc Chesapeake Region, which began 65 years ago by a group of parents imagining a better life for their children with disabilities.
“Fello Communities is going to be celebrating 20 years next year, and it was really created with the goal of developing inclusive communities throughout the state of Maryland” and “with the intention of separating our housing from the services that we provide,” Benincasa said. In other words, Fello Communities is the real estate component of the organization that helps provide revenue for the services to people with disabilities provided by Fello Inc.
“Even though we're a separate company, it's still extremely important that we stay fairly integrated,” he said. “The whole reason that we develop these (housing) projects is for the people that we serve, for the people with disabilities – to not only be able to provide a better life for them, but also to eventually have additional revenue sources to support those services.”
“We already design for people that have varying disabilities in mind; we are also one of the first calls for people trying to age in place, people who may have accessibility challenges,” Benincasa said. “There's not many developers creating elevator buildings on the Mid-Shore. There's not many developers looking at hallway sizes and doorway sizes and turning radiuses inside bathrooms and the like, and so those are all things that we need to do for the people that we serve, but also it's extremely helpful if you're a couple who's retired, or even a single person who is just trying to age in place and wants to live near downtown (and) doesn't want to leave the town that they've grown so fond of.”
Unfortunately, many downtown homes “are these beautiful Victorians, whether it's Denton or Easton or Chestertown or wherever, that aren't really conducive to being able to stay. We found that consistently. We love the idea that we can provide housing for people that have varying accessibility, varying income challenges,” he said.
The first thing that Fello did was begin a conversation with community leaders and stakeholders, so everyone “is rowing in the same direction,” Benincasa said. “Like any good developer, we don't want to go into a community that doesn't want us there.” Fello Communities is looking to develop one or two smaller projects within Denton’s commercial district.
The first project is planned for Market Street and will be similar to the recently completed Laura House in Easton. At least 70% of the units will be available at market rate, while 30% will be deemed affordable housing. One unit will be available for a family transitioning out of homelessness who “can’t quite afford the median rent for the area,” he said. None of the units in this project will be available to those served by Fello Inc.
The Denton project will have “about seven to eight units, built to blend into the historic area, built to be the same height as the neighborhood buildings and the like – what we call a mansion-style apartment. It'll look like the homes around it, and just happens to have more units inside of it than a normal house would,” Benincasa said. At least half of the units will be built to ADA specifications.
“We are very happy to see this project come to Denton,” said Denton Town Administrator Scott Getchell. “It’s a great model for affordable housing.”
Benincasa praised Denton’s leadership. “To Denton's credit, Mayor McNinch and the council members that we've talked to, the staff that we've talked, … the planning commission members – they've all been generally supportive of this idea and generally supportive of building infill housing within Denton. It is something that's important for us,” he said. He hopes to start construction during the 2026 calendar year.
“We're not going to take farmland away and put a bunch of single-family homes up,” he said. “We almost always build within the commercial district of a town, and Denton is not unique in that way, and so that's really been our focus.”
“Building on existing infrastructure and also building communities, even at a small scale, that can give those people that work in a given town the opportunity to actually live there” is “so important to us,” Benincasa said. “I think it's just a much more holistic, better approach to economic development for the town.”
“We can put a dent in the problem and slow the problem down,” he said. “We're not gonna fix the problem with seven, eight units in Denton, but I think that if you (were to go) to the Market Street Pub, and you ask (co-owner) Brian (Tyler), does he want his servers to be able to afford to live three blocks away, or does he want them to live a 30, 40-minute drive away and risk them not being able to come in? Does Walmart want the people that work there to be able to live in town and support local businesses in town?”
As a 501(c)(3) organization, Fello Communities is able to accomplish what other developers either can’t, or won’t, do.
“Just to be very blunt about it: there's not a good reason why a for-profit developer would do what we do,” Benincasa said. “There's not a good reason why they would (set aside) 30% of the units to people that have affordability challenges. It’s our mission, and we're able to do it because we're a 501(c)(3), and because it's the core of why we exist. I think we need all types of housing right now, frankly, but just in terms of creating a stronger community, I think our model is unique, and I think it's proven to be successful.”
“There's a lot of data that shows that people are happier, stay longer and have a better quality of life in a mixed income, mixed ability community,” Benincasa said. “We really just call it inclusive living. It's not necessarily a new model. It was not that long ago, or was more common, for one street to have both high income, middle class and low-income people living on it. We have, unfortunately, over the past 30 or 40 years really segregated housing, at least based on income.”
Benincasa is enthusiastic about the philosophy and future of Fello Communities. “I love real estate development. That's what I've been in for some time now, and to be able to do it for an organization where everything's not run off the spreadsheet is rewarding,” he said. “It's very, very rewarding to hand off keys for the first time to people that may be in their 20s all the way up to their 50s or 60s, and have never actually a chance to live on their own.”
To learn more about Fello Communities and Fello Inc., visit Fellocommunities.org, or listen to the podcast “Fello. Thinking Differently.”
