JUST AS QUICKLY AS YOU READ THIS…YOU ARE NOW INVOLVED THE GRADUATE PROGRAM IN DESIGN AND URBAN ECOLOGIES
IN THE CITY OUR RIGHT TO THE CITY
NEWCOMERS
SI O
s nt e re ris
RETURN DISPLACED PEOPLE
FLOW
D IV ER
DISPLACED PEOPLE NEWCOMERS
INSIDE
MONEY
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The History And Strategies
FRANK MORALES: MY LIFE AS A HOMESTEADER page 28
DEVELOPERS
DEVELOPERS
N
O
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MONEY FLOW OUT OF COMMUNITY
COMBATING DISPLACEMENT IN BUSHWICK, BROOKLYN CITYSTEADING
page 36
The people and community organizations of Bushwick are ‘planning to stay.’ Any strategy must adopt an integrated approach to consider community owned housing, cooperative wealth building, and participation in governance. Citysteading is the steady making of economic life as a city and community through the creation of shared assets and dialog.
BUSHWICK INCLUSIVE
page 40
If a more inclusive community of stakeholders have access to socially innovative tools, resources and networks, community projects will have a greater impact, leading to overall systematic change instead of just local interventions. In short, we want to create an innovative and sustainable social impact venture to build affordable housing alternatives.
ENGAGING LOTS
page 44
Through agreements with the owners of vacant lots, we can begin to build a space for our community to gather and pursue shared images of our neighborhoods. Other spaces are set up to divert the problems of displacement. The goal is to create permanent spaces of habitation both for displaced people and our neighbors at risk.
FROM URBAN HOMESTEADING TO A NEW ECOLOGY OF HOUSING This Gazette is part of a long term urban research and design project initiated by faculty and students from the Graduate Program in Design and Urban Ecologies at the New School. Our investigation begins with an overview of city-wide processes, the current housing condition, homelessness, structural vacancy, and the success and failure of federal and local urban homesteading programs. In today’s context of for-profit development, urban practices in the legacy of Homesteading are crucial to acheive the Right to Housing. However, they must be envisioned with complimentary urban processes leading to Citysteading, the path to fulfill the Right to the City, and therefore gain access to alternative models
of learning, working, housing provision and ownership. The project seeks to design alternative strategies for community based access to housing, renovation and infill of existing housing stock, structured around the provision of subsidies, loans, sweat equity subsities and developing expertise with residents able to renovate existing vacant buildings. In addition, it envisions platforms to recognize local knowledge, resources and skills that could be disseminated and exchanged to collectively generate a more sustainable and inclusive social and spatial development.
THE ECONOMICS OF HOUSING: PROGRAMS, THE ECONOMICS OF HOUSING: PROGRAMS &AND POLICIES POLICIES, INSIGHTS A HISTORY OF UPHEAVAL IN OUR URBAN LANDSCAPE
Urban policy,DIFFERENT profit-driven economics, racial prejudice and political power have reshaped the city over and OUR URBAN LANDSCAPE HOW INITIATIVES HAVE CHANGED over, often at the expense of residents and the marginalized. Listed below are some of the most influential urban initiatives: producing drastic impacts in the daily life of the city, and the bottom line of cities and the real estate industry. URBAN RENEWAL
shape a city. In the following article I will show how, through a political and economic lens, certain policies, programs and housing initiatives have transformed our environment. The goal is to show how different urban policies and practices in New York City have used the people and the places aspolicy, a means to transform city’s landscape. Originally a federal Redlining wasthe introduced by Home Owners Loan Corpo-
REDLINING
This national program was instituted under the Federal Housing Act in 1949, as a means to put new infrastructure in the cities. Although the program was also meant to stimulate housing development, more emphasis was given refers to big development not Beginning in the 1960s, this phenomenon to real-estateprojects agents that and did speculative prioritize housing, or at least not low-income developers working together to pressurehousing. white homeowners into selling their Consequences: saymarket that therates idea over behind urban renewal wasprejudiced to eliminatewas the slums in properties atSome below racial fears. Racial directly
BLOCKBUSTING
ration in 1937. Redlining classified different urban districts to indicate which areas offered investment opportunities and which were considered risky places for investment. Around theseimpacts ‘risky’on districts a ‘redline’ would drawn. The determinprovoked to convince white homeowners that their properties would loose value cause they have had drastic its settlement patterns. It isbeimportant to understand from communities to city-initiative development projects, displacing many citizens. ing factor in Redlining was race: redlines could be drawn around districts with as as existing minorities moved into the neighborhood. Real estate companies and building that these practices have always been driven by a power structure where dominant economic little as 5% people of color. In redlined areas, bank officials denied loans to landlords developers went as far as to use paid non-white agents to deceive white residents players have made the decisions. Though these are simple diagrams, meant to be guidelines and homeowners, making selling or renovating the property difficult or impossible, into believing that black people were “moving in,” thereby encouraging them to sell to help understand the different policies and programs, it is important to understand the comand effectively removing any chance for people of color to acquire home loans. their urban home (at a loss) and buy new properties in more racially homogeneous plexity behindsupermarkets, each drawing. First, they cannot be seen separated from a contextualized Healthcare, and even jobs could andaswere denied based on the desuburbs. The tactics included hiring black women to be seen pushing baby carriages and historical situation. it is important to understandinsures the implications of the differlineation. The practiceSecond, of neighborhood disinvestment the decline of whole in white neighborhoods, so encouraging white fear of devalued property; selling a ent urban policies the continued constructionfor and transformation of our neighborhoods. communities andinhas decades in various forms through informal house to a black family in a white neighborhood, etc. Blockbusting was a common mechanisms. and profitable form of racist exploitation that lead directly to the phenomena of it is crucial to understand how these policies continue to shape our city. “white flight” from urban centers. REAL-ESTATE AGENTS HOME OWNERS
SPECULATORS
BLOCKBUSTING that local area properties might lose value because of racial minorities moving in.
REDLINING
RACIALLY CHANGING NEIGHBORHOOD
different urban districts to indicate which areas offered opportunities and which areas where risky places for investment. The good places to invest where marked with a blue line in the map, while the risky places were marked with a red line. Usually these redlined places were The phrase “Spatial de-concentration” refers to a late 1960s federal program dispersZoning changes and tax abatements contribute to this contemporary phenomenon, neighborhoods with low-income and minority populations. It became illegal on 1968.
SPATIAL DECONCENTRATION
GENTRIFICATION
ing entire low-income communities in order to reduce the likelihood of “civil disorsometimes thought of as ‘green lining’, which refers to the rapid increase in property der.” The policy grew out of studies of “civil disorder” in urban communities of color withvalues andaround rents associated a red line them wouldwith havethe migration of “creative class” and affluent (usually conducted by the Kerner Commission in 1968, whose recommendations on housing a hard white) intoofpreviously timepopulations getting any type insurance working class urban neighborhoods. The result advocated a “theory of white middle class predominance” as a requirement of stable or loan. is theIt displacement and scattering paralyzed the housing market, of the original communities, often low-income communities. The practice linked to motives of social control through the dilution lowered the properties values andtransformation of the neighborhood. communities of color, and and dispersement of poor urban communities of color to areas where people of color incentivized abandonment from those areas. would not become a majority. CHANGING INCOME NEIGHBORHOOD
LOW INCOME NEIGHBORHOOD
CITY CENTER
MIDDLE INCOME NEIGHBORHOOD
DISPLACEMENT OF ORIGINAL POPULATION
POOR SUBURBS = LOW INCOME HOUSEHOLD = HIGHER INCOME HOUSEHOLD
= LOW INCOME HOUSEHOLD = MIDDLE INCOME HOUSEHOLD
CITY CENTER
Mitchell Lama Housing Project 1955 Community Economic Development (CED) POOR SUBURBS = LOW INCOME HOUSEHOLD
Jane vs Moses Urban Renewal Housing Act 1949
= HIGHER INCOME HOUSEHOLD
BlockBusting Blockbusting 1950- continues to happen Redlining 1934 1930 2
1940
1950
1960
D)
DISINVESTMENT
SHRINKAGE
certain areas, waiting for these areas to devalue on their own, making it easier and cheaper to proceed with redevelopment.
URBAN RENEWAL
Title One of the Housing Act of 1949 kick-started the modern “urban renewal” program that would reshape American cities. Although the program was meant to stimulate affordable housing, more emphasis was given to large public housing development projects that disrupted the social fabric of and displaced communities. The Act provided federal funding to municipalities to cover the cost of acquiring areas perceived to be “slums.” Those sites were then given to private developers to bulldoze and construct new housing. In the process, entire neighborhoods were destroyed, displacing thousands of residents (most of whom were poor people of color). Because of the ways in which it targeted the most disadvantaged sector of the American population, novelist James Baldwin famously dubbed Urban Renewal “Negro Removal” in the 1960s.
SPATIAL DE-CONCENTRATION
HOPE VI
ing sites built during urban renewal. Hope VI began in 1992 to eradicate and transform the nation’s severely distressed public housing by tearing apart the subsidized complexes and replacing them with “mixed-income” development. The program sought to reverse the “spiral of decline” by providing more integrated structures with neighborhoods recover from their the capacity to would bring new services, facilities and job opportunities. Like the Urban problems. Renewal programs which created the public housing, demolition, displacement and relocation are at the center of Hope VI. But unlike Urban Renewal, Hope VI encourages and embraces displacement of low-income peoples from the area as a desirable outcome. Moving to “neighborhoods of opportunity” is one of the benefits of the program. However, there has been criticism of the program for not requiring a “one for one” replacement of destroyed homes. It has built fewer units than it has torn down, and those who used to live in the complexes can find difficulties returning to the rehabilitated site, or establishing themselves in ‘better’ neighborhoods.
HOPE VI
Dilution of the urban poor minorities toward the suburbs.
1992, also known as Urban Revitalization Demonstration. It started as a program to eradicate and transform the nation’s severely distressed public housing by tearing apart the subsidized complexes and replacing them with mixed-income development. Hope VI is a program that comes out of the idea of defensible spaces (Oscar Newman) and New Urbanism. Defensible spaces states that an area is safer when people feel a sense of ownership, which are thought to be strengthened by the theories of New Urbanism: walkable neighborhoods and shorter
DISINVESTMENT This informal policy refers to both public and private development and maintenance projects being deferred in areas slated for development or ‘renewal’, waiting for these areas to devalue on their own, making it easier and cheaper to proceed with redevelopment.
MOVING TO OPPORTUNITY (MTO)
A social experiment from the department of Housing and Urban Development that started in 1994. Low-income families living in public housing in high-crime and poverty neighborhoods were selected randomly to be assigned to one of the three program options: AREA DEVALUES
CHEAPER TO PROCEED WITH RE-DEVELOPMENT
PUBLIC AND PRIVATE PROJECTS DEFERRED
ing and troubled neighborhoods. In 1970, Roger Starr proposed that these neighborhoods should not receive more funding and instead to use those resources to invest in This program responds the concentration of poverty in large public housthoseongoing neighborhoods that “could betosaved”.
buildings. Criticism: Hope VI has built fewer units of public housing than it has torn down, not having enough housing and displacing many MTO a Housing and in Urban Development social experiment in 1994 using of the began familiesasthat already lived the torn residents of public housing. Low-income families living in public housing in highdown complexes.
MOVING TO OPPORTUNITY (MTO)
crime and poverty neighborhoods were selected randomly to be assigned to one of the three program options:
1. The Experimental group was given special assistance regarding rent subsidy vouchers that could only be used in low poverty areas (poverty rate below 10%, as could only be used in low-poverty areas (poverty rate below 10%, as measured by 1990 US - measured by 1990 US Census). This group also received counseling regarding the rent vouchers and possible neighborhoods to move to. borhoods to move to. 2. The Comparison group was given vouchers that could only be used in Section 8 housing and did not receive counseling. 3. The Control group did not receive any vouchers or assistance.
and did not receive counseling
PLANNED SHRINKAGE 10 years
15 years
20 years
By the 1970s, damage to urban centers was severe enough to justify the reduction of essential services in ‘troubled’ neighborhoods, usually low-income people of color. In 1970, Roger Starr proposed that ‘declining’ neighborhoods, should not receive more funding and instead to use those resources to invest in those neighborhoods that “could be saved”. The intent being that when services such as police, fire departments, etc., were withdrawn, people would migrate to areas with services.
GENTRIFICATION neighborhood.
No Help EXPERIMENTAL GROUP SPECIAL ASSISTANCE rent subsity vouchers and possible neighborhoods to move into.
Help COMPARISION GROUP given vouchers that could only be used in section 8 housing and no counciling
CONTROL GROUP no vouchers no assistance
Bloomberg’s Housing Plan Moving To Work 1994 Hope VI 1992 Tenant Interim Lease (TIL) Planned Shrinkage 1970 Spatial De-concentration Kenner Commission Report 1968 Term “Gentrification” Coined 1964
1970
1980
1990
2000
2010 3
HOUSING TAX POLICY IN THE UNITED STATES Tax subsidies are, in fact, far larger than direct expenditures for housing. The federal government subsidizes housing not only through direct funding but through tax expenditures: deductions and credits connected to housing-related expenditures and investments. In 2004, the federal government spent $30 billion on direct subsidies (public housing, rental voucher, etc.) and nearly $120 billion in tax breaks to homeowners and investors in rental housing and mortgage revenue bonds.Of the $119.4 billion in federal tax expenditures in 2004, 88% ($105.2 billion) went to homeowners. By far, the largest tax break is the deductibility of mortgage interest payments from taxable income. Speculative investors in housing received $14.2 billion (1/8 of the homeowner total). These tax expenditures also include the Low Income Housing Tax Credit; the single most important funding source for development of low income rental housing.
from tax advantages of homeowners. If the tax code were to give more assistance to them, the current set of deduction could be changed to tax credits. In fact, low and moderate income tax payers take the standard deduction on their federal income taxes and therefore receive no tax benefit from mortgage and property tax payments.
Although Canada, Australia and some European countries have similar homeownership rates, they offer far less generous tax breaks.
LOW-INCOME HOUSING TAX CREDIT
WHAT BENEFITS FOR HOUSEHOLDS? The most controversial issue concerning this program is that relatively few low and moderate income households benefit
TAX INCENTIVES FOR INVESTORS Investor tax incentives account for only 12% of the total, and yet are essential for the development of low income housing. Although they can rightly be criticized as inefficient, since only a portion of the funds go to bricks and mortar, nevertheless, they do bring private investments into low income housing. Tax incentives can become more efficient over time as in the case with the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit.
Through 2003, the tax credit has helped fund the development of more than 1.2 million housing units, or 28% of all multifamily units built during this period, and it now accommodates more households than public housing, a program that started 50 years earlier.
WHAT BENEFITS FOR INVESTORS? The LIHTC allows investors to reduce their federal income taxes by $1 dollar for every dollar of tax credit received. Investors receive the credit for 10 years while the property must remain occupied by low-income households for at least 15 years. The amount of the credit depends on cost, location and the proportions of the units occupied by low-income households.
WHAT DEVELOPMENTS ARE ELIGIBLE? Unlike other tax breaks associated with real estate, the LIHTC is not awarded automatically. Tax credits are assigned
to individual housing developments by designated state agencies (usually state housing finance agencies, or HFAs). Rental housing developments are eligible for the tax credit if at least 20% of their units are affordable earning up to 50% of the metropolitan area’s median family income or if at least 40% of the units are affordable to households earning 60% of the median. Although federal statute requires state housing agencies to allocate at least 10% of all tax credits to nonprofit housing developers, nonprofit groups account for more than twice this amount: 22% of all tax-credit developments and units placed in service through 2011.
DOES IT GENERATE SEGREGATION? Tax credit housing is more likely to be located in minority and low-income neighborhoods than in other rental housing. This issue has opened the program to criticism that it perpetuates “existing condition of racial and economic segregation.” Still it is less concentrated in these neighborhoods than is public housing and other housing with project based federal subsidies.
The Low-Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC), established by the Tax Reform Act of 1986, is the single largest active subsidy for low-income rental housing. It is not a federal housing program but an item in the Internal Revenue Code.
. LIMITATIONS AND CRITICS
. 4
.
1. Unlike public housing and Section 8, tax credit does not provide deep subsidies that adjust automatically with changes in tenant income. In fact, the percentage of income that tenants spend on housing may increase if their incomes decline and they may start out spending more than 30% of their income on rent. Extremely low-income families can seldom afford tax credit housing unless they also receive federal housing vouchers. 2. The program offers minimal incentive for building mixed-income housing. Because the amount of tax credit available is directly proportional to the percentage of low-income units, the vast majority of projects are 100% of low-income.3. It does not provide for the long term sustainability of the housing it helped financing. Some tax credit housing is at risk of converting to market-rate rents after the expiration of the initial 15 years affordability period. Perhaps more importantly, there is a big
lack of funds to replace major building systems. For overcome this issue, state and local government are providing additional resource including new tax credits to help pay for the capital improvement. 4. Limited supply of tax credits: there are many more applications for tax credit than credits to allocate.
STRENGTHS The tax credit is a very flexible form of subsidy. State housing finance agencies have considerable latitude in deciding the types of housing that should receive tax credit and giving preferences to what they think is a priority. It is often used in conjunction with the federal HOPE VI program for revitalization of distressed public housing.
PUBLIC HOUSING IN THE UNITED STATES Public housing originated in 1937 during the New Deal, and is the oldest and most widely known form of subsidized low-income housing in the United States. About half of the nation’s Public Housing Authorities (PHA) oversee fewer than 100 units; almost 90% of all PHAs are responsible for 500 or fewer units. The New York City Housing Authority, whose portfolio of 180,000 units accounts for 12% of the nation’s public housing stock, is widely considered among the nation’s best. In the past quarter century, far more resources have gone to the preservation and redevelopment of public housing than to the expansion of the program. Only 5% of the current public housing stock was built after 1985, and most of that replaced older public housing buildings that had been torn down. On the other hand, 57% of all public housing units are more than 30 years old, and 38% are 15 to 30 years old. Since the beginning, the program has targeted low-income families. However, over time, the public housing population has become increasingly impoverished. Originally, public housing managers imposed strict criteria in selecting tenants. The post war period saw less of the “submerged middle class” remain in Public Housing since low cost homeownership, made possible by FHA mortgage insurance, enabled working class families to move to new suburban developments. As a result, the median income of public housing residents fell from 57% of the national median in 1950 to 41% in 1969, 29% in 1970, and less than 20% by the mid-1990s. In 1998, Congress sought to reduce the concentration of poverty in public housing through a public housing reform act (Quality Housing and Work Responsibility Act of 1998). It mandated that no more than 40% of the households admitted into public housing can have incomes below 30% of the area’s median family income.
BUILDING TYPES Although many people associate public housing with high-rise buildings, most of them consists of other building types: high rise elevator buildings account for 30% of the total public housing stock
and they are mainly located in the largest cities. Low-rise townhouse and row houses comprise an additional 25%. However, the design of public housing seldom blends in with the surrounding community, regardless of building type.
RESIDENTS: INCOME AND RACIAL COMPOSITION The most common source of income for public housing residents consists of social security disability or retirement benefits and pension payments. This reflects the large proportion of elderly and disabled residents. One third of public housing households are elderly, 38% of whom are disabled. An additional 19% of public housing households are headed by disabled adults under age 62. Wages and salaries constitute the second largest source of income received by 31% of all public housing households. A far smaller segment of public housing tenants, 16%, receive some form of welfare. Although many public housing residents work, the extremely low income of public housing residents suggests that they earn very low wages and/or work for a limited number of hours. In terms of the total population living in public housing, 42% are under 18, including 15% under age 6; 14% of all residents are 62 or older. With respect to ethnicity, Whites make up half of the public housing population, followed by African Americans with 46%. Hispanics, Asian Americans, and other races, make up 20%.
EFFECTS OF LOCAL POWER ON RACIAL AND INCOME SEGREGATION The original Public Housing legislation is partly responsible for the location of public housing developments and therefore the tendency to be situated in low-income, often minority neighborhoods. By relaying on PHAs to build public housing, the federal government gave local government the right to decide whether to build any public housing at all. Moreover, affluent suburbs and other municipalities had no obligation even to establish a public housing authority. As a result, public housing could be located only in jurisdictions that chose to participate in the program, virtually guaranteeing that public housing would
be concentrated in central cities and working-class suburbs: absent from most affluent areas. Indeed, 61% of all public housing units are located in central cities, compared to 45% of all rental housing. Localities that decided to participate in the program also had almost complete control over where public housing would be situated within their jurisdiction. This virtually guaranteed that public housing would be subjected to racial segregation. White neighborhoods typically opposed the development of any public housing in their midst. If such housing had to be built, it would be reserved for low-income Whites. On the other hand, elected officials from black communities were often more interested in having public housing built in their neighborhood than having it developed on a more integrated basis. More than half of all public housing units are in census tracts with poverty rates of 30% or higher, compared to less than 20% of other federally subsidized units and less than 13% of all rental housing. Public housing renters are two to three times more likely than other renters to live in predominantly minority neighborhood. Half of all public housing is located in tracts where minority neighborhoods comprise at least 50% of the population, including 38% in tracts that are 80% minority or higher.
PHYSICAL CHARACTERISTICS The poor design and physical condition of public housing is partly, but not completely, due to the severe financial limitations imposed by the original legislation (1937) on the amount of money that can be spent on construction. Furthermore, by linking public housing with urban renewal, the legislation imposed additional costs that made even fewer funds available for new buildings. The original legislation also shaped the drab aesthetic of public housing so that it would not compete with the rest of the private real estate industry.
MANAGEMENT ISSUES Other major problems derive from the choices, practices, and attitudes of public housing administrators and government officials. Public housing in some cities has been treated as a source of patronage, with hiring decisions based on personal and political connections. This is reflected in lax tenant selection procedures, failure to respond to tenants complaints, failure to repair and maintain appliances and building systems, and failure to develop and implement long term plans to replace building systems as they approach the end of their useful life. A key impediment to the effective management of public housing is the centralized operations and financing of public housing authorities. Unlike other subsidized housing and market rate rental housing, PHAs report expenditures and revenue on a system-wide basis and assign limited authority and responsibility to on-site management personnel. Public housing was originally structured so the federal government paid the costs
of building the projects and tenants paid for the costs of operating them. Local housing authorities issued bonds to finance the costs of project development and Washington paid principal and interest. Maintenance and other operating costs were covered by rental income. The system worked reasonably well into the 1960s. Eventually, operating costs increased faster than tenant incomes. At first, rents were increased regardless of the tenants’ ability to pay but also many PHAs deferred basic repairs and maintenance. In the late 1960s and early 1970s Congress responded to the problem with a series of amendments to the Public Housing Act that capped rental payments at 25% of income (later raised to 30%) by instituting a new operating cost subsidy to supplement tenants rents.
PERCEPTIONS OF PUBLIC HOUSING Despite these problems, most public housing is in decent condition and provides satisfactory homes for residents. Established by Congress in 1989, the National Commission on Severely Distressed Public Housing estimated that 6% of the nation’s public housing was severely distressed, accounting for 86,000 units. A survey of public housing residents conducted for HUD in 1999 found that two thirds of the respondents were satisfied or very satisfied with their apartments and the development as a whole. Less than 10% were very unsatisfied. The survey certainly showed room for improvement, with 21% expressing dissatisfaction with their homes. Nevertheless, the results do seem to defy the popular image of public housing as an unmitigated disaster. Hence, “Public housing is unpopular with everybody except those who live in it and those who are waiting to get in it” (Stegman 1990)
MAIN STRENGTH: PUBLIC OWNERSHIP Public housing has proven to be the most durable of the nation’s low-income housing programs. The secret to its longevity is its public ownership. Unlike virtually all other types of subsidized housing, public housing guarantees perpetual low-income occupancy. The central threat to its long-term viability consists of poor management and security and inadequate funding to replace building systems and to provide adequate maintenance.
5
HOPE VI AND THE TRANSFORMATION OF DISTRESSED PUBLIC HOUSING Hundreds of public housing projects across the nation have been transformed since the 1990s into housing developments that defy popular conceptions of public housing. Distressed public housing is being replaced by smaller scale, often mixed-income housing, built to a design standard inspired by ‘new urbanism.’ Most redevelopment projects have been funded through the HOPE VI program for severely distress housing. From 1993 through 2004, HOPE VI has funded the demolition of more than 150,000 units of distressed public housing and has invested more than $5.5 billion in the redevelopment of 224 public housing projects. The National Commission on severely Distressed Public Housing has defined distressed public housing using four criteria: 1. Families living in distress (low levels of educational attainment, high unemployment rates, low household incomes) 2. High rate of serious crime within the public housing development or the surrounding neighborhood 3. Barriers to managing the environment (high vacancy rates, high turnover rates, low rent collection and high rate of units rejected by applicants) 4. Physical deterioration of buildings
A NEW APPROACH HOPE VI design targets seek: To overcome the physical isolation of many public housing developments by blending in with the physical fabric of the surrounding community.
To minimize public spaces, over which residents are less likely to exert control, and give them instead private and semiprivate spaces. Higher costs per unit than what has been allowed for public housing in the past for improving construction and design quality. The program has also engendered changes in the management of public housing, introducing a more decentralized approach: most sites are managed independently.
LIMITATIONS AND CRITICS However, we notice that the program does not necessarily improve the lives of all the residents of the original public housing. First, by replacing large public housing developments with smaller scale, mixed-income projects, HOPE VI developments typically have fewer public housing units than the projects they supplant. On average, only 39% of the original units will be replaced by units targeting households with incomes up to 30% of the area median income, and this percentage range from 9 to 102% (Center for Community Change & ENPHRONT 2003). A second and related criticism of HOPE VI concerns the fate of public housing residents who do not get to live in the new housing developed under the program. Residents of public housing slated for demolition or re-development under HOPE VI have four options: Pass the screening test for the limited number of public housing units in the new development; Use a housing choice (Section 8) rental voucher to find a home in the private market; Move to a vacant unit, if available, in different public housing development; Leave assisted living altogether. Not all residents of public housing projects redeveloped under
HOPE VI are eligible to reside in the new housing that replaced the old. Local housing authorities and site managers have the latitude to devise and enforce stricter tenant eligibility criteria than is typical for public housing as a whole. HOPE VI developments may exclude families with poor credit histories, with criminal records, or that do not demonstrate acceptable house-keeping skills. In Chicago, prospective tenants for new public housing must also be working at least 30 hours a week or enrolled in school full time.
PRIVATELY OWNED RENTAL HOUSING BUILT WITH FEDERAL SUBSIDIES From 1960 to 1980, the federal government financed the development of more than 1 million low and moderate income rental housing units owned by private entities. As a means of stimulating the economy, these subsidies were intended for families with income too high to qualify for public housing but not high enough to secure standard housing in the private market.
MORTGAGE SUBSIDY PROGRAMS Since the 1960s, three main programs subsidize the interest on a project’s mortgage have been established: Section 221(d)3 in 1961, Section 236 in 1968, and Section 515 (for rural rental housing) in 1962. All three programs ran into serious trouble in the inflationary 1970s. Driven by rapidly escalating oil prices, operating costs rose far faster than tenant incomes. Many projects went into default, unable to cover their debt service obligations after meeting their operating costs.
DIRECT RENTAL SUBSIDY PROGRAMS
Eventually, unlike public housing, federal subsidies for all these programs extend for only a finite period of time: allowing the housing may be converted to market-rate occupancy.
VOUCHERS Vouchers are the largest housing subsidy program for low-income Americans. Vouchers enable low-income households to obtain housing that already exists in the private market. Compared to project-based subsidies, vouchers are less expensive and provide access to a wider range of neighborhoods and housing. However, the households must find an apartment that does not exceed the program’s standards for physical adequacy, and whose owner is willing to participate in the program. The Housing Act of 1974 established the first national voucher program, originally known as the Section 8 Existing Housing Program. As first designed, it provided rental certificates to households with incomes up to 80% of the area median income. The certificates covered the difference between 25% of family income (later increased to 30%) and Fair Market rent (FMR). The quality Housing and Work responsibility Act of 1998 merged the certificate and voucher programs into a single program, renamed the Housing Choice Voucher program (HCV) that mandates that extremely low-income households (earning less than 30% of area’s median family income) must receive at least 75% of all vouchers issued annually. By 2004, vouchers assisted more than 1.8 million households, more than any other federal housing program (40% of all HUDassisted).
STRENGTHS AND LIMITATIONS
In 1974, Congress established the Section 8 Loan Management Set-Aside program (LMSA) to improve cash flow and also relieve the excessive rent burdens. The program, destined for properties funded through mortgage subsidy programs, covered the difference between 25% of tenant income (later increased to 30%) and the rent. A very similar program for new developments was also established by Congress in 1937: the Section 8 New Construction and Substantial Rehabilitation.
It is clear that vouchers provide a greater degree of residential choice than project-based subsidy programs, enabling recipients to live an a wider array of neighborhoods. Compared to public housing, a much smaller percentage of voucher holders live in economically distressed neighborhoods. For example, while more than half of the nation’s public housing units are in census tracts with a poverty rate of 30% or more, this is true of just 15% of all voucher holders and 13% of all rental units.
STRENGTHS AND LIMITATIONS
Moreover, vouchers are far less expensive per unit compared to project-based subsidy programs. The General Accounting Office estimates that public housing redeveloped under HOPE VI program will cost 27% more than vouchers over their 30-year life cycle and housing financed with LIHTC cost 15% more. In 2004, rental voucher accounted for 54% of HUD’s budget.
The Section 8 program, designed to avoid the limitations of capital subsidies that we have described, guaranteed a combination of the deep rent subsidies and generous tax advantages. This made the Section 8 program very attractive. 6
When Reagan administration terminated it in 1983, the program had subsidized more than 850,000 new or rehabilitated housing units. Section 8 NC/SR was an expensive program. Development and operating costs were often high. Developers have scant incentive to control costs as long as fair market rents would cover debt service and operating costs and leave a margin for profit.
BLOOMBERG’S NEW HOUSING MARKETPLACE PLAN THREE AIMS FOR A MORE AFFORDABLE, VIABLE AND SUSTAINABLE CITY
PROBLEMATIZING THE NEW HOUSING MARKET-PLACE PLAN
Bloomberg’s administration had the goal to build a total of 165,000 affordable units by 2014. The plan was divided in three categories:
Bloomberg’s New Housing Marketplace Plan
1. Strengthen neighborhoods: Improving the conditions of the neighborhoods by physically improving and financially aiding distressed properties to create stabilized communities.
X
One-third units for the upper income limit
X
X
Half units unaffordable for many community districts Housing affordabiltiy for short term
X X
X
X X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X X
X
Goal:165,000 affordable housing units through new construction and preservation
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
X
PHYSICAL AND FINANCIAL AID
X X
RISK
X
2. Expand the supply of affordable and sustainable housing: Providing 165,000 affordable housing units, 36 percent new construction and 65 percent for preservation.
City will lose per year 11,000 units built with city subsidies starting in 2017 City will lose most of the affordable units built under the NHMP
Displacement of vulnerable households Risk of homelessness City will overpay to keep owners from eviction PERMANENT AFFORDABILITY IS NEEDED
60,000
NEW
105,000
PRESERVE RENT LOCKED
3. Stabilize families: Keeping people in their homes. Using an educational strategy the city advise, assist and educate the population living in areas threaten by foreclosure. It would also help vulnerable families such as those at risk of homelessness and those already in the shelter system.
KEEP PEOPLE IN THEIR HOMES educational strategy + council/assist/and educate The New Marketplace Plan wasthe launched in 2003, and completed neartheHousing population against threat of forclosure
ly 160,000 units of affordable housing by the end of 2013 (as of October 2013), according to the latest report from the New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development. Under the plan Manhattan had 51,168 units built or preserved, the Bronx had 49,426, Brooklyn had 37, 643, Queens had 16,530, and Staten Island had 2,463. The question is what is affordable housing and who benefits from affordable housing?
According to a recent report developed by the Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development, the units developed as part of the Bloomberg’s New Housing Marketplace Plan (NHMP) do not always meet the actual affordability needs of the neighborhood in which they were built. Approximately one-third of the units constructed or preserved have an upper income limit above the median income of the city. In half on the community districts, most of the affordable housing units provided are too expensive for households earning the local median income of the neighborhood. The parameters used for the provision and distribution of affordable housing do not always benefit households most in need. The Average Median Income (AMI), a statistical measure calculated annually by the Housing Preservation and Development, is used for housing eligibility for the New York metropolitan area. AMI is calculated taking into account the city and surrounding suburbs. The five boroughs plus Putnam County are included in the equation creating an AMI of $85, 900 for a family of four in 2013. According to the report, approximately 83% of the units developed under the NHMP targeted families making below 80% of AMI ($68,720). However, the plan primarily served households at the upper end of this spectrum. Out of this number almost half of the units targeted households earning between 60 and 80% of AMI ($51,540 $68,720) while the rest of the units (34%) targeted households earning below 60% of AMI (the latest were developed using Low Income Housing Tax Credits). In many community districts in the outer boroughs only the better off can benefit from the NHMP. For instance, the median household income in Brooklyn in 2011 was $43,592 (below 60% of AMI) and over 25% of its households earned below $18,689 the same year. Nevertheless, units targeting households earning less than 30% of AMI have been provided in just a few community districts. Moreover, housing policy, including some of the instruments used to implement the NHMP, has not managed to provide long-term affordability. According to the report the City will be at risk of losing an average of 11,000 units built with city subsidies per year starting in 2017. In addition, new yorkers could lose the affordability of as many units as were built by NHMP by 2037! Most of the affordable units built as part of the NHMP are only affordable for a short-term, approximately 30 years. This means that future generations will not be able to benefit from the program and public subsidies. The expiration of affordability restrictions will put households at risk of displacement and homelessness. For more information about Bloomberg Affordable Housing Legacy go to http://www.anhd.org 7
REAL ESTATE SPECULATION, GENTRIFICATION AND DISPLACEMENT
8
PRICES SKYROCKET, NEIGHBORHOODS TRANSFORM As ‘gentrifying classes’ seek affordable rents in a low income neighborhood, real estate interests sell the narrative of a positive transition, landlords dramatically increase rents, speculative developers build homes for higher incomes, and the original working class community is displaced: low income individuals are scattered to other parts of the city and beyond, and whole communities are dissolved. In New York City, gentrification often follows subway lines out from Manhattan, but the process can begin long before the first gentrifiers arrive. Speculators in areas further down train lines target cheep vacant land and abandoned buildings in the hopes that a neighborhood will gentrify. These predictions are often self-fulfilling.
Some gentrification centers around the conversion of abandoned spaces into lofts. Loft living had its beginnings among artists who were in need of an affordable space for both working and living. Space in the inner city warehouses, where manufacturing was in decline, became an ideal setting because of its established mixed use and large open spaces. This kind of spacious loft living became popular among the middle class, and a battleground for gentrification. Then market forces got involved attracting only residential tenants while rejecting the last manufacturing small businesses. Gentrification can be identified when new and upcoming businesses like coffee shops, organic groceries, and vintage stores appear to cater to this new population. Neighborhood “coolness” is a common factor in New York City, but it is not the most important one. The real estate industry, aggressive landlords and speculative developers are the primary drivers of gentrification, as well as its primary beneficiaries. Low income communities suffer the most from this profit-driven process, and gentrification is far more of a manufactured phenomenon than it seems.
9
DISPLACED JOB OPPORTUNITIES FROM INNER CITY NEIGHBORHOODS Affordable housing is not only linked to the price of a home, but the income of the tenant. We cannot explore housing without also recognizing larger economic factors, and we have to rethink how to create job opportunities in the inner city, and build community wealth. Perhaps the largest blow to the income of inner city neighborhoods was the de-industrialization that has occurred since the 1970s. Manufacturing jobs have largely been displaced from the American city: “outsourced” to industrializing countries. Money fled the city beginning with the suburbanization of housing and job opportunities, impacting differentiated communities in the inner cities. A transition to cars and buses, combined with suburbanization, meant it became difficult to access many jobs due to a lack of affordable transportation.
INCOME INEQUALITY: NEW YORK CITY IS THE MOST UNEQUAL CITY, IN THE MOST UNEQUAL STATE, IN THE MOST UNEQUAL INDUSTRIALIZED NATION IN THE WORLD.
DISINTEGRATION OF THE AMERICAN DREAM The American dream takes money. If you cannot pay cash for a home, you have to borrow the money. For most, therefore, owning a home means owning debt. In the years leading up to the housing bubble, there were two basic interest rates on home loans: Prime, or low interest for the best, low-risk borrowers, and Subprime, or highest interest, for borrowers with more risk of not being able to make monthly loan payment. As the housing bubble began to inflate, brokers found that they could enhance their profits by selling packages or bundles of Subprime home loans, even though investors were most interested in bundles of prime rates mortgages. But housing brokers made a market for subprime loans by putting the safest mortgages into cocktails with higher risk mortgages.
10
Subprime loans increased dramatically, and whole new populations, usually low income people of color, were sold the high-interest debt bankers knew they couldn’t afford. Eventually subprime purchasers began defaulting on their high-interest mortgage payments, and the housing bubble burst. Banks foreclosed on borrowers who could not afford their loans, and the market was left with millions of mortgages in default. Banks and other lenders failed, construction of new housing dried up, and a glut of foreclosed housing entered the market at greatly devalued prices. The most disrupted communities were often the most vulnerable.
INCOME DATA: COMPARING NYC WITH THE NATION HOUSING COST AND RISK OF HOMELESSNESS National income tax data show definitively that the nation’s income distribution has become more unequal for at least the last three decades, with the top 1 percent capturing more of the national income and the rest, and especially the bottom 50 percent, earning less. This is an exacerbated long-term trend in New York City.
How much people spend for their housing
POVERTY & INEQUALITY INCOME INEQUALITIES ARE RISING IN USA AND WORST IN NYC Across the nation, income equality has soared to the highest levels since the Great Depression with the top 1% of earners taking 93% of all increases in income. As for New York City, inequality grew over four times as fast, with 1% of city residents earning 35% of all real income. In fact, New York City leads every major US city in the category of economic injustice, such that if the borough of Manhattan were a country, the income gap between the richest twenty percent and the poorest twenty percent would be on par with countries like Sierra Leone, Namibia and Lesotho. New York City is now the most unequal city in the most unequal state in the most unequal developed country in the world.
$
11
MAPPING THE CRISIS INCLUSIVE HOUSING “Everyone shares the right to a decent standard of living. Essential to the achievement of this standard and therefore to the fulfillment of human life beyond simple survival is access to adequate housing. Housing fulfills physical needs by providing security and shelter from weather and climate. It fulfills psychological needs by providing a sense of personal space and privacy. It fulfills social needs by providing a gathering area and communal space for the human family, the basic unit of society. In many societies, it also fulfills economic needs by functioning as a center for commercial production.” -Human Rights Education Association www.HREA.org
HOUSING AS A HUMAN RIGHT As fundamental as food and water, access to housing is a human right, a necessity to live a basic, safe, and comfortable life. Recognizing this, the state of housing in this country, and in this city especially, is appalling. The wealth disparity is disgusting, while real estate and rental pricing is largely unregulated, allowing landlords to charge whatever rent they can without any regard for who can pay and who cannot. This often means that, when the time comes, those who can no longer pay get displaced. Without any regulations, the aspirations towards a society with actual equal opportunity, with any semblance of decreasing disparity, continues to move farther and farther into the distance. These largely unregulated market forces also allowed predatory lending and the housing bubble, resulting in the foreclosure crisis, which made accesssing housing even more difficult for many New Yorkers. This section tries to explain who is most at risk of losing housing in this city and to visualize this instability through maps.
DETERMINING AFFORDABILITY Acess to housing is the product of complex social relationships, determined by many obvious and less obvious things, such as work status and
occupation, education, the ability and/ or decision to purchase versus rent, and, maybe the most important in New York City, the ups and downs of the real estate market.Affordability of housing is, for the most part, dependent on basic market forces - supply and demand which means rents continue to increase as more and more people move to New York City. These market rate properties and processes are considered the ‘1st sector’ of the housing market. Publicly subsidized housing, through the policies and mechanisms mentioned in this pubication, are recognized as the ‘2nd sector’ housing made affordable through public programs, often lasting a limited amount of time then eventually being brought back into the free market, the 1st sector. Additionally, and much less prevalent, are permanently affordable properties —the ‘3rd sector’—usually based on ‘social ownership’ and managed to be non-speculative, or non-market based. These community land trusts, limited equity or zero equity co-operatives, and mutual housing associations are the best opportunity for broad and guaranteed affordability.
MEDIAN HOUSEHOLD INCOME= $51,270 The Median Household Income (MHI), or Median Family Income (MFI), is the amount at which half the city’s house-
Map 1
12
Map 2
holds earn more and half the city’s houseolds earn less; in 2012 New York City’s MHI was $49,461, as determined by the US Census. This number is used to determine the official Poverty Line as well as household eligibility for public housing assistance or low-income and affordable housing.
OWNERSHIP
Map 1: MHI
Map 2: Homeownership Rate
This map reflects the reality that poorer neighborhoods tend to be located at the periphery of the city’s boroughs. Being relegation to the exterior means that these communities, that are already earning less, are also routinely farther from the services and jobs usually focused in the central business district, and thus farther from the opportunities to improve their living situation. Something else worth considering is if we think about this MHI geography in relation to the subway lines, we can see a similar discrepancy between poorer neighborhoods and access to, or convenience of, public transport infrastructure as well. When we use the general rule of thumb that 30% of income should go towards housing, reasonable rents for these households at the periphery would need to be quite low. The reality of the situation means that, in addition to being farther from the opportunities available in the center of the city, as well as having less access to these resources, lower income households are also paying a disproportionately high amount of their income to secure housing, creating a greater financial burden for them.
New York City’s homeownership rate refers to the percentage of total housing units that are owner occupied. In 2011 this number was 32.6%, according to the US Census, which means more than twothirds of New Yorkers are renters
Areas of lower homeownership mean higher rates of renting. Owning one’s home versus renting guarantees a certain amount of stability in the cost of living in a place, at least with respect to housing costs. While homeowners must pay higher property taxes as their neighborhoods improve, at the same time they reap the benefits as the community’s infrastructure and amenities improve, such as local schools, while the value of their property increases as well. New York City is a city of renters, which can be seen in Map 2, while the highest rates of ownership in Brooklyn are seen along the periphery at the places with the greatest MHI. Conversely, renters are susceptible to the whims of landlords as well as market forces, which reflect the desireability of neighborhoods. These market processes mean tenants have less stability as their rents are more likely to change unexpectedly and at a more unsustainable rate. Homeownership is lowest in the poorest neighborhoods, those with the lowest MHI, and this relationship helps to express the increased precariousness of those New Yorkers who rent.
MEDIAN SALE PRICE OF SINGLE FAMILY HOMES
beginning alternative models of acquisition and tenure because of the owners’ liability of having abandoned and unsold properties on their books. Today these are often banks, who want to get rid of toxic assets which hurt their profits.
Median sale price reflects the property values and state of the real estate market in a given location. Half of the homes in New York City sold for more than the median price and the other half sold for less.
“The new settlement with the Attorney General is trying to push the banks to give these... properties to non-profits... but it seems like they’re only giving away the terrible properties, which non-profits don’t even want because they need so much work it will cost the non-profits money to demolish and rebuild them.” Ingrid Ellen, The Furman Center
Map 3: Median Sale Price Of Single Family Homes, 2011 As median sale prices reflect the strength of a local real estate market, it is unsurprising to see a correlation between lower sale prices and communities with lower MHI. While lower sale prices might also relate to lower rent prices, with regards to ownership, it might also reflect a higher rate of turnover and instability in a neighborhood as it is easier for new property owners to enter the market. Similarly, neighborhoods with lower median sale prices represent easier access for buyers or groups of buyers trying to work in alternative and non-market processes.
MARKET RATE RENTAL UNITS MEDIAN Market rate rental units are those found in the 1st sector and are tied to the supply and demand of real estate in a neighborhood, meaning the prices center will increase as people’s desire to live in an area increases. The other side of this data represents the amount of 2nd and 3rd sector housing in a neighborhood. These 2nd and 3rd sector units are subsidized or managed to be affordable and less intimately tied to, or totally disconnected from, the effects of the real estate market.
Map 3
Map 4: Market Rate Rental Units As Percent Of Housing Stock As more units are rented at market rate, fewer units are subsidized and in effect made affordable. Higher rents and un-subsidized rents are both more precarious for lower income and already at risk tenants. Historically industrial parts of the city, which are often those with the lowest Median Family Income, and those with the highest Median Family Income, have the lowest rates of subsidized housing, affecting the former population in a much more severe way than the latter.
Map 4
FORECLOSURES: WHO, WHAT AND WHERE Map 5: Notices Of Fore-Closure Rate, 2010. Map 5 shows the rate of foreclosures at the community district level. They are most heavily focused in the poorest and peripheral communities. These high rates of foreclosure help to better understand the relationship between neighborhood wealth and how at risk residents are of losing their home or losing their rental tenancy without notice. At the same time, though, these foreclosure rates also reflect the most opportune places for
Map 5
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population and Housing
law, RigHts, Rent FRaud
LAWS, RIGHTS AND RENT FRAUD
According to the New York City Rent Guidelines Board (RGB), landlords owning rent controlled and rent stabilized apartments can increase rent 2% to 4.5% for oneyear leases, and 4% to 8.5% for a two-year leases. The only way to raise the rent above these numbers is when an apartment becomes deregulated. The legal rent can increase up to 20% and even more. Additionally, an apartment may become deregulated at the end of a tenant’s last lease commencing during the period of the tax abatement (if it was stabilized as part of a tax benefits program); when a building is converted to a co-op under an eviction plan; upon vacancy; and if the rent is $2,500 or more, and the household earned $200 000 or more in the two prior consecutive years.
Research on illegal rent increases and the loss of affordable housing in the city was recently undertaken by Make the Road New York (2011). In 200 randomly selected apartments across NYC the researchers found excessive rent increases with no explanation; landlords failing to register rents of their stabilized apartments; and evidence of inflated rents when vacancies occur (over the 20%), upon renewal, or after major repair work in the buildings. Rent overcharges have put tenants in difficult situations. In the worst cases, they don’t have any option but to move. The research also uncovered many of the difficulties tenants in preventing eviction, such as tenants lack of knowledge on their rights and rent-regulations; language barriers when they want to interact with the authorities; inadequacy in DHCR’s complaint-driven enforcement process; and a long backlog of rent overcharge complaints stretching in some cases to over two years.
In New York City, rent control apartments generally applies to residential buildings constructed before February, 1947 in municipalities for which an end to the postwar rental housing emergency has not been declared. For an apartment to be under rent control, the tenant must generally have been living there continuously since before July 1, 1971 or for less time as a successor to a rent controlled tenant. Once the unit becomes vacant, it leaves the rent control program and is not eligible for rent stabilization. New York’s current rent control program is the longest-running in the United States.
Class 2 includes: → Sub-Class 2a (4 – 6 unit rental building)
→ Sub-Class 2b As with most metropolises of the world, (7 – 10 unit rental building) New York City’s most stable and con→ Sub-Class 2c sistent form of revenue is its property (2 – 10 unit co-op or condominium) tax. In 1975, a descision for the state → Class 2 Supreme Court brought up the issue of (11 units or more) inequitable property assessments and taxations, and Albany was faced with the Class 3: Most utility property. bringing this up to fix. S7000A, a New York City law, was the response, and Class 4: All commercial and industrial it made New York City create a quadproperties, such as office, retail, factory class property tax system in order to fix buildings and all other properties not the disparities between homeowners and commercial/large structure owners. included in tax classes 1, 2 or 3. While it protected the small property The Mayor and City Council annually owners and ensured that their taxation set each class’s tax rate; and, this tax rate wouldn’t be overburdened, it would have is placed upon the assessed value of the the inadvertent impact on impacting how property in order to determine the tax rental systems and costs would that is owed. Assessed value is calculated be pegged. as the product of the market value by
QUAD-CLASS TAX PROPERTY SYSTEM
the level of assessment of the property.
While this seems simple, it is far from it. These tax assessments can vary from year to year, and exemptions make the formulas even more complicated.
Class 1: Most residential property of up to three units (family homes and small stores or offices with one or two apartments attached), and most condominiums that are not more than three stories.
According to current trends in New York City’s taxation, the property tax has been in a consistent upward move – even including the economic downturns. Moreover, the S7000A has not made a more equitable landscape in terms of Class 2: All other property that is not in Class 1 and is primarily residential (rent- how taxation is pulled from properties: even in the city, apartment buildings als, cooperatives and condominiums). 14
In ings of six or more units built between February 1, 1947 and January 1, 1974. Tenants in buildings built before February 1, 1947, who moved in after June 30, 1971 are also covered by rent stabilization. A third category of rent stabilized apartments covers buildings subject to regulation governmental supervision or tax by virtue of various benefit programs.
a system of progressively increasing
are still overburdened compared to the heavily protected residential homes. This rents/maintenance mechanics. If a more becomes just one more reason why rents equitable means was founded between keep rising in Manhattan and surroundClass I and II, apartment rentals might ing areas. This notion has been noted in be better to control in terms of cost. studies as a reason why various academic This issue is not symptomatic in Manthe system should be reformed. hattan considering that due to surrounding environs, properties will usually be taxed at the higher rates; while, the outer boroughs will have properties’ taxes will be impacted by vacancy – creating a failsafe for ensuring therefore long-term speculation/investment.
WAREHOUSING FROM A PROPERTY TAX PERSPECTIVE
In another twist, the condominium was not a popular form of property ‘Vacant spaces’ can be held empty and tenure when the tax revision was taxed at the Class I rate as long as they passed; therefore, its definition within have a sole tenant; therefore, ensuring the tax code is still rather tenuous and that it fulfills the class specification. thorny. Considering the newer laws This technicality allows for a five-story/ about the condo and their growing multifamily building to be classified as a presence in the real estate market, the Class I property as long as only the one tax abatement system was created as person/family is there. This clearly is an a means to prevent units sometimes inherent ability to allow for speculation getting assessed even higher than by allowing developers to take over a the buildings they were inside of. As building, keep an occupant, get the right it attempted to rectify this growing tax class, and then wait for it to accrue problem, it was only a Band-Aid as it value over time. This is a noticeable did little to fight inequalities trend in districts like Bushwick, where in assessments due to which buildings the first floor will be occupied, but the can even qualify for an abatement in the top floors are not. first place. Another impropriety lies in the fact that Class I properties are taxed on sales/ market data unlike Class II and IV that are taxed by income stream. This causes problems with apartment/condo buildings and complexes by having to keep up with income streams; therefore, creating
New York State Division of Housing and Community Renewal (DHCR)
New York City, rent stabilized apartments are generally those apartments in build
EFFECTS OFS7000A: FOURPROPERTYCLASSES
Simply, anyone without a home!
WHAT IS HOMELESSNESS There are many definitions of homelessness, but according to the Stewart B. McKinney Act, 42 U.S.C. § 11301, et seq. (1994), a person is considered homeless who “lacks a fixed, regular, and adequate night-time residence; and... has a primary night time residency that is: (A) a supervised publicly or privately operated shelter designed to provide temporary living accommodations... (B) an institution that provides a temporary residence for individuals intended to be institutionalized, or (C) a public or private place not designed for, or ordinarily used as, a regular sleeping accommodation for human beings.” The term “homeless individual” does not include any individual imprisoned or otherwise detained pursuant to an Act of Congress or a state law.” 42 U.S.C. § 11302(c)1
HOW MANY ARE HOMELESS IN NYC? “Since the first annual street survey in 2005, the number of homeless individuals living in public places has decreased by 26% from 4,395 to 3,262. That’s more than 1,133 fewer New Yorkers sleeping on streets, in parks and in subways.” To quantify the issue of homelessness and gain a better understanding of the situation, the city of New York developed an annual census program, called the HOPE (Homeless Outreach Population Estimate) survey, to dedicate a night on which thousands of volunteers go out, count and record the amount of homeless people they see on the streets- those not in shelters.
Questioning its accuracy, the program discloses, “To ensure accuracy the HOPE count has employed a quality assurance component every year since beginning its citywide count in 2005: decoys. The Hunter College School of Social Work, an independent research organization, plants decoy homeless individuals on some of the streets, parks, and subways that volunteers will survey. Decoys ensure that volunteers cover every part of their assigned areas, and that they interview everyone they see. Hunter’s researchers report how many decoys were surveyed, and the City adjusts its estimate based on the percentage missed. New York is the only U.S. city that ensures the accuracy of its count through this plant-capture technique, providing an additional measure of accuracy to our methodology.” Even though the city is making an effort to maintain accuracy in its census, organizations such as Coalition for the Homeless feel it is still unrepresentative of the actual data of homeless -on-thestreets individuals. According to Coalition for the Homeless, “Research shows that the primary cause of homelessness, particularly among families, is lack of affordable housing. The U.S. Bureau of the Census has recorded a steady decline in the number of affordable rental apartments in New York City, at the same time that wages for low-income New Yorkers have stagnated or fallen -- thus creating a widening affordability gap.”
A SERIOUS ISSUE Recently homelessness has reached the highest level it’s ever been since the Great Depression, according to the Coalition for the Homeless.
1600 1400 1200 Amount of Street Homeless per Borough
1000 800 600 400 200
SUBWAYS
STATEN ISLAND
QUEENS
BRONX
BROOKLYN
0 MANHATTAN
Homeless people are generally viewed in a couple of ways. One being that they are solely responsible for their plight and have failed at sustaining themselves, hence failures of society. Another view in line with advocacy efforts for basic human rights, disputes the fact that homeless people are solely to be blamed for this and takes into account the many factors that contribute to homelessness and the lack of a system put in place to reverse and counter homelessness.
“New York City’s methodology for counting the homeless is considered the gold standard by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. The City’s streets, parks, and subway stations are divided into approximately 7,000 HOPE Areas, each about the size of a few square blocks. In the months before HOPE DHS uses information from outreach providers and past HOPE results to divide the City into high density areas, where we expect to find unsheltered individuals, and low density areas, where we may not. On HOPE night, teams of volunteers survey a sample of the areas, collectively walking over a thousand miles through New York City’s streets, parks, and subway stations. To maintain the survey’s integrity volunteers do not know if they are assigned to a high density or low density area. “
1800 AMOUNT OF STREET HOMELESS
WHO ARE THE HOMELESS?
According to the HOPE Program:
HOPE RESULTS IN 2012 PER NYC BOROUGH & SUBWAY
BOROUGHS
HOPE RESULTS FROM 2005 TO 2012 5000 4395
4500 AMOUNT OF STREET HOMELESS
THE FACE OF THE HOMELESS
4000
3843
3755
3500
3306
3262
3111 3000 2648 2500
2328
Amount of Street Homeless per year
2000 1500 1000 500 0 2005
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
2012
2013
YEARS
Total number of homeless people in municipal shelters per night:
48,694
Out of this number
11,678 were homeless families 20,383 were homeless children DID YOU KNOW: Families comprise nearly three-quarters of the homeless shelter population! 3/4 of the shelter population are families
Youth population 5-10% LGBT
Homeless Youth population 20-40% LGBT
Number of homeless single men:
7,728
Number of homeless single women:
2,740
SOME CONTRIBUTING FACTORS • Loss of home
More than 1 in 4 children in NYC live in poverty and are likely to be homeless. A typical homeless child is under 5 years old. Number of homeless adults in families:
17,843
Number of homeless single adults:
10,476
• Loss of job • Unemployment • Disability • Illness/Mental Illness • Sexual orientation (Homosexuality) • Incarceration record • Lack of affordable housing • Low income 15
rooms, there’s overcrowding and shelters DEMOGRAPHICS often don’t make sense for everyone OF HOMELESSNESS RATE OF SHELTER IN NYC RECIDIVISM 53% African-American
32% Latino 6% Caucasian 1% Native American 1% Asian
African-American and Latino New Yorkers are disproportionately affected by homelessness. Approximately 53 percent of New York City homeless shelter residents are African-American, 32 percent are Latino, 6 percent are white, 1 percent are Asian-American, 1 percent are Native American or other race/ ethnicity, and 9 percent are of unknown race/ ethnicity. This disproportionate correlation between minority groups and homelessness has not always been this consistent. According to a report by the National Coalition for the Homeless, homelessness emerged as a national issue in the 1870’s (Kusmer, 2002). At that time in American history, African-Americans made up less than 10% of the population and although there were no national figures documenting the demography of the homeless population, some sources suggest that African-Americans represented a very small segment of the homeless population. As a matter of fact, in the 1950s and 1960s, the typical person experiencing homelessness was white, male, and in his 50s (Kusmer, 2002). Since that time, however, the scope and demographic makeup of the problem have changed dramatically. Not only do families with children now comprise 41% of the homeless population (National Alliance to End Homelessness, 2006), but 42% of the population is African American. The composition of the average homeless family living in a shelter is a single parent household headed by an African-American female (U.S. Conference of Mayors, 2004). Studies show the large majority of street homeless New Yorkers (not in shelters) are individuals living with mental illness or other severe health problems. Four out of five street homeless New Yorkers are men.
INTERVIEW ON NYC SHELTER SYSTEM AND HOMELESSNESS Interviewee: Rob Robinson Interviewer: Shirley Bucknor Shirley: What are your views on the NYC homeless system? Rob: The NYC homeless system is complicated. To it’s credit, NYC has a robust system in place and that system, goes through a lot of different avenues, a maze if you will. It can go into those dormitory style where bunk-beds exist, single room occupancy hotels, even scatter site apartments—so it’s complicated. There are shelters with dormitory style beds so maybe 6 or 7 people to a room or single 16
“Homelessness is not about housing. It never has been. It is about poverty!”
Although the city of New York has made substantial efforts to provide an ample amount of shelters, it does not address nor solve some of the key components surrounding the issue of homelessness such as skill-set, mental illness and rehabilitation. More than often the system of shelters can become a trap for many families below the poverty line. According to an article in the New York Nonprofit Press, about 40% of all families who seek temporary shelter have had at least one prior shelter stay. Take the case study shown in the diagram on the adjacent page, in whcih a homeless person was asked to pay market rate to live in the shelter system. She brought the request to the attention of the media and luckily the decision was revoked by city officials. Unfortunately, this kind of practice takes place on a daily basis for the unaware. This same practice is transferred to the government organizations such as the Department of Homeless services who have been reported to be paying an underestimated amount of between $150-$250 per head per day for homeless individuals within the shelters. An estimated $750 billion in funding has been allocated for homelessness and shelters in New York City, but are these funds being properly allocated? Why is the government continuing to spend such high amount to the shelter system, why not put the funds towards helping people gain better permanent and affordable housing? In August 2010, Coalition for the Homeless released a document discussing the flaws behind the then Advantage Program. Realizing the glaring problem of the assistance time limit placed on the service by officials, Coalition for the Homeless sought to acquire data on the state of shelter recidivism. They acquired the following: “From a document entitled, ‘Reapplications of families with prior Advantage exits,’ the Department of Homeless Services data show that between April 2007 and April 2010, 1,137 different families have re-applied for shelter after receiving Advantage. By April 2010, just 3,746 families had started receiving the subsidy two or more years ago, meaning that the recidivism rate could be as high as one in three. Nearly half of these re-applications were in the last six months, showing a continued increase in the number of families returning to shelter. Indeed, in March 2010, 172 applications were filed at the family intake center, PATH-- nearly six a day!” The Advantage program no longer exists due to its inefficiency at helping families get back on their feet and did not im-
prove the numbers of families in shelters. A New Path: An Immediate Plan to Reduce Family Homelessness proposes using the family shelter as a tool for parents with limited education and work experience, as well as for victims of domestic violence, those with mental health and substance abuse issues, and a history in the child welfare system. Realizing this pattern, hundreds of advocates and providers from across the nation including the Institute for Children, Poverty and Homelessness (ICPH) are proposing a restructuring NYC’s family shelter system into three separate components, based on assessments of a family’s situations or needs. The report stresses that approximately half of all families placed in a shelter leave within 30 days and never return. It is the other half, those who cycle in and out of the shelter system, which requires more extensive services – and in some cases longer stays in the shelter system – to prevent recidivism. Under the ICPH proposal, the shelter system would be structured as follows: • Tier I Emergency Shelters would look like the current system of services for families who enter the Prevention Assistance and Temporary Housing (PATH) Office. During an initial 30-day stay, assessments would be conducted to 1) identify those families unable to quickly find and retain permanent housing, 2) determine their specific service needs, and 3) develop a future plan of service. • Tier II Transitional Shelters would
serve those families whose needs can be addressed during shelter stays of between 2 and 12 months. These programs would look similar to the current Tier II shelter model but would be targeted for households where the parent has some education and work history and requires only some help from case managers and housing specialists in finding new or better employment and low-income market housing. • Tier III Specialized Shelter Programs – a new programmatic proposal – would serve families who demonstrate more complex needs and have higher barriers to maintaining permanent housing. The Tier III shelters—also known as Community Residential Resource Centers -- would offer on-site employment opportunities for shelter residents starting at minimum wage; job search, readiness, and retention training; and GED classes.
HOMELESSNESS CONTINUUM
HABITAT FOR HUMANITY: ADVOCACY FOR AFFORDABLE HOUSING We talked to Matthew Dunbar, Advocacy and Community Relations Manager, Habitat for Humanity New York. Since its founding in 1984, Habitat-NYC has provided more than 260 homes. At that rate it would take Habitat for Humanity more than 5,500 years to meet the current housing deficit, which is why the advocacy work is at the core of the organization.
› Corporation for National and Community Service (AmeriCorps and VISTA):Provides Habitat affiliates with the capacity to engage tens of thousands of volunteers in efforts to rebuild struggling neighborhoods; › National Housing Trust Fund and Capital Magnet Fund:Provides production resources for new construction and rehabilitation of vacant properties; › SHOP (Self-Help Homeownership Opportunity Program):Provides Habitat affiliates with resources to acquire the land and infrastructure needed to rebuild communities hard-hit by the foreclosure crisis;
FEDERAL LEGISLATIVE PRIORITIES
› Section 4 Capacity Building:Provides resources to support the staffing and skills needed to rebuild communities with high foreclosure rates;
Invest in stabilizing communities and maintain federal resources that support the work of Habitat for Humanity nationwide. In support of the federal Neighborhood Revitalization Initiative, Habitat for Humanity International seeks to leverage U.S. government programs and resources to revitalize low-income neighborhoods and to create resilient communities. To support this initiative, the federal government must maintain and enhance the following funding streams:
› Preservation Programs:Provide affordable rental homes for low-income families and individuals through public housing, Section 8 Housing Choice Vouchers and Section 202 housing for the elderly.
NEW YORK STATE
NYC
Increase New York State’s capital investment in affordable housing. Habitat-NYC is urging Governor Cuomo to increase the state’s capital investment in affordable housing and the economic activity and job creation that home building generates. Programs such as the Low Income Housing Trust Fund (HTF), the Affordable Housing Corporation (AHC), and New York State HOME provide essential housing development opportunities that contribute to New York’s economic growth and the stabilization of struggling neighborhoods. The state should also identify a flexible, dedicated revenue stream for affordable housing that is not subject to annual appropriations.
Call for 2013 Mayoral Candidates to produce comprehensive affordable housing plans that address the full housing continuum. Habitat-NYC is pushing for a plan that emphasizes the importance of homeownership, homeless and supportive housing solutions, public housing and rental preservation, tenant protection, foreclosure prevention, and neighborhood stabilization.
Renew J-51 tax abatements for cooperative and condominium ownership opportunities. The J-51 tax abatement is an important mechanism for low-income and working class homeowners; ensuring that for the life of a family’s mortgage, their tax burden will be low enough to maintain affordability amidst increasing energy and maintenance costs. Habitat-NYC advocates for renewal of this important legislation alongside measures that strengthen, protect, and expand NYC’s affordable housing stock.
Ensure that affordable homeownership remains an essential and central public policy issue as a key solution to city’s affordable housing crisis. Affordable homeownership gives low-income and working families critical economic and social benefits — building equity, significantly improving educational achievement, fostering greater civic participation, inspiring pride and a sense of accomplishment and improving physical health. Building affordable homeownership units are powerful economic engines that quickly create jobs, generate new tax revenue and stabilize families and communities.
Any plan should clearly define affordability and unit sizes, prioritizing need over numbers so that distribution of housing opportunities reaches very low-income residents while addressing the continued challenges of creating and preserving workforce housing.
ACCORDING TO HABITAT: “PRIMARY ADVOCACY WORK THIS YEAR WILL FOCUS ON MAKING AFFORDABLE HOUSING A TOP PRIORITY AT THE MAYORAL CAMPAIGN. WE ARE LOOKING TO PUSH DIFFERENT MAYORAL CANDIDATES TO REALLY COME OUT WITH A COMPREHENSIBLE HOUSING PLAN WHICH DEALS WITH THE FULL CONTINUUM OF HOUSING NEED.” 17
HOMELESSNESS, SHELTERS AND HURRICANE SANDY Every night, thousands of homeless people sleep outside in New York City. What happens when there is a snowstorm or hurricane? When Hurricane Sandy was about to hit, a storm that was called “life-threatening,” the mayor repeatedly asked homeless and vulnerable people to go to the safety of the extra storm shelters in the evacuation zones. Surprisingly, though, a number of homeless individuals opted out of the shelters, and chose to take their chances riding out the storm on the streets.
“THE SHELTER IS LIKE JAIL, I’VE BEEN THERE.” In an interview by the Huffington Post, a homeless man named Michael explained why he planned to avoid a nearby shelter in Harlem: “Those people, they have AIDS, they’re always drinking, so I don’t want to stay inside today.” Michael sometimes works as a handyman, and lived in an apartment in Brooklyn until he fell behind on rent and was evicted. He planned to ride out the storm walking the streets of the Upper West Side. “I’ll be better off outside than in there,” he says. He is trying to get back on his feet, and explains, “The things they do in there make me lose focus.”
Another homeless man, Carol, remarked of a nearby shelter on the East Side, “The shelter is like jail, I’ve been there.” The most concerning thing about these accounts before the storm, is that various homeless stated that they did not even hear about the extra shelters that had opened up, let alone their locations. The city had said that they were taking efforts to do outreach on the streets, but was it enough? Finally, the death toll after the storm that was greatly publicized by various news sources never mentioned a single homeless person; all included on the list of dead were found in or around their home or car. Two people were killed in a park but their neighborhood was listed as well. Did every single homeless person in the city remain unscathed after the deadly storm? Or did the city not tell us something?
THE DOE FUND: READY, WILLING & ABLE “TO SOLVE HOMELESSNESS FOR A NIGHT, YOU NEED SHELTER. TO SOLVE IT FOR GOOD, YOU NEED WORK.” That is the idea behind the Doe Fund’s Ready, Willing & Able Program, which provides paid transitional work and individualized services to homeless men so that they may join or re-join the workforce and get out of a cycle of homelessness, crime or addiction. The organization’s success rate is good, and the backstory of the founders is worthy of a movie. 18
The Ready, Willing & Able Program recruits their men from various homeless shelters in New York City. According to Victor, who works in administration at the Doe Fund’s East Williamsburg location on Porter Avenue, when an individual at a shelter shows interest in the program, a case worker there will call the Doe Fund, and a representative will come to the shelter and give an interview. The Doe Fund does a fair amount of outreach, but the program is not allowed to pick people up off the street. They can only admit individuals who are living in a shelter and specifically show interest in the program, Victor says. Every day, the Doe Fund sends out their vans to pick up interested people and bring them back to the “opportunity centers” for recruitment and sometimes interviews. If the individual shows that they are serious about getting their life back on track and
are accepting of help, the orientation sessions and case management begins.
COULD THIS WORK FOR BUSHWICK? The Ready, Willing & Able Program is set up in four phases, all which last between nine and twelve months. Graduates from the program leave with full-time jobs, housing, sobriety, and reestablished relationships with their family. Each graduate also receives life-long career counseling, job placement assistance and further training and education opportunities. Throughout their stay at the Doe Fund, the trainees receive housing and three meals a day. The facilities and housing are clean and very well run, with a supportive and caring staff. The trainees all work for one of the Doe Fund’s social enterprises for minimum wage. These enterprises include a community improvement project, a pest control service, an administrative assistance office, and a green enterprise called “Resource Recovery” which provides restaurants with free waste cooking oil pick ups to be recycled into premium grade biodiesel.
GRADUATES FROM THE DOE FUND PROGRAM LEAVE WITH FULL TIME JOBS, SOBRIETY AND HOUSING. The Doe Fund has offices, supportive housing, and “opportunity centers” scattered all over the city. Although the organization aims to rehabilitate new parolees, addicts, and homeless men alike, Victor from Administration says that the vast amount of trainees he has are homeless men. He says that previously, the Fund was opened to men and women, but because each gender has such drastically different facility needs, the Doe Fund was closed to women years ago. This is unfortunate given that women and children lead the homeless demographic.
DYNAMICS OF VACANCY VACANCY IN DYNAMICS BUSHWICK NEW YORK CITY OF VACANCY BUSHWICK DYNAMICS OF VACANCY BUSHWICK
WHAT IS VACANCY?
What is vacancy? After surveying multiple methods of counting “vacancy” across the city, there is apparently no uniform, recognized definition for vacancy. A project titled “No Vacancy” stated “Whether in decline, temporarily unfit for use, difficult to use or awaiting a specified future development, vacant spaces are spaces in states of limbo between prior and future uses.” Vacant spaces whether lots or buildings represent the in-between transient spaces withheld from the public. How, then, can this data become public knowledge? And, more importantly, how can it be used to house the people without homes?
a different impac the former indust knew a long decl climax with the p afterwards is still waste or as car pa though the influx illustrate many as Bushwick is one of the neighborhoods in Bo of the dynamics vacant properties, which includes vacant New York City.lo condos. This high level of vacancies comes a different impact on the main components the former industries near Williamsburg and knew a long decline when both industries a 1830 - BLUE COLLAR climax with the pillaging and burning aroun NEIgHBORHOOD afterwards is still reflected today in the man waste or as car parking lots. However, prop Bushwick grew together with the industries though the influx of artists in the neighborh of the nearby Brooklyn waterfront. The illustrate many aspects that created the diffe shipyards, warehouses, distilleries, sugar Bushwick is one of the in Brooklyn withinone of the higi foreclosure abuses by 14 major lenders earlier this year and theneighborhoods Consumer Financial of the dynamics of vacancy Bushwhick refineries, and manufacturing plants attracted vacant properties, which includes vacant lots, houses, industrial buildi New York City. crisis Protection Bureauandhas issued banking regulations to help prevent a similar many German later Italian new immigrant condos. This high level of vacancies comes from a long history of real in theworkers. future. However, it is too late for manya different families, andon it the is unclear exactlyofhow impact main components this community district: the former industries near Williamsburg and the shopping strip of Broa many people became homeless as a direct result of the crash in 2008. Though the amount of foreclosures knew a long decline when both industries and people abandoned their 1960 - BLOCKBUSTINg 1830 - BLUE COLLAR has gone down since 2010, when New climax with the pillaging and burning around Broadway in 1977. The enthnicity (Furman Realafterwards is still reflected today in the many vacant lots in Center theseforareas York City reached its peak of NEIgHBORHOOD foreIn the 60’s real-estate speculators tried to “It is a scandal that there is housing that could easily be available for integrated ne waste or as car parking lots. However, property speculation is happeni frighten white residents to sell their homes closed homes, this is still an issue. What Bushwick grew together with the industries 5% great dynam though the influx of artists in the neighborhood. But these ‘before it was too late’. They bought the occupancy and it is held empty only for speculative purposes, while of the nearby Brooklyn waterfront. The happened exactly to make foreclosures houses at cheap prices and sold them through illustrate many aspects that created the different kinds of vacancies thr hispa shipyards, warehouses, distilleries, sugar whole families are in desperate need of housing that they can afford.” majority so abundant? The volume of high-cost, origins of vac fraudulent practices to poor blacks and Puerto- of the dynamics of vacancy in Bushwhick illustrates the 49% refineries, and manufacturing plants attracted New York City. Ricans at prices they could not afford. subprime mortgages issued tomany lenders -Peter Marcuse German and later Italian immigrant mixed-minori starting in 2003 fueled a booming real workers. 46%
VACANT UNITS IN BROOKLYN
estate industry, which then blew up and collapsed. A foreclosure ensued,- BLOCKBUSTINg 1972 - ABANDONMENT 1830 - BLUE crisis COLLAR 1960 leading to the Great Recession of the NEIgHBORHOOD Many could In the 60’s real-estate speculators tried not to pay the bad loans and 21st century. Effects are clearly still beabandoned their homes, which caused a frighten white residents to sell their homes Bushwick grew together the industries ing felt today, and with eachwith foreclosure further decrease ‘before itThe was too late’. They bought the of local property values. of the nearby Brooklyn waterfront. houses also emptied because of the comes the displacement of distilleries, residents and houses atsugar cheap prices andOther sold them through shipyards, warehouses, plummeting of the housing prices and buyers fraudulent practices to poor blacks and Puertothe possible homelessness of families. refineries, and manufacturing plants attracted Bushwick. Ricans at prices they couldavoided not afford. many German and later Italian immigrant The federal governement is issuing a $10 workers. to resolve claims of billion settlement
1972 - DEINDUSTRIALISA1960 - BLOCKBUSTINg 1972 - ABANDONMENT TION In the 60’s real-estate speculators tried to Many could not pay the bad loans and frighten white residents to sell their homes abandoned their homes, which caused a base of Bushwick was at the The industrial ‘before it was too late’. They bought the of local property further decrease values. same time also in drastic decline. The once houses at cheap prices and Other sold them through houses also emptiednumerous because ofknitting the mills were also rapidly fraudulent practices to poorplummeting blacks and Puertoof the housingdecreasing prices andinbuyers number and all the remaining Ricans at prices they couldavoided not afford. Bushwick. beer breweries were either closing or drastically reducing staff.
vacancy in bu one and two fa
enthnicity
(Picture the2011) Homeless Department of Ciy 20 Pl (Furman Center for Real-Estate and (NYC Urban Policy
vacant reside integrated neighborhood 147 5%
vacant manuf majority hispanic neighborhood 55 49% vacant lots mixed-minority neighborhood 182 46% enthnicity
ethnicity bushw vacancy in bushwick
(Furman Center for Real-Estate and Urban Policythe 2011) (Picture Homeless 2011)
(Furman Center for Real-Es
integrated neighborhood vacant residential buildings 5% 147
AGENTS OF VACANCY EXAMPLES
majority hispanic neighborhood vacant manufecturing units 49% 55
DE-INDUSTRIALIZATION
vacant manufecturing units 55
The industrial base of the city declined leaving derutilized. In central areas many of those experienced adaptive reuse, whereas some others keep vacant in peripheral urban areas. 2000 - MIgRATION OF 1972 - DEINDUSTRIALISA1977 - BUSHWICK
vacant lots 182
1977 - BUSHWICK 1972 - ABANDONMENT 1972 - DEINDUSTRIALISABURNINg TION Many could not pay the bad loans and
BURNINg
932 807 811 636
- structuralbuild fires arsons - suspicious industrial
CREATIVE DISTRICTS
2005OF - gENTRIFICATION 1977 - BUSHWICK 2000 - MIgRATION BURNINg CREATIVE DISTRICTS The influx of artists in neighborhoods attracts
a creative industry and attracts other investors, During the blackout of JulyBecause 13, 1977ofa ever mas-rising housing prices artist which makes prices rise. Bushwick has known sive ‘blackout looting’ brokeare out on the main priced out of their homes. This created a a rapid increase in rents since the 2000s, but shopping street Broadway. Many shops migration ofwere artist from Greenwich Village in also many new condo’s have been constructed pillaged and set on fire. Whole blocks were the 1950s to Bushwick since the 2000s. The that now stand vacant. abandoned and the citystarted knocking L-train seems down to be the carrier of this artist-led vacant homes clearing evengentrification. more buildings.
Landlords holding vacant and underutilized properties are not penalized, thus these sites continue unoccupied or underdeveloped. A number of City Council Bills have proposed a registration and annual city wide count of vacant and underutilized properties to end the practice of holding properties out of service. A fifth property class for vacant and underutilized sites has been also proposed allowing for a higher tax on these properties.
(NYC 2012) arson strike force 1 (Parsons 1969; NY daily news 197
vacant residential buildings 147
Department Ciy Pl (NYC arson strike force 1986; NYC(NYC department of cityof planning 1969; NY daily news 1977)
ofaever The industrial base of Bushwick wasthe at blackout the During of JulyBecause 13, 1977 mas-rising housing prices artist areout priced outmain of their homes. This created a same time also in drastic decline. The once sive ‘blackout looting’ broke on the of artist numerous knitting mills were also rapidly shopping street Broadway.migration Many shops were from Greenwich Village in the 1950s Bushwick since the 2000s. The decreasing in number and all the remaining pillaged and set on fire. Whole blockstowere L-train seems to be the carrier of this artist-led beer breweries were either closing or drastiabandoned and the citystarted knocking down gentrification. cally reducing staff. vacant homes clearing even more buildings.
PROPERTY TAX
suspi arsons -bushw vacancy
vacancy in bushwick
(Picture the Homeless 2011)
abandoned their homes, which a base of Bushwick Duringwas theatblackout of July 13, 1977 a masThe caused industrial the further decrease of local property values. sive ‘blackout looting’ broke out on the main same time also in drastic decline. The once Other houses also emptied numerous because ofknitting the shopping street Broadway. Many shops were mills were also rapidly plummeting of the housingdecreasing prices and in buyers and set on fire. Whole blocks were number andpillaged all the remaining avoided Bushwick. and the citystarted knocking down beer breweries were eitherabandoned closing or drastithousands of buildings empty un- staff. vacant homes clearing even more buildings. callyor reducing
TION
mixed-minority neighborhood vacant lots 46% 182
932
1968
807
142 1976
811
206 149 1985
636
commercial bu
arsons - suspicious - structural fires (NYC arson strike force 1986; NYC department of city planning 1969; NY daily news 1977)
(NYC Department of Ciy Pl
vacant condos 1968
932 807
149 197
(Right to the City Alliance 2010)
completely vacant 142 1976
20
811 partially vacant 206
149 1977 30
construction 149 1985 636
40
2013 - VACANT LOTS
2000 - MIgRATION OF 2005 - gENTRIFICATION FIRES AND ARSON PROPERTY FORECLOSURES CREATIVE DISTRICTS Despite this attracts ongoing gentrification, Bushwick The influx of artists in neighborhoods WAREHOUSING is still covered by vacant lots and buildings of AND Properties affected by the fire aepidemic creative Because of ever rising housing prices industry artist and attracts other investors, vacant condos which many attract crime and pose health iswhich of the 1970s andout 1980s keep vacant sinceprices are priced of their homes. Thismakes created a rise. Bushwick has known Properties acquired by real suesthe toare their environment. Theseestate vacancies are HIGH-PRICES a rapid increase in rents since 2000s, but migration artiststructural from Greenwich Village in some may sufferoffrom damage completely vacant 20
L-train stops
(Right to the City Alliance 2010)
especially located in the areas that were most many new have been constructed speculators, mainly shell corporations 1950s Bushwick sincealso the 2000s. Thecondo’s and highthe cost of torehabilitation. Innow some Stagnating wages and rising housing hit by the fires of the 70s. that stand vacant. partially 30 L-train seems to be the carrier of this artist-ledand LLCs, and keep them unoccupiedvacant occasions the destruction or damaging costs are a threat for households. gentrification. while waiting for the rise of their value to construction 40 their homes due of the properties has been intentional to Families are loosing sell or rent out the units. The bottle line collect insurance money, to get public to foreclosures and evictions leaving 2005 - gENTRIFICATION 2013 - VACANT LOTS is making greater profit. In the meantime assistance for relocation or to get rid of properties vacant and in hands of banks. buildings are Bushwick stored, kept out from famiThe influx artists taking in neighborhoods Despite ongoing gentrification, drug dealing andofabuse place this in attracts At the same time un affordable condos lies in of housing. a creative industry and attracts other investors, is still covered by vacant lotsneed and buildings of abandoned buildings. are being erected with public subsidies vacant condos which makes prices rise. Bushwick has known which many attract crime and pose health is(Right to the City Alliance 2010) and tax incentives, many times the units a rapid increase in rents since but suesthe to2000s, their environment. Thesecompletely vacancies are vacant 20 sit empty side by side foreclosed also many new condo’s haveespecially been constructed located in the areas that were most that now stand vacant. hit by the fires of the 70s. partially vacant 30 properties. construction
2013 - VACANT LOTS Despite this ongoing gentrification, Bushwick is still covered by vacant lots and buildings of
40
vacant condo’s
(Right to the City Alliance 2
19 vacant lots
(NYC department of ciy pla
he housing market has great mics, a pattern does emerge n comparing the different ts on maps: there are clear entrations of vacancy in neighborhoods: Harlem, the Village, but especially East ford-Stuyvesant, which corresponds with The fact that owners of newly built York, Bedford-Stuyvesant the red cloud of vacancies. In Manhattan condos do not lower their prices, but and the Bronx the shelters seem to be prefer to wait and “store” their property Bushwickas itstand out as ofdark more evenly distributed. were, is an example “property warehousing.” In general the term refers ge stainstoon the maps. Still, speculators who wait for the rise of VACANCIES IN NYC values to sell or rentis out their of these property concentrations New York City becomes a red nebula houses, the property waits empty for fuwhen putting an red dot for each vacant tly different character. ture usein or development. These units are abandoned, they are usually privately lot or building in the city. A history of speculation, demolitions, redlining, etc, of all thenot Bedford-Stuyvesant owned and the tax is correctly paid. has left clear scars of abandonment on BushwickThere border gathers are other variations of this, such some districts of NYC where the dark as partial vacancy, which is much harder red clouds gather. But this image also imy vacant tolots. The high level recognize. For example, in Harlem mediately poses the question: How come and Bedford-Stuyvesant there are many these vacancies continue when there are cant lotsactive is astorefronts, remnant of but the apartments on so many people in immediate need of are left vacant while the owners profit housing? illaging top and burning that off the ground floor commercial space. ened during theaccomodates blackout oftenants Making an accurate forecast of the The owner low rent until he can raise a higher rent or develop nebula and its densities becomes crucial . to expose this vast empty housing stock. the property in another profitable way.
VACANCY AND HOMELESSNESS
The problem of tracing and recognizing vacant property remains. Much of warehoused vacant property can be labeled as “shadow real estate owned.” These are often repossessed homes across the city that banks or investors purposely keep off the market. Because of the fear that flooding the market with vacant and foreclosed homes would present a danger to the housing market as a whole, these houses are not advertised for sale.
climax was preceded long run-up of housing donment and arson. The
However, each map of vacancy becomes erratic the moment it is made because of the great turbulences in the property market of the city. Since the city has, apart from its data on vacant lots, no accurate information on the state of vacant property, many organizations have tried to
locate particular kinds of vacant property. As mentioned earlier, Picture the Homeless did a block-to-block count of vacant properties in fall 2010 in the areas with highest expected vacancies. They found a total of 3,551 vacant buildings and 2,489 vacant lots. Similar to this count the Right To The City Alliance did a survey of vacant condos in select New York City neighborhoods in 2010. They found 264 completely constructed condos with an estimated 4,092 vacant units. Even though the accuracy of these counts is hard to verify and the housing market has great dynamics, a pattern does emerge when comparing the different counts on maps: there are clear concentrations of vacancy in some neighborhoods: Harlem, the East Village, but especially East New York, Bedford-Stuyvesant and Bushwick stand out as dark red stains on the maps. Still, each of these concentrations is slightly different in character. First of all the Bedford-Stuyvesant and Bushwick border gathers many vacant lots. The high level of vacant lots is a remnant of the pillaging and burning that happened during
the blackout of 1977. This climax was preceded by a long run-up of housing abandonment and arson. The ‘redlining’ policies of financial institutions violated the poor residents of these neighborhoods and denied them meaningful mortgage access and insurance coverage. In some cases the houses were torched by the owners themselves to collect the fire insurance money, then by gangs to get at the valuable fixtures and copper wiring. A vast municipal demolition program then radically cleared the burntout carcasses of the houses. By the end of the 1970s most of the land was cleared in this way, resulting in vast numbers of vacant lots. Many of these cleared sites still remain today.
CORRELATION VACANCY utions discriminated the poor AND SHELTERS ents of these neighborhoods (?) These buildings and lots lie vacant and denied them meaningful unused for purely speculative reasons, but on top of this some of these vacant gage access and insurance houses became crack dens, garbage-filled rage. Theandhouses weed-ridden.were Many are now labeled by signs of firms that take care of pest control. These spaces form potential health hazards but could, if rehabilitated, really enhance the quality of life of some of these neighborhoods.
ance money, then by gangs to RELATION VACANCY AND SHELTERS
Picture the Homeless already es because they werehave paid
pointed out that there is a correlation between neighborhood vacancy and homelessness: The community districts from which most homeless people came are the same ones where you can find the highest rates of vacancy. It shows a direct link between property warehousing and homelessness. Many of these families have lost their homes and end up in the homeless shelter system, sometimes in their own neighborhoods.
aced them. A vast demolition
radically cleared the burntarcasses of the houses. By nd of the 1970s most of the was cleared inoverlap thisallway and When we the maps – the at vacant lots where houses were demolsuppliedished, a safer environment the (warehoused) vacant buildings and the locations of the homeless shelters ample parking space on these – further questions of their interrelation arise: Why connect the homeless nt lots. Many ofnotthese cleared shelters and the vacant houses? Why still remain andtooften not usetoday these vacancies house homeless people? have the same use. From the data we were able to collect it seems as if the shelters in Brooklyn are situated more or less in and around Bed20
NEW YORK CITY VACANCY AND SHELTER CORRELATION
WHAT IS BEING DONE ABOUT VACANCY? Organizations such as 596 Acres have implemented an interactive website to locate different classifications of publicly owned vacant spaces and to identify the agencies that possess each site. However, 596 Acres is only one organization that has hypothesized and advocated for the potential of vacant spaces. In 1987, the Architectural League conducted a study titled “The Vacant Lots” program in which various sites across the city were provided by the Department of Housing Preservation and Development for students to envision the potential for what each site could become from an architectural perspective.
“THIS IS NOT A VACANT LOT” “This is not a vacant lot” as part of Design Philadelphia provokes to question what does it mean to have a vacant space in their neighborhood and what vacancy represents. Approaches to tackling vacancy are coming from governmental legislation as well. Land banks are emerging as an alternative method of accounting for vacant land at multiple scales. In November 2011, Governor Cuomo passed a bill instituting the call for the first ten land banks in New York State, as yet unrealized New York City. Land banks are emerging programs that provide for an additional method for taking control of the vacant land for productive use.
WHAT IS A LAND BANK?
STRUCTURAL VACANCY FROM A TAX PERSPECTIVE
A land bank is the combination of at least two tax districts, or foreclosed governmental units (FGUs), that obtain property from various sources such as donation or purchase, manage those properties, and then distribute that land once again for productive use for parks, affordable housing, etc. Land banks are more transparent in their processes due to their requirement to make their database of vacant lots and buildings accessible for public knowledge. This program has yet to be implemented within New York City, but with groups such as 596 Acres already advocating transparent processes and previous legislation for Urban Homesteading, land banks could provide a vehicle for strengthening both of these aims.
As a whole, both the affordability of housing and the survivability of a newly revised and implemented urban homesteading program depend on a more equitable property tax system. While we need to find a better balance between homeowners and apartment complexes through a more transparent, clearer assessment process, there also comes the danger of policy-process to be influenced by developer-influenced government officials or policymakers. Moreover, a comprehensive study and property tax reform is needed as mere patches to the current system will not stop current inequalities, but exacerbate them, like the condo/apartment abatements. As for the idea of taxing or penalizing vacant property owners, the concept is simple: Create a disincentive for owners to sit on vacant properties. The same would apply to residential properties and abandoned houses with little maintenance and overgrown yards that are seen as a blight in neighborhoods. One proposal to triple the property tax on these properties—might provide the sort of stimulus that would allow for the acessing of otherwise inaccessible vacant and underutilized properties for the production of affordable housing.
21
HOMESTEADING HISTORY HISTORICAL ANALYSIS: 19TH CENTURY Before homesteading was urban, it was the mechanism used to manifest a rural landscape from the ‘virgin land’ of the open west. The conversion of ‘frontier wilderness’ into ‘productive land’ was initialized by granting federal territory to entrepreneurial farmers in return for ‘making use’ of the richness of the continent, starting in 160-acre plots. “Free Soil” was the property of the free farmer, the American Farmer, who independently wrests from the land the bounty of a growing nation. According to the American Government, the national frontier belonged to those willing to work it. Driven by a national destiny, the Homesteading policy marched settlers
1862
westward with little respect or understanding that this ‘unused space’ was in fact long inhabited land. The steady erosion of First Nation lands and their people amounted to displacement and genocide, while a zealous attitude concerned with ‘making use’ of the earth lead to ecological devastation that would
1937
1961 1964
culminate in the dust bowl of the 1920s and 30s, when enormous tracks of once prairie land turned into desert due to over farming. The political history of Homesteading has never been simple. The first Homestead Act was signed in 1862 by then President Abraham Lincoln, after the south had seceded from the Union, and southern Democrats could no longer block legislation designed to proliferate independent, “free” farmers at the expense of wealthy slave-owning planters. The west would be won; this was understood before any official homesteading began. Before the Civil War, it was only unclear who would be the winners. Northern politicians promoted the Jeffersonian ideal of the Yeoman Farmer throughout the 19th century, and by the time of the 1862 Homestead Act, which allowed anyone who had not “taken up arms” against the United States to homestead, they had a particular population in mind—the act included the participation of freed slaves. Homesteading, it seemed, was an answer for freed slaves and poor European immigrants, including single
1968
women, to participate in the democratic project of independent land ownership. The process was straightforward: apply, work the land into productivity over five years, and thus earn the deed through “sweat equity.” Scrutiny on behalf of the Government was minimal, Homesteading was often abused, and its intended users were not always the ones homesteading: including freedmen and the most poor. Humanitarian and ecological consequences proliferated. The policy would be amended and expanded to encourage ranching in the mountain west, reserve portions of homesteads for planting forests, and subsistence farming during the New Deal, but only a few of these intentions ever materialized. Making use of what is unused, a frontier mentality, the freedom of ownership earned with hard work and the opportunity that homesteading offers to the disenfranchised, were rhetorical legacies that continue into the contemporary, urban era. Direct links to this history helped develop the program of Urban Homesteading, and similar trouble between intention and reality linger through the decades.
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1974 *HUD owns over 75,000 vacant homes (Largest residential land owner in country)
RURAL HIOMESTEADING ACT OF 1862 HOUSING ACT OF 1937 This ACT established Local Housing Authorities (LHA’s) with the power to develop and administer housing policy in municipalities across the US. It too introduced Section 8 (42 U.S.C. § 1437f) Low Income Housing Assistance, which was later expanded in 1974 and exists to this day.
ALTERNATIVE PLAN FOR COOPER SQUARE (1961) In 1961, in opposition of Rober Moses’s urban renewal plan for the area, the Cooper Square Committee released the Alternative Plan, NYC’s first substantial community initiated plan. The result of over 100 meetings, it focused on the rehabilitation of existing housing stock for the purposes of creating long-term affordable housing for local residents. Cooper Square exists to this day.
HOUSING AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT ACT OF 1968 This ACT established Section 235 - Home Purchase subsidy. This program was intended to support home ownership for low income minority households, through subsidization of private development. It has been criticized for assisting mostly middle income white households and enforcing racial segregation in housing. It too was criticized for contributing to mortgage defaults and housing abandonment in the 1970’s. Section 236 - Rent subsidies program
HOUSING ACT OF 1964 This ACT established Section 312 Rehabilitation Loan Program, which authorized direct low interest federal loans to eligible borrowers for the rehabilitation of single + multi family units. It eventually became the Primary source of rehabilitation funds in urban homesteading. Section 312 was canceled in 1991 - 42 USC § 12839 . .
GRASS ROOTS SWEAT-EQUITY: FATHER FOX’S FULL CIRCLE PROJECT
A QUICK HISTORY OF:
URBAN HOMESTEADING FEDERAL POLICY NYC MUNICIPAL POLICY NON-PROFIT / GRASSROOTS ORGANIZING
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In 1960’s and 70’s Father Fox’s Full Circle Project saw the Sweat-Equity based rehabilitation of abandonded tenement buildings in East harlem.
NYC HOUSING CRISIS CONFERENCE In 1972 a conference was hosted by Rev Dean Morton and attended by other housing advocates, City officials, and activists. It in part lead to the development later homesteading strategies and municipal programs.
*
FED URBAN HOMESTEADING
FEDERAL HOMESTEADING PROGRAM: HOUSING AND COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT ACT OF 1974 12 U.S.C. 1706e
This ACT established the first official federal Urban Homesteading policy in the form of Section 810 legislation. It too reintroduced the Section 8 Low Income Rental Subsidy, and implemented Community Development Block Grants (CDBG). Section 810 inititiated the federal Urban Homesteading Program, establishing LUHA’s (Local Urban Homesteading Agencies) and giving local governments and HUD area offices the discretion and flexibility to implement programs that made use of housing acquired by HUD through defaults on federal mortgages. Basic goals were to 1. utilize existing housing stock to provide homeownership, 2. encourage public + private investment in specific neighborhoods and 3. foster neighborhood revitalization. Section 810 funds reimbursed federal agencies for the section 8 value of the transfered properties. Funds were specified for use in identified homesteading neighborhoods only. Section 810 did not offer administration or rehabilitation loans and or grants. As such, local governments had to raise funds elsewhere, often utilizing Section 312 Rehabilitation Loans, and funds from Community Development Block Grants, the source of administrative funding for most LUHA’s. Federal Homesteading Program Timeline : 1974-1977: Demonstration program takes place in 23 cities 1978: Program is officially operational 1983: 110 cities + 12 counties participate 1979: 1335 properties occupied through federal program 1984-1985: Multi Family homesteading demonstration undertaken, considered a failure. 1984: City owned properties become eligible for purchase with Section 810 funds.
URBAN HOMESTEADING ASSISTANCE BOARD (UHAB) In 1973 UHAB was launched in Harlem to offer assistance to builidngs interested in cooperatively goiverning and operating themselves. It has since assisted the preservation of over 1700 buildings and created homeownership opportunities for over 30,000 households. (UHAB)
CDBG
CDBG: The Com program provides wide range of uni including urban re model cities, wate facilities, Open sp in 1974, the CDB ously run program purchase land for
HABITAT FOR
Habitat for Human founded in 1976. T upon the concept o The concept cente adequate shelter w volunteers to build
SWEAT EQUITY
SWEAT EQUI
Prior to the introdu Homesteading pro 1976-1980 HPD a Equity Program w government mortg purchase and reha property with swe
DIVISION OF MANAGEMEN (DAMP) (HPD
In 1978 NYC’s Ho Department create Alternative Manag to develop new ho respond to the hou launches HARP, H experimental prog
HISTORICAL ANALYSIS: MID 20TH CENTURY Fast-forward to the inner city of New York in the late 1960s: think of the South Bronx, the Lower East Side, and large sections of Brooklyn. Seemingly, whole worlds have come and gone in the meantime, but as these neighborhoods declined, a new “frontier” was “opening up” inside the abandoned core of America’s largest cities. Dozens of city and federal programs would be developed to counteract this “downward spiral” as part of the “War on Poverty,” but Urban Homesteading was alone in its rhetoric describing this exploited landscape as a new frontier: ripe for the expansion of entrepreneurial urban pioneers. National housing policies were the main catalyst for Urban Decay in the first place. The policy of “Redlining” restricted mortgage financing for urban neighborhoods of color, and though revised on the policy level, continued de facto in the private market for decades. Top-down policies of “Urban Renewal,” where large sections of American cites were demolished and replaced with housing projects, became politically unpopular during the 1960s as the public began
to refer to “slum clearance” as “Negro Removal.” The failure of federal mortgage programs resulted in massive foreclosure and, coinciding with abandonment, meant that tens of thousands of empty properties were now owned by the government. By 1973, then President Nixon approved a moratorium to freeze all federally subsidized housing programs. The original federal Urban Homesteading Program was included in the 1974 Housing and Community Development Act. It allowed homesteaders to own housing through sweat equity by renovating derelict and abandoned property. Because it relied on the gumption of individual soon-to-be homeowners, the program was seen as a bottom-up answer to the centralized programs of the preceding decades. Before the federal program was signed into law, Urban Homesteading had gained notable publicity on various local scales for seeming to solve the issue of abandoned housing and home ownership in one fell swoop. Meanwhile, the easy comparison to traditional Homesteading during the frontier era catalyzed an unusual degree of romanticized interest and cross-sectional support. The chance to transfer massive amounts of government-owned abandoned property to those willing to ‘make use’ of the buildings seemed like “an idea who’s time has come.” It was a difficult logic to deny, and because Urban Homesteading initially faced
little political opposition, the first federal program was hastily enacted less than a year after it was first written. There is little evidence, however, that Urban Homesteading was portrayed overly optimistically, even at the outset of federal programs. Most journalistic descriptions included a disclaimer that homesteading would still require a large investment of work and equity, and many cities choose to demolish buildings they concluded would not be worth the effort and money required to renovate them. A critique developed that Urban Homesteading lacked the productive element which made rural Homesteading viable, while many speculated that initial public interest wouldn’t necessarily result in large numbers willing to follow through with the whole process.
After a brisk but limited beginning, the urban homesteading program is falling victim to the common American attitude of excessive expectations and instant cynicism. Actually less a program than an ad hoc effort to rehabilitate abandoned housing stock by selling buildings for token sums to those who will restore and live in them, this pioneering experiment is now undergoing all the pains common to bootstrap renewal. The fact is that urban homesteading, a concept of good sense and humanity, still provides no free lunch. After that initial “dollar” purchases price, the work to be done is neither easy nor cheap. “Sweat equity” has to be matched by funds that are too frequently underestimated.
Final guidelines for the federal program wouldn’t arrive until 1978: well after criticism of the program’s varying degrees of support and specificity rose to the surface. In 1975, the same year a study concluded that Urban Homesteading in Baltimore, Wilmington and Philadelphia had failed to provide a large-scale solution to housing, a New York Times article described the core issues:
URBAN HOMESTEADING RENAISSANCE
1975
1981
1976
1983
1989
1991
*NYC’s HPD owns over 100,000 vacant / partly occupied units (Largest land owner in city)
* NYC fiscal crisis
G
BG: The Community Development Block Grant ram provides communities with resources to address a range of unique community development needs ding urban renewal, neighborhood development, el cities, water + sewer projects, neighborhood ities, Open space, loans for public facilities. Beginning 74, the CDBG program is one of the longest continuy run programs at HUD. Can fund 100% of project to hase land for housing or infrastructure improvements
BITAT FOR HUMANITY
HOME IMPROVEMENT LOANS (HPD) The Home Improvement Program (HIP) provides renovation loans to assist income-eligible owner-occupants of single- to four-family homes to make repairs to masonry, roofs, plumbing, and other building systems in need of repairs. 1982-present.
tat for Humanity International was ded in 1976. Today, It was developed the concept of "partnership housing." concept centered on those- in need of uate shelter working side by side with nteers to build simple, decent houses.
NYCH In 1983 the New York Coalition of Homesteaders is formed.
to the introduction of of a municiple esteading program in NYC, between -1980 HPD administrated a Sweat y Program which offered 1% rnment mortgages for people willing hase and rehabilitate city owned erty with sweat equity.
ISION OF ALTERNATIVE NAGEMENT PROGRAMS MP) (HPD)
78 NYC’s Housing and Preservation rtment creates the Division of native Management Programs (DAMP) velop new housing programs that nd to the housing crisis. DAMP soon hes HARP, HAMP, TIL and other imental programs.
HOUSING AND URBAN-RURAL RECOVERY ACT OF 1983 The 1983 ACT directed HUD to undertake both Local Propoerty and multifamily homesteading demonstrations Multifamily Homesteading Demonstation: After members and associates of ACORN and other low income advocacy groups testified at the 1982 congressional hearing on homesteading for its neglect of low income persons , legistlation was developed to adress this challenge. In 1984 and 198S Multifamily Homesteading Demonstration was undertaken.
LOCAL P. DEMONSTRATION
Local Property Urban |Homesteading Demonstration (1985-1987): The Local Property Demonstration provided participating cities, for the first time, with funds to aquire private 1-4 unite properties for use in homesteading. A report on the demonstration was published by HUD in 1987.
NYC HOMESTEADING PROGRAM
AT EQUITY
EAT EQUITY (HPD)
MULTIFAMILY DEMONSTRATION
CITY LIMITS MAGAZINE LAUNCHED. In 1976 City Limits Magazine is launched by advocacy organizations to improve the information flow among communities hit hardest by the city's fiscal crisis. Exists today.
TENANT INTERIM LEASE PROGRAM (TIL) (HPD) TIL is an HPD program that assists organized tenant associations in City-owned buildings to develop economically self-sufficient low-income cooperatives where tenants purchase their apartments for $250. TIL exists to this day.
NYC MUNICIPAL HOMESTEADING PROGRAM (HPD) (DAMP) The City’s formal Urban Homesteading program was officially launched by HPD in 1981. The program involved three elements: Housing Stock, Financing, and Technical Assistance. The Housing was selected from HPD’s large housing stock, much of which was abandoned. It offered a budget of up to $6000 per unit for base rehabilitation costs, as well as technical assistance services through the Urban Homesteading Assistance Board (UHAB. In 1983 HPD released its first homesteading Request for Proposals (RFP), by which community groups could apply to HPD to obtain resources and support for homesteading. A second RFP was announced in 1986. 2000 New Yorkers lined up to get applications. 60,000 applications were distributed, 700 submitted and 33 accepted. In 1987 HPD changed its RFP system, pre-selecting sites, revoking the right of community groups to propose sites, and changing the financial assistance from a $10000 per unit grant to $15000 loan (30 year 1% interest). In 1991 the program was ended even though thousands of applications had recently been submitted by New Yorkers.
TIL HOME IMPROVEMENT LOANS
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HISTORICAL ANALYSIS: MID 20TH CENTURY (CONTINUED)
Available sources of funding for Urban Homesteading were complicated. Federal management of the program was carried out through the department of Housing and Urban Development. HUD offices, via Local Urban Homesteading Agencies, were responsible for the cumbersome task of choosing federal properties, accepting and reviewing applications, and matching property with Homesteaders. Section 810 of the 1974 Housing and Community Development Act, which authorized the first federal Urban Homesteading program, provided federal funds to buy HUD properties back from the government, and section 312 of the 1964 Housing Act opened low-interest loans for the rehabilitation of dilapidated housing. A main source of federal funding came from Community Development Block Grants, CDBGs, which could also be used by the locality to run the administration of their Local Urban Homesteading Agency.
The poor and the underprivileged need special help and guidance to do what the middle class has the training and resources to carry out. And a few restored houses do not turn a neighborhood, or a city, around. Yet, the author goes on to defend Urban Homesteading against such cynicism, arguing that well managed group efforts on the local scale were overcoming obstacles and succeeding in their mission to Homestead. In New York, the proliferation of Homesteading was spearheaded as early as 1973 by the Episcopal Church of St. John the Divine, and its Urban Homesteading Assistance Board, UHAB. Despite localized success, spokesman for these groups still noted delays, citing “our necessity to borrow money from the city to accomplish rehabilitation” as the main obstacle.
Local sweat equity programs in New York had offered low-interest loans to anyone willing to purchase and rehabilitate city owned property from 1976 onward. In
1981, New York City began a formal local Urban Homesteading program. The program, ran by HPD, was coupled with funding from Home Improvement Loans, which began in 1983 and continue today. But this formal history neglects the popular movement to use sweat equity to earn housing for the disenfranchised. The maze of programs and funding sources was provoked by a people’s movement that began, for New York City, in Harlem following the 1967 riots. From here, the radical idea of tenants taking housing into their own hands was further developed by the Episcopal Church and UHAB, while the story of ama teur builders beating the odds to earn their housing captured the popular imagination. Rehabilitation efforts were often combined with community gardens, solar water heaters, and even wind turbines for power generation. Homesteading legitimized ongoing squatting efforts while it capitulated them, and the homesteading process built community along with livable housing stock. With urban pioneers willing to see projects through, when sufficient funding could be acquired, and technical assistance
properly administered by organizations such as UHAB, homesteading worked. It wasn’t enough. Though Urban Homesteading worked for some, it was not prolific enough to be deemed a successful program in the “War on Poverty.” Despite it’s bootstrap ethic, the program struggled through the 80s and early 90s under conservative administrations who perceived programs designed to assist the urban poor as failures that were wasting government money. A general narrative developed that Urban Homesteading was not scalable, and only applied to a small population that was willing and capable of providing sweat equity. There was truth in this assessment, and many homesteaders even burnt out; never finishing their projects. Just as in frontier homesteading, the reality of Urban Homesteading never quite matched the rhetoric that described it. The same cynicism for top-down government housing initiatives that helped launch Urban Homesteading eventually consumed the program. Despite continued interest from prospective homesteaders, in 1991 Urban Homesteading formally ended.
INCREASINGLY BROAD-BASED URBAN SOCIAL MOVEMENTS EXPANSION OF PUBLIC - PRIVATE PARTNERSHIPS
1990 HOME PROGRAM
1994
1996
2007 2007
2002
*Su
SHOP PROGRAM
EB5
20
CDBG
HOPE VI - 1992
HOUSING ACT OF 1990 HOME PROGRAM Cranston-Gonzales National Affordable Housing Act in 1990, established the HOME program. HOME is the largest Federal block grant to State and local governments designed exclusively to create affordable housing for low-income households. Under HOME, HUD funds local participating jurisdictions (60 percent of funding) and states (40 percent ) for housing development purposes. Fifteen percent of the grant amount must go to nonprofits known as Community Housing Development Organizations, or CHDOs.
HOPE VI is a major HUD program meant to revitalize the worst public housing projects in the United States into mixed-income developments utilizing federal block grants. Its philosophy is largely based on New Urbanism and the concept of Defensible space. Many have criticized HOPE VI for not enforcing “one-for-one” replacement of demolished public housing. Furthermore, local housing authorities have been criticized for using the program to displace poor residents in favor of more affluent residents.
NEHEMIAH PROGRAM (HPD) Under the Nehemiah Program, HPD supports the construction of homes on vacant city owned land in the East New York and Brownville sections of Brooklyn developed by East Brooklyn Congregations (EBC), a consortium of over 30 congregations. HPD also works in the Bronx with the South Bronx Congregations (SBC). Involved churches contribute donations into a revolving construction fund while HPD provides below-market rate second mortgages to keep the homes affordable to occupants. 1985 - Present
NEIGHBOUHOOD ENTREPREUNERS PROGRAM (NEP) (HPD) Only a few years after the Urban Homesteading Program was canceled, in 1994 HPD launched NEP, extending wholesale access of city owned housing stock along with financial support to private developers. NEP enabled neighborhood-based private development companies to purchase and manage clusters of occupied and vacant City-owned buildings. Buildings selected for NEP were sold to the Neighborhood Partnership Housing Development Fund Corporation (NPHDFC), a subsidiary of the Enterprise Foundation, for $1 each and then leased to the entrepreneurs. The properties were eligible for Federal Low Income Housing Tax Credits (LIHTC), local property tax abatements and other financial support. HPD provided permanent financing through a mix of City Capital and Federal HOME funds at a cost of approximately $120,000 per unit. This program saw hundreds of buildings and thousands of units rehabilitated into affordable housing by private for-profit entities. TIL NEHEMIAH
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HOUSING OPPORTUNITY PROGRAM EXTENTION ACT OF 1996 / SHOP PROGRAM The SHOP program awards grant funds to eligible national and regional non-profit organizations and consortia to purchase home sites and develop or improve the infrastructure needed to set the stage for sweat equity and volunteer-based homeownership programs for low-income persons and families. Homebuyers must be willing to contribute significant amounts of their own sweat equity toward the construction or rehabilitation of their homes. SHOP Grantees include Community Frameworks, and Habitat for Humanity International amoung others.
A RIGHT TO HOUSING The seminal book A Right to Housing: Foundation for a New Social Agenda is released.
RIGHT TO THE CITY COALITION FORMED
Right to the City (RTTC) emerged in 20 as a unified response to gentrification a call to halt the displacement of low-inco people, people of color, marginalized LGBTQ communities, and youths of co from their historic urban neighborhoods are a national alliance of racial, econom and environmental justice organizations www.righttothecity.org
TA MO
HOMEWORKS HOMEOWNERSHIP PROGRAM (HPD)
UHAB UNDERTAKES CO-OP DEVELOPMENT PIPELINE
Through HomeWorks New York City conveys small, vacant city-owned buildings to not-for-profit and for-profit experienced builders at a nominal price, and may also provide a subsidy. The builders then rehabilitate the property into one- to four-family homes for sale to individual homebuyers at market prices. There are no income limits for buyers. 1995 - present.
In 2002 UHAB began developing affordable housing Co-ops. It has since rehabilitated over 70 buildings.
“Th Mo ach Con elev aH thes buil fun rela Thi tran Act w.ta
ALTERNATIVE FUNDING SOURCES EMERGE
NEIGHBOURHOOD HOMES PROGRAM (NHP) (HPD) The Neighborhood Homes Program (NHP) transferred occupied, city-owned one- to four-family residential buildings to selected community-based sponsors for rehabil itation and eventual sale to owner occupants. 1998 - 2008
NEP
HOMEWORKS
ARTISTSHARE CROWDSOURCING PLATFROM
A United States based company, ArtistShare (2000/2001) is documented as being the first crowdfunding/fan-funded website for music followed later by sites such as Sellaband (2006), SliceThePie (2007), IndieGoGo (2008), Spot.Us (2008), Pledge Music (2009), and Kickstarter (2009).
SOCIAL IMPACT BONDS (UK) Social Impact Bonds, also known as a Pay for Success Bond or a Social Benefit Bond, are performance-based investments that encourage innovation and tackle challenging social issues. First social impact bonds were launched by Social Finance UK in 2010.
C A
$5
U “E P
HISTORICAL ANALYSIS: CURRENT ERA The formal end to Urban Homesteading could not suffocate the concept of sweat equity initiatives to earn housing. Nor was it the last time the bootstrap rhetoric around entrepreneurial homesteaders would be evoked. Over the next twenty years, the housing ecology in New York would change dramatically, but the legacy of Urban Homesteading lives on. Sweat equity based programs, such as Habitat for Humanity, have since been widely successful. Technical assistance organizations such as UHAB have continued on: further developing models to allow a transition into ownership models. After Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans in 2005, then President Bush proposed a homesteading program to aide recovery in affected areas. The plan, touted by republicans for its self-help style, was derailed by democrats who noted that, like previous homesteading
programs, the initiative would be too limited to have any real impact on the post-storm housing crisis. A new ecology of private funding has developed out of the burgeoning non-profit and social entrepreneurial sectors. Crowd funding provides an intriguing model for financing housing projects, which may be applied to sweat equity initiatives. New organizations around housing advocacy and direct action have proliferated as the need for equitable housing grows. Homesteading has rediscovered its productive roots, now transplanted by Urban Homesteading into the city. The term is most commonly associated with urban farming and self-sufficiency: in the classic rhetorical tradition of Homesteading. The elements of Urban Homesteading: willing urban pioneers, financing models, and technical assistance, are all alive and well. Taking lessons from its history into consideration, the program could awaken from its dormancy—so long as new properties can be accessed.
2011 2011
2010 *Sub Prime Mortgage Crash sparks recession
Y ED
emerged in 2007 ntrification and a nt of low-income arginalized d youths of color eighborhoods. We acial, economic organizations. httothecity.org/
*Occupy movement emerges
CHOICE NEIGHBORHOODS
BANKING ON VACANCY REPORT/ PICTURE THE HOMELESS
Building upon HOPE VI, Choice Neighborhoods grants aim to transform distressed neighborhoods and public and assisted projects into viable and sustainable mixed-income neighborhoods by linking housing improvements with appropriate services, schools, public assets, transportation, and access to jobs.
In 2011, NYC non-profit PICTURE THE HOMELESS completed a citywide count of empty lots and buildings in low-income communities! They found 3351 vacant, publa report Banking on Vacancy and developed legistlation INTRO 48 that would have NYC undertake an anual vacant property count. Picture the Homeless working to start a citywide Community Land Trust. http://www.picturethehomeless.org/
OCCUPY WALL STREET
TAKE BACK THE LAND MOVEMENT “The Take Back the LandMovement is organized towards achieving secure Community Control Over Land; and elevate Housing to the Level of a Human Right. Pursuant to these objectives, we are building a movement to fundamentally transform land relationships in this society. This movement, comprised of a trans-local network of Local Action Groups...” http://www.takebacktheland.org/
2013
2012
O4O On July 23, 2011 an inaugural conference launched O4O. “Organizing for Occupation (O4O) is a group of New York City residents from the activist, academic, religious, homeless, arts, and progressive legal communities who have come together to respond to the housing crisis.” http://www.o4onyc.org/
“Occupy Wall Street is a people-powered movement that began on September 17, 2011 in Liberty Square in Manhattan’s Financial District, and has spread to over 100 cities in the United States and actions in over 1,500 cities globally. #ows is fighting back against the corrosive power of major banks and multinational corporations over the democratic process, and the role of Wall Street in creating an economic collapse that has caused the greatest recession in generations.” - Occupywallst.org
H.R. 41: HURRICANE SANDY RELIEF BILL (2013) NYC SPECIAL INITIATIVE FOR REBUILDING AND RESILIENCY In December 2012, Mayor Bloomberg created the Special Initiative for Rebuilding and Resiliency (SIRR) to address how to create a more resilient New York City in the wake of Hurricane Sandy, with a long-term focus on preparing for and protecting against the impacts of climate change.
RIGHT TO HOUSING IN THE CITY REPORT
OCCUPY SANDY Occupy Sandy is a grassroots disaster relief network that emerged to provide mutual aid to communities affected by Superstorm Sandy. http://occupysandy.net/
CROWDSOURCING EMERGES AS MAJOR FUNDING SOURCE
SOCIAL IMPACT BONDS (US)
CHC LAUNCHES CROWDFUNDING PILOT (2012)
JUMPSTART OUR BUSINESS STARTUPS ACT (JOBS ACT)
$530 million 2009 - 1.5billion 2011
Social Impact Bond’s emerge in US as Pay For Sucess Bonds. In 2012, the city of New York financed a $9.6 million social bond for prisoner rehabilitation led by The Osborne Association.
First-of-its-Kind Campaign in the National Affordable Housing Field. Community Housing Capital is using crowdfunding to fund an ongoing mission, to provide affordable housing and stabilize communities nationwide.
The Jumpstart Our Business Startups Act or JOBS Act, is a law intended to encourage funding of United States small businesses by easing various securities regulations, in particular around online crowdfunding. signed into law by President Barack Obama on April 5, 2012.
US CONGRESS PROPOSES “EQUITY” CROWDFUNDING PLATFORM
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MODEL PHILADELPHIA MODEL OF URBAN 1.HOMESTEADING THE ORIGINAL
LOW - INCOME HOUSING PROGRAM A HOUSING PROGRAM FOR LOW-INCOME PEOPLE
In the late 1970’s there was an estimated 31,000 vacant buildings in Philadelphia. With the goal of supporting affordable housing for low-income people the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now (ACORN), lead a sophisticated squatters movement throughout the city. This grassroots action spawned a model of Homesteading designed as a “housing program” for low-income peoples rather than a “property rehabilitation program.”
community boards, restricted eligibility to low-income and moderate-income families, and allowed for the acceleration of tax foreclosures of abandoned or blighted housing for homesteaders. The program was first administered by an Independent Homestead Board nominated by the City Council. It eventually transfered to the non-profit Philadelphia Housing Development Corporation (PHDC). It had authority to: 1. Identify and select property
In the late 1970’s there2. Institute wasforeclosure an estamated proceedings 3. Propose “Homesteading areas” 31,000 vacant buildings in Philadelphia. 4. Establish local Community Boards With the goal of supporting Homesteadingaffordable Requirments: In 1973, the Philadelphia City Council passed Ordinance 543, establishing a 1. Proof of trades skills + financing housing forthatlow income people the Assomunicipal program would serve as a 2. 5 year occupancy requirement comprehensive resource for the rehabilitation of vacant properties by homeNo retake policy ciation of Community3.Organizations for steaders. The Philadelphia homesteading model was considered highly progressive 4. Community approval of Homesteader because it empowered through Reform Nowresidents (ACORN), lead a sophisticated squatters movement throughtout the city. It spawned a model of Homesteading designed as a “housing program” rather than a “property rehabilitation program”. In 1973, the Philadelphia City Council passed Ordinance 543, establishing a municipal program that would serve as a comprehensive resource center for the rehabilitation of vacant properties by homesteaders. The Philadelphia homesteading model incorporated: 1. Restriction of eligibility to low income and
26
moderate-income families, 2. Sufficient time to facilitate homesteads, 3. Financial assistance for rehabilitation, 4. Production quotas dependent on city size, administrative capacity, and level of abandonment, and 5. aggressive solicitation of houses through acceleration of tax foreclosure. Administration: The program was first administered by an Independent Homestead Board nominated by the City Council. It eventually transfered to the non-profit Philidelphia Housing Development Corporation (PHDC). It had the authority to: 1. Identify and select property 2. Institute foreclosure proceedings on vacant or blighted property to speeded
HOMESTEADING NEW YORK CITY SWEAT EQUITY AND HOMESTEADING IN NYC “From 1976 to 1980 the New York City Sweat Equity Program, reacting to calls for the rehabilitation of abandoned buildings and the growing demand for low-income housing, sought to facilitate transfer of ownership of city owned housing to low and moderate income people by way of “sweat equity.” In exchange for labor performed by prospective residents, the city offered one percent interest rates on 30-year mortgages for the gut rehabilitation of city owned abandoned buildings. Unfortunately, despite positive support from then President Jimmy Carter, along with financing from four major New York banks, by 1980 the program was defunct. But it wasn’t defunct for long! In 1980 the New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) initiated an Urban Homesteading Program as a response to residents illegally inhabiting vacant buildings (squat-ting) in poor and red-lined neighborhoods. At the time, the program granted up to $10,000 per unit to tenants willing to inhabit and simultaneously renovate vacant city-owned buildings. Participants qualified for the program through a Request For Proposal process. After renovation, HPD sold the buildings to the residents for $250 per apartment with the stipulation that the building operate as a Housing Development Fund Corporation (HDFC) under
Article XI laws, which included limited equity on resale profits. The classification as an HDFC ensured building affordability for 40 years. In 1991, the Urban Homesteading Program was repealed by order of then Mayor Ed Koch, effective Oct. 1, 1991. Currently, there are some 1500 HDFCs in NYC.” -Frank Morales.
HDFC COOPERATIVES Housing Development Fund Corporation or HDFC is a special type of limited equity housing cooperative in New York City which is incorporated under Article XI of the New York State Housing Finance Law. Under this law, the city of New York is able to sell buildings directly to tenant or community groups to provide low-income housing. Many HDFCs were created through a
- Eleanor Bumpers Homestead -East 8th Street. LES / NYC process of co-op conversion of a foreclosed, city-owned property. As of 2008, over 1,000 HDFC cooperatives have been developed in the city.
UHAB In 1973 UHAB was launched in Harlem to offer assistance to buildings interested in cooperatively governing and operating themselves. UHAB eventually became
the key Technical Assistance provider for Urban Homesteading program in NYC. While this program was canceled in 1991, UHAB continues to support the rehabilitation and management of co-op housing in the city. Since its creation UHAB has assisted the preservation of over 1,700 buildings and created home-ownership opportunities for over 30,000 households.
- A map of UHAB supported sites as of mid 1980’s 27
MY LIFE AS AN URBAN HOMESTEADER BY FRANK MORALES Although I’ve been a NYC squatter since about 1980, I have also been involved with the “official” urban homesteading movement. When I speak of urban homesteading I am speaking of two distinct but interrelated aspects. One is the legal, official, permitted, somewhat bureaucratic urban homesteading program initiated by the federal government in the mid-1970s and implemented in various municipalities around the country. The other involves the un-permitted, extra-legal, “walk-in urban homesteading” called squatting that also occurred in various parts of the country. Seeming opposites, they are actually quite related and I’ve been part of both.
cleaned out the debris, gutted out all the rot, and utilizing local skills and very little money, but with a ton of spirit, we made homes for ourselves, including me. With Brother Roger and the local Franciscan religious community, including Mary Kay and Sharon women religious, we organized a narcotics and alcohol abuse counseling and detox center in our storefront that also provided meals. Orlando, a long time resident of the neighborhood stripped the motor out of a washing machine left for dead in the lot across the street, installed it in the remnant of the rusty boiler in our basement and we had hot pipes, hot water and heat all winter.
In 1980, I was living in the South Bronx in a neighborhood overwhelmingly Puerto Rican and Afro-American. Portrayed in mainstream media as the symbol of urban poverty in America, having suffered decades of politically motivated policies of forced displacement and calculated disinvestment, my neighborhood was the prime time destination of touring popes, presidents and buses full of gawkers gazing at the barely living testament to society’s disdain for its poor citizens.
We raised funds to purchase building materials by throwing hip hop shows at Saint Ann’s gym where - if my memory serves me well - the Orange Crush and troops from the Zulu Nation (up on Cypress Ave) scratched and danced, along with others during those days when rap was being born. Jane Dickson, Charlie and John Ahearn, Kiki Smith, Tom Otterness and artists from COLAB also contributed to the cause, part of a wonderfully engaged art movement centered around Stefan Eins and Fashion Moda up on 147th street - if my memory serves me well.
As for me, I was finishing up my church assignment at Saint Ann’s Episcopal Church where I’d been functioning as an associate priest.Wanting to remain in the neighborhood and needing a place to live, I decided with others to move into two abandoned, city owned buildings sitting along Saint Ann’s Avenue. Motivated by need as well as desire to do something creative with all the devastation, and not all that mindful of the illegality of the situation (seems like all the empty houses with all the homeless is the real crime), I was excited to work with others on such a project. The buildings, 281-283 Saint Ann’s off 139th Street had, like so much of the neighborhood and borough, been slated for demolition. Sitting adjacent to a giant corner vacant lot, the buildings were about to be destroyed. So with a bit of fanfare, an Easter liturgical action to “remove the stone” from the front door, we moved in: Me and Stevie Montalvo, Frenchie and Capon, Brunie and DooWop, Catherine and Tim, Juanito, Robero, Jorge and Kaz, and some members of the Young Lords, a Puerto Rican Liberation organization that had deep roots in the neighborhood and People’s Park on 142nd Street, who some years earlier in 1970 had participated in “Operation Move-In” squatter actions in East Harlem and various parts of the city. Neglected for years, the buildings were a wreck so we organized workdays, 28
So there we were, dug deep in the epicenter of urban poverty in America in the era of Reaganism, engaged in a direct action, self-help, DIY operation when one day, six months into our residency and a lot of hard work, a few guys in suits from HPD (Housing, Preservation and Development) show up and proceed to inform us that, “according to our records you are illegally occupying city property.” In fact, we were. Nonetheless, recognizing that we were not about to leave, they eventually saw fit to invite us down to their offices at their “alternative management division” at 75 Maiden Lane to discuss the matter. About a dozen of us from the hood went to negotiate with the man.
ing to contain urban grass root squatter movements that were breaking out all over America and incorporate them into more acceptable channels. Attempting to come to grips with the crisis in the cities, the consequence of massive “planned shrinkage” and the resulting endemic vacancy and crumbling of inner city neighborhoods, these projects, though limited, were also creating opportunities for poor and working people to utilize their “sweat equity” in exchange for an opportunity to acquire a home, or maybe even own a home. Now, to be precise, the design of these official efforts sought to incorporate willing and eligible “urban homesteaders” in strictly weekend work projects in vacant and dilapidated buildings in poor neighborhoods. They were never intended nor did they allow for outright, full-time occupation, but only a closely monitored type of workfare over the course of what often amounted to years of weekend labor! And you weren’t always assured that you would even acquire the property in the end! In our case though, we’d made it clear that despite our newly acquired legal status, we would never leave our homes, and that if need be, we would fight for our right to rebuild our community! Fortunately, with people like Bruce Dale and others in the “alternative management” office in our corner we were able to remain and live in our buildings full-time as legal urban homesteaders. Practically, what that entailed was our providing regular reports to our HPD contact, Simon Keifer about the work that we were doing, how much cash we had in the bank, producing copies of receipts and records and being available for occasional inspections, all situated within the context of the usual administrative paternalism familiar to poor people. As it turned out, when things seemed pretty secure with our buildings, having spent about four years there, including collaborating with hundreds of neighbors in building a park on the vacant corner of 139th Street called Children’s Park (still there), I decided to hand my very first squatted apartment over to friends, leave the South Bronx and the urban home-
steader status and head back down to the Lower East Side where I was born and raised. That was 1985 and again, in need of a place to live, I discovered a neighborhood that had similarly suffered the epidemic of abandonment and vacancy. With boarded up and cinder-blocked buildings all over, the Catholic Church’s local Joint Planning Council had organized a number of HPD sanctioned urban homesteads in the neighborhood that were in various stages of accomplishment, all aiming to occupy and eventually own their homesteader apartments as low-income coops legally as Housing Development Fund Corporations (HDFCs). Myself though, having become acclimated to a more immediate, direct action approach, and having an immediate need to create a place to live, and quite possibly feeling some sort of entitlement (“I was born here”), and simply loving the thrill of working in vacated and “abandoned” spaces, I was fortunate to meet and connect with dozens of neighborhood people all committed to the same end: un-permitted squatting of the vacant property on the Lower East Side with the aim of creating housing, centers of art, culture and politics, and whatever creative hearts and minds could come up with. At the same time, it was announced that there would be no more official urban homesteading slots in the pipeline, at least not in the soon to become very fashionable and profitable “East Village.” In fact, by the mid-1980s the legal option for “sweat equity” minded folks—the Urban Homesteading Program— was dead in NYC. I remember speaking with HPDs Urban Homesteading Program director at the time who told me that they had put forward an “RFP” or “request for proposals” for those willing and able (if not desperate) to enroll in the Program. According to the director, they received some 12,000 applications to urban homestead. That’s 12,000 separate addresses, 12,000 separate groups of desirous homesteaders who wanted to homestead vacant spaces, 12,000 plus citizens of NYC who really wanted a shot at renovating a vacant space in order to build
Well, lo and behold! While we were chastised as “squatters” in the beginning of the meeting, by meetings end, we were accorded legal “urban homesteader” status. That’s right! In fact, they even offered “urban homesteading” leases to each of us on the spot! All across the country, publicly assisted efforts that engaged low-income people in self-help renovation of vacant housing were in operation. Spurred on by mid-70s federal legislation that allowed for, financed and studied local urban homesteading “demonstration projects,” in truth, the government was attempt-
Frank Morales is an American writer, squatter activist, ordained Episcopal priest (1977) and author of Police State America (Arm the Spirit, 2002) and numerous published articles on housing and social justice matters. Frank worked with the homeless population of NYC back in the late 70s and early 80s, while living in the South Bronx, first as a legal “urban homesteader” and then as a squatter. He has spoken at numerous conferences, lectured at universities and given many interviews on these subjects.
a home they could afford … and guess what? The city accepted TWO of those 12,000 applications and SHUT DOWN the Urban Homesteading Program! And further still, many of those official homesteads on the Lower East Side, like the Eleanor Bumpers Homestead on 8th Street (B and C), who had worked for years, lost them and were swindled out of their buildings which are condos today. Consequently, my only option at the time (1985), and the option left open to those of us who sought to act on our belief in the human right to a home, who are drawn to the intrinsic goodness of creative and collective work, who bask in the joy of mutual aid and meeting the needs of those who suffer the violence of homelessness; our only option was to squat, which we did, enacting, not without resistance from the forces of speculation and greed, a form of “walkin homesteading” which eventually lead to the occupation of some thirty buildings on the Lower East Side, with eleven remaining today, one within which I still reside. In conclusion, I’d like to point out that that two aspects of urban homesteading to which I have referred; namely the permitted and the un-permitted, are part of my history and the history of the urban homesteading movement as a whole. With this in mind, I would suggest that overcoming the tyranny of speculation on housing will require the bridging of both legal and otherwise un-permitted means to achieve our ends; that merging these two strategies will continue to prove its relevancy in opening up space for negotiation and insuring progress in our non-violent struggle for homes for all and the practical realization of our right and opportunity to rebuild our city in the vacated and warehoused urban spaces all around us.
FROM URBAN HOMESTEADING TO A NEW ECOLOGY OF HOUSING IN BUSHWICK TEN POINTS UNFOLDING THE DISTRICT’S CONDITION 1. Housing developments targeting moderate- and high-income households have replaced former housing projects targeting low- and very low-income families in the district. Upscale developments are flourishing and old multifamily buildings are being transformed into condos. Rezoning processes, tax incentives, public policy and grants have facilitated the new developments benefiting the wealthy at the expense of those in critical need. Gentrification has been desired and promoted by real state investors and developers due to the rise of property values in adjacent districts, such as Williamsburg. Displacement in the name of “development” has become a policy. 2. Population is increasing and demographics are changing. The arrival of artists, students and single professionals looking for affordable housing has opened new housing markets typified by rent and sale price increments and real estate speculation, as well as changes in local economies. Newcomers, mostly white non Hispanic, have the tendency to stay temporarily. Making roots and forming families in the district is not always in their agenda. This has generated anxiety among long term residents, mostly Hispanic and African-American, which are welcoming. However, they feel threatened since those leaving may not be aware of the implications of tenants’ rotations. Most of the time housing prices go up when tenants come and go. 3. Owner occupied and rental housing prices are rising. The median monthly rent in Bushwick in 1999 was $500. It increased to $1,176 in 2011 and continued climbing to around $2,099 in 2013 (NYCHVS; Furman Center; Real Impact Real Estate 2013). Likewise, the price of owner occupied housing has sky rocketed. The median sales price per unit (2-4 family building) in year 2000 was $119,720 climbing to $173,031 in 2010 (Furman Center, 2009; 2011). The median household income of the district is $34, 813 (Furman Center 2012), which means that families must expend more than 50% of their income in housing.
SOURCES New York City Housing and Vacancy Survey. Online Acess: http://www.census.gov/hhes/www/housing/nychvs/nychvs. html Furman Center for Real Estate and Urban Policy State of New York City’s Housing and Neighborhoods. Online Acess: http://furmancenter.org/research/sonychan Real Impact Real Estate (2013) Brooklyn Rental Market Report. New York: Real Impact Real Estate. Sanchis, E. (2010) Stimulus Funds are not Enough to Fight Foreclosures in New York. Online Access: http://news. feetintwoworlds.org/2010/02/10/stimulus-funds-are-notenough-to-fight-foreclosures-in-new-york/
4. Rent overcharges are becoming more common in rent regulated units, the district is losing its affordability. Rental housing comprises about 84.1% of the district’s occupied housing units. Out of this number a significant portion is rent regulated. The portion of rent regulated apartments decreased from 58.8% in 1999 to 32.1% in 2011. Likewise the percentage of subsidized units declined in the same period, from 17.3% in 1999
to 6.2% in 2011 (Furman Center, 2001; 2012). Rent increases, often illegal, have put tenants in difficult situations, in the worst cases they don’t have any option but to leave.
that buildings sitting empty in the district could provide affordable housing and accommodate over 1,500 community members. Permanent affordable housing is in great demand.
5. Housing decay due to lack of mainte-
9. Bushwick has plenty of assets starting with its people and grassroots organizations. However, residents, local grassroots groups and community organizations who have worked diligently to improve the housing conditions, maintain housing affordability and guarantee the well being of its residents are facing new challenges. Their endeavours –which include dissemination of tenants and housing rights, legislation enforcement, legal advice in court procedures related with evictions, etc– will fail given compartmentalized visions and limited funding vis a vis the aggressive profit-driven strategies currently talking place in the district. Thus, new alliances must be formed to exchange knowledge, social capital and resources to collectively win the ongoing urban battle.
nance has severely affected residents in Bushwick. Some landlords have run into trouble paying mortgages and property taxes, thus buildings are being abandoned without basic services and in a state of despair. In 2005 the district had the highest number of serious code violations in the city, ranking second in 2011. In addition, the district was recognized as having the fifth highest rate of severe overcrowding in the city during the same year. Housing units with serious code violations accounted for 150.1 per 1,000 rental units in the area in 2011, whereas the rate of severely crowded households increased from 3.3% in 2005 to 7.7% in 2010 (Furman Center, 2011).
6. Eviction notices have increased in the last years, especially in the western area. Part of the housing stock has been acquired by unscrupulous and exploitive landlords interested in profit not people. These practices have caused illegal evictions of low-income residents. Some landlords have even offered flight tickets to Puerto Rico, Ohio and other states to get rid off tenants! Multifamily homes are being bought, cleared, rehabilitated, turned into condos and sold for two times the price. 7. Banks are taking over the district with foreclosures. Foreclosures have evicted long term families, especially Hispanic, in recent years. Of the 59,000 foreclosure processes initiated in the period of 2006-2010 in New York City, over 1,600 have occurred in Bushwick (Sanchis, 2010). Stagnating wages, unemployment and predatory lending have resulted in the loss of properties of many families leaving behind vacant one- to four-family homes.
10. Alternative housing models are already taking place in Bushwick. There is a demand for social and economically sustainable models of living, working and learning. Thus, long term strategies and coalitions must be formulated and coordinated by residents, local groups, resistance movements and community based organizations invested in the district with the following aims: preserving and expanding rental housing for lowand very-low income citizens; protecting undeveloped land and vacant properties from market development and speculation transferring those sites to Community Land Trusts and other sorts of models guaranteeing permanent affordability and community control over land and other local assets; and designing alternative models of housing challenging the current unafordable market models.
8. Bushwick has plenty of space to house its community. While people lose their homes there are hundreds of buildings and lots sitting empty in the district. Many buildings have been neglected for decades, while other ones have been bought and warehoused in recent years by speculators, mainly shell corporations and LLCs. These landlords usually keep properties unoccupied waiting for a rise in their value. Property owners holding these properties out of community service are not penalized. It is estimated 29
DETAINING DISPLACEMENT THROUGH THE ACQUISITION, REHABILITATION AND OCCUPATION OF VACANT PROPERTIES The aim of this research and design project is not only to reflect on the current urban condition and the agents affecting us and our neighboorhoods, but also to react and thus propose some actionable alternatives for housing accesibility that could delinate some directions for future development, legislation and policy reform. This is an open call for discussion, organization, mobilization and intervention. This section opens the discussion depicting the planning phase of our work. In fact this is only the result of a complex process developed during the first phase of this ambitious project. Nevertheless, it is worthwhile to analyse the strategies proposed in order to ackknowldege that there are alternatives to prevent displacement and take control of our own living environment. These proposals were developed during five months with the assistance of local residents and organizations. A number of activities were organized as part of this project including a panel on Urban Homesteding and a discussion group on housing accesibility, as well as field work including surveys, key informant interviews and participant observation in community board meetings and other local housing meetings.We conducted a block-by-block vacancy survey and analysed different aspects of the vacancies. Furthermore, we selected some clusters of vacant buildings and lots and did field work to analyse in depth the potential of those properties. At the same time, we conducted additional research on urban and housing policy influencing the development of the district, current urban developments and trends, as well as the district’s demographics, median household income, local facilities, public services, public spaces, housing, and the real estate market. Finally, we proposed three commuity-based strategies: (1) City Steading in Bushwick: A way Forward, (2) Buhswick Inclusive; and (3) Engaging Lots. The proposals, which are described in the following sections, respond to economic development trends that ignore social development and the role of citizens in the construction of the city. These propositions encourage citizen involvement in planning and development processes, the right to the city and the right to housing acknowledging housing as a human right, raising up a use value over exchange value. Furthermore, the proposals acknowledge the demographic changes seeking ways of integrating the long term community with the newcomers through initiatives addresing the creation of living and working models with alternative ownership and managing approaches.
THIS IS AN OPEN CALL FOR ACTION IN BUSHWICK, A DISTRICT REPRESENTING MANY NEIGHBORHOODS IN THE CITY EXPERIENCING MASSIVE DISPLACEMENT AND THE LOSS OF AFFORDABILITY
UNDERSTANDING VACANCIES: AN OPPORTUNTIY FOR COMMUNITY BASED STRATEGIES
COLLECTIVE OWNERSHIP: A MODEL FOR PERMANENT AFORDABILTIY
Before moving to the proposed community-based strategies, which are mainly based on the legal adquisition, rehabilitation and occupation of underutilized, vacant and derelict properties, it is critical to acknowledge that these properties are the most contested spaces in the district. Many of these sites have been seized by developers and investors in recent years. Therefore, if underutilized, vacant and derelict properties are not taken by people and local groups invested in Bushwick, they most certainly will be taken for profit development.
It is also critical to recognize that those tactics can only be achieved through collective efforts and models of ownership, as we suggest in the different strategies. This can be fulfilled through the formation of Community Land Trusts (CLT). A CLT is a local non-profit organization created to acquire land on behalf of the community and hold it in trust. The CLT provides 99-year renewable leases for exclusive use in accordance with the terms of the trust. The lessee is typically a non-profit housing corporation, a non-profit mutual housing association, or limited-equity cooperative, closely related to the CLT, that rents to qualified tenants, or an individual owner whose ability to profit from equity gains is severely limited. CLTs are one of the most efficient instruments currently available to provide and preserve low-income housing for today’s and future generations.
It is also important to understand the dynamics of vacancies and the changes in the demographics of the district, as well as the needs, demands and priotities of its inhabitants and community stakeholders. Thus, prior to learning from the strategies, some facts about vacancies will be outlined. 30
(brooklynhistory.org)
arsons suspicious structural 932
1950 1960
7% 5%
1970
Demographics started changing with the decline of the manufacturing industry and German breweries. Families with European background gradually moved out to suburban areas while AfricanAmerican and Puerto Rican families arrived during the so called Great Migration.
30%
27%
1980
African-Americans and Puerto Ricans established in Bushwick. The percentage of white-non hispanics decreased almost reaching the same share of these two minority groups.
56%
26%
1990
25%
Bushwick is consolidated as a Hispanic community. Ecuatorians, Dominicans and Mexicans joined the Puerto Ricans. The background of the district is essentially Hispanic. African-Americans concetrate mostly in the souhtern area of the district, while cohabitating with the Latino population.
2000
Today new and habitable buildings are held total or partically vacant. Foreclosures have risen leaving hundreads of homes empty and in hand of financial institutions. On the other hand, the city has assisted with the provision of tax abatments and re-zoning approvals the construction of condominiums. New housing units have been constructed but many are still unoccupied. Prices are way to high for the the Hispanic and African-American population.
65%
67%
24%
The district’s population increased with the arrival of young white non-Hispanic residents, a group that has tripled in the last decade and keeps growing in north Buhswick.
65%
20%
1968
807
142 1976
811
206
636
“Redlining” and “Blockbusting” assisted in the decline and abandonment of multifamily housing. Banks would draw a line in declining neighborhoods preventing any investment, while real estate speculators tried to frighten residents to sell their homes ‘before it was too late’. Buildings were bought at cheap prices and rented or sold through fraudulent practices to low-income families at prices they could not afford. Many of the new homeowners held their houses only for 10-15 years, losing them as their income declined and foreclosure set in. These houses were eventually boarded up and abandoned.
2010
Industrial buildings keept abandoned ultil recent years. Artist and creative insdustries priced out from Manhattan and Williamsburg have repursposed these spaces. Today, there are still a number of vacant buildings with the capacity to provide affordable working and living spaces. However, the influx of the creative population and activities have attracted investors and speculators interested in profit not people. A number of buildings have been bought and keept warehoused, out of community use and service, until their property value increases.
Bushwick was populated by residents with German, Polish, Irish, English, Russian, and Italian background. These families joined the first Dutch settlers during the industrialization of the area in the 19th century. By 1950 Bushwick had the greatest concentration of ItalianAmericans in Brooklyn.
Residents with strong roots in the area kept leaving the district due to the urban and economic decline. Puerto Ricans and African-Americans residents kept growing.
FORECLOSURES / CONDOS
REAL ESTATE SPECULATION
(Brooklyn’s Bushwick, Brian Merlis & Riccardo Gomes)
Toward the end of the 1960s and 1970s the city stopped investing in public services in declining neighbohroods. The socalled “planning shrinkage” would cut police and fire services and assist in the urban decline and fire epidemic that destroyed large sections of Bushwick. Hundreds of fires took place, some were indicated as suspicious since residents would torch vacant properties to clear those areas from crime and drugs. These fires only attracted public attention after two devastating events; the looting and fires that erupted along Broadway during the Brooklyn Blackout of July 1977 where many shops were pillaged and set on fire; and, a large fire that destroyed part of the heart of the district only ten days later. Around 20% of Bushwick’s housing stock was burned out and abandoned causing long-term residents to move. A portion of the cleared spaces still remain vacant today.
REDLLINING / BLOCKBUSTING
Bushwick flourished in the 19th century with the industrialization of the nearby Brooklyn waterfront. The shipyards, warehouses, distilleries, sugar refineries, breweries and manufacturing industries attracted immigrant workers with European background to Bushwick. At the begining of the 20th century economic changes took place with the gradual deindustrialization of the area. Most of the 14 breweries located in Bushwick were gone by the 1960s.
PLANNED SRINKAGE / FIRE EPIDEMIC
DEINDUSTRIALIZATION
DYNAMICS OF VACANCY
149 1985
149 1977
White NonHispanic
Hispanic
AfricanAmerican
SOURCES: NYC Department of City Planning 1969,1980; US Census Bureau 1980, 1990, 2000, 2010 and 2010; NYC Arson Strike Force 1986; NY Daily News 1977
31
VACANT PROPERTIES BY TYPE
UE
G HIN
N AVE
S FLU
ENUE
MYRTLE AV
W
YC KO F
FA VE
NU
BR
E
OA D
WA Y
structurally vacant
VACANT PROPERTIES SURVEYED 357:
vacancy
32
totally vacant
partially vacant
no data
156 VACANT LOTS 201 VACANT BUILDINGS These maps are the result of a block-by-block vacancy survey conducted by students from the graduate program in Design and Urban Ecologies, Parsons the New School for Design, The New School. The vacancy survey was conducted during two weekends in March 2013. A survey sheet assisted to collect information about the vacancies including: typology, number of stories, condition, and address. Afterwards, addresses were mapped using a Geographic Information System (GIS). Some of the properties were matched with data from the Department of Finance, which included taxes, ownership and zoning. Part of the research is presented here, but there is still information that need to be matched and revised. The vacancy count reveals 156 vacant lots and 201 buildings throughout the neighbourhood, 357 properties in total. We estimate that this amount could go even higher if we consider a five percent error margin. The area between Flusing and Myrtle Avenues manifest fewer vacant properties. One explanation might be that this area has become more popular for investors and real estate speculators due to it closeness to Williamsburg. This area has been even re-branded as “East Williamsburg�. Vacant properties and lots in the rest of the district seem to be dispersed, although there are some concentrations of vacancies in the sourthern area. Most of the vacant buildings are residential, with two and three stories, and habitable. Most of the lots are fenced or used as an informal parking lot. Regarding ownership, most of the investigated lots and buildings are privately owned, mostly by LLC and shell companies. There are some buildings owned by financial institutions and just a few properties owned by the city. We stipulate that the 201 vacant buildings could house over 1,500 persons struggling with housing issues including those in the shelters located in the district, long term community members and newcommers seeking affordable housing.
VACANT PROPERTIES BY SIZE
UE
VEN GA
IN SH FLU
ENUE
MYRTLE AV
W
YC KO F
FA VE
NU
BR
E
OA D
WA Y
vacant lot
1-2 stories
LAND USE
mixed use commercial
3-4 stories
CONDITION
residential industrial
abandoned dilapidated
5-6 stories
OWNERSHIP
habitable no data
private owner city owned
bank owned no data
33
FACILITIES PRIVATE, NON-PROFIT AND PUBLIC FACILITIES The map of the facilities was generated using information provided by the city, which was checked and extended by looking at the actual facilities. For some layers, such as the daycare centers and after-school programs, not all the information is compiled and available. The facilities are mapped using the size of the lot, the actual facility is usually smaller.
UE
IN
SH
FLU
VEN GA
ENUE
MYRTLE AV
W
YC KO F
FA VE
Schools in Bushwick seem to be equally spread thoughout the neighbourhood and are usually quite large in size. The afterschool programs are usually located near the schools. These facilities include: highschools (8); middle schools (10); elementaty schools (17); private schools (4); parochial schools (4); and afterschool programs (11).
NU
BR
E
OA D
Day care institutions are mainly located along the commercial avenues, such as Broadway and Myrtle Avenues. They are also part of housing corporations, such as Ridgewood-Bushwick Senior Citizen Council, and the Bushwick United Housing Develoment Fund Corporation. These facilities include: child care centers (40) and senior care centers (4).
WA Y
Healthcare facilities in Bushwick include: hospitals (7); diagnostic and treatment centers (3); hospital extension clinincs (6); mental health care facilities (8); and a residential health care facility.
AFTER SCHOOL
SCHOOLS
DAYCARE
HEALTHCARE
PUBLIC
UNEMPLOYMENT
MEDIAN HOUSEHOLD INCOME
MEDIAN RESIDENT AGE
100%
$70,000
55
34
0%
$12,000
Public facilites in Bushwick include: the Knickerbrocker Avenue NYC Police Station; the Wilson Avenue NYPD Facility; the Central Avenue NYCHA Police Svc Area; and four NYC Fire Houses.
POPULATION DENSITY (PEOPLE/SQUARE MILE)
0
310,000
20,000
DEMOGRAPHICS RESIDENTS SPEAKING SPANISH AT HOME UE
ING
SH FLU
N AVE
ENUE
MYRTLE AV
W
YC KO F
FA VE
NU
BR
E
Based on 2005-2010 data source: http://www.city-data.com/ neighborhood/Bushwick-Brooklyn-NY. html#boxMAPborder
OA D
WA Y
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
AFRICAN-AMERICAN
WHITE-NON HISPANIC
ASIAN
100%
100%
100%
0%
The maps representing the demographics of the area reveal a sharp Spanish speaking community in Bushwick flowing into the neighboring areas of Ridgewood, Queens. The dominance of Spanish is clear in both maps; “Residents speaking Spanish at home” and “Hispanic” demographic. It is particularly interesting how sharp the contrast is with neighboring area of Bedford-Stuyvesant, which has a predominantly African-American population. The border of Broadway is clearly the boundary between the two populations. The young white-non hispanic population has recently established in the northeastern part of Bushwick, the area adjacent to Williamsburg.
0%
HISPANIC
0%
100%
0%
This section was written and designed by: Stefano Aressti, Joshua Brandt, Braden Crooks, Kaitlin Killpack, Katya Levitskaya, Alberto Salis, Gabrielle Andersen, Charles Chawalko, Bonnie Netel, April De Simone, Ferhat Topuz, Charles Wirene, Shirley Bucknor, Caitlin Charlet, Jonas De Maeyer, Wendy van Kessel, Luca Filippi, Jessica Kisner Giraldo, and Thomas Willemse
35
CITYSTEADING: THE STEADY MAKING OF ECONOMIC AND POLITICAL LIFE AS A COMMUNITY. Stefano Aressti, Joshua Brandt, Braden Crooks, Kaitlin Killpack, Katya Levitskaya, and Alberto Salis. The shadow of Manhattan has cast itself upon the working communities of Bushwick. The crisis of gentrification, with all it’s complexity and seeming inevitability, is in full-bloom. Landlords will raise rents, developers will change zoning, real estate will hype the neighborhood, and investment speculators will rush to cash in. For many residents, community groups, churches, and working-class families, the boom times mean displacement from their homes and the neighborhood. This up-rooting process has already begun to dispossess the communities of Bushwick of the common wealth they have created: in social bonds, small businesses, informal networks, civil society, local culture and daily life. It is a force we reckon with. Do we have a right to our city? The people of Bushwick are finding the answer is no, they were just passing through: the city often belongs to for-profit interests. The story goes that Bushwick is changing, and only a certain class will benefit. The process is more than hip new-comers, more than galleries and coffee shops and hot-spots. There are two critical factors to consider. One is the story being told about Bushwick. The narrative of change is powerful, and it’s used to justify raising rents and new developments. It is self-fulfilling. Second is the private ownership and rent economy of
36
most housing and commercial space in Bushwick, which effectively seperates the rights over space from the people who make a life in those spaces. Therefore, an effective reckoning with the crisis will involve community intervention in the story being told about Bushwick, and the transfer of housing ownership rights into community hands. Neither goal is simple or easy. Looking to the past and key precedents, we can begin to predict some clear paths forward. When Bushwick burned in the 1970s and 80s along with many disenfranchised neighborhoods in New York, squatting and other reclamation projects began taking root in abandoned buildings. These efforts were formalized in Urban Homesteading policy, which allowed for legal transfer of housing to groups who renovated the buildings. This bottom-up process began to form places of larger community organizing, particularly when coupled with other endeavors like community gardens. Some of this property was transfered to Community Land Trusts, which keep housing in perpetual affordability and community control. These efforts helped reshape some neighborhoods in New York, but were often not enough to effect the larger processes of the city. Today, there are
growing efforts to combine community economic activity with housing in order to effectively form alternatives to the dominant system. In Cleavland, since 2009, a network of worker-owned cooperative businesses intend to fund a Community Land Trust that will begin to pull properties off the for-profit housing market, creating affordable housing for workers and the community alike. Credit unions, revolving loan funds and ethically grounded investment institutions are bringing needed finance to the “Solidarity Economy” globally. In New York, networks like Solidarity NYC and the Right To the City Alliance are beginning to strengthen the political power of urban movements and community wealth building. Meanwhile, groups like Picture the Homeless and Sandy Storyline are producing people-powered narratives that tell a different story about key issues in the city.
Together, the planks of community owned housing, cooperative wealth building and capturing the narrative of political discourse, form the agenda we call “Citysteading.” Under many names, the process of Citysteading is expanding globally, nationally and even in Bushwick. Nonetheless, it’s a long way from the people-powered strength needed to counter community displacement. The project focus concerns what’s needed now to lay the foundation for Citysteading, a conceptual structure for expanding the process, and a first step to intervene in the story of gentrification. We suggest legislation to empower local non-profit developers of affordable housing. With the participatory development of a “Community Commons” we believe gaining the right to our city will happen as residents, organizations and community groups to work together for each other’s sake.
BUSH
WORKING TOGETHER
WICK
PLAN TO S NING TAY
In the fight against displacement, it’s easy to become overwhelmed by everything we don’t want. We need to put a positive vision at the forefront of our efforts. Numerous and diverse groups of stakeholders in Bushwick have begun meeting and planning to counter the raising rents and development that threatens to displace them from their homes. Bushwick is planning to stay.
STORY BANK COMMONS COMMUNITY COLLECTING STORIES FOR REFLECTION AND ACTION
DISPLACEMENT / COMMUNITY CONTROLLED ASSETS / SPACES OF OPPORTUNITY
Important Examples: Community Owned Housing
A NETWORK OF STRATEGIES Organize a Participatory Process
Community Land Trust Co-ops Perpetual Affordability Quality and Sustainable
organizations committed to anti-displacement community organizing. As the project develops other partners could join. The Story Bank could symbolically launch the Bushwick Commons with the collection of local ofBank local knowledge throughstories a Participatory Action Research framework. It will be a starting point to build Independent media a new discourse around urban change in Bushwick.
Narrative and Discourse Local production Coalition Building Local Politicians
Netw or k
a Bo rd CT
When oppositional stances must be taken, they can also be framed by this CLT CET Community Community shared vision and plan. For example, Land Trust Energy Trust Community Trust residents who are in opposition to new developments may explain their opposi3. BUILD STOR BANK Maintains in perpetuity The story assets wouild be collected within an online Story Bank 2. GATHER STORIES tion by noting that the project is not adSTORY BANK, where people cound watch stories, and Our team of local adults and youth would pan out into vancing the shared vision for Bushwick add new ones. All stories would be located on a map, Community South Bushwick visiting significant sites, some of which allowing for a spatialized analysis. The STORY BANK as it stands. This keeps a community have alreaduy identified. The team will meet with Asset Trust Space Timebeen Bank would not just be a database. It would be used as a residents and gather digital stories about three meta determined plan for Bushwick’s future generative Bank pedagogical and organizing tool. themes: at the center of the discourse. Diversity of New and Long term Residents 1. Gentrification and displacement 2. Community controlled assets 3. Spaces of opportunity
Cross-Sectional Assets
By collecting stories, histories, plans and hopes for Bushwick into a common ‘story bank,’ we believe that the process of placing a positive future at the center of discussion can begin, and some first, simple commitments to each other can take place.
Materials Exchange
The begining of a movement?
4. CO-CREATE PUBLIC PRESENTATION
The STORY BANK project team would work with the Story Assets to develop a performative event that presents the stories back to the community in the form of a Parade Against Displacement. The group will define a route, write a script, produce multimedia installations, and invite other local organizations to contribute. Additionally Bushwick Collective will create a series of murals inspired by the STORY BANK meta themes and real stories of community members.
By framing actions taken by individual groups or as a coalition with a simple plan and vision for the future of Bushwick, these groups can begin to alter the story being told about Bushwick’s future. This can begin as simply as saying ‘we are planning to stay,’ and can over time become as detailed as some proposals in this document.
s
Worker-owned business Co-op groceries Credit Unions 1.Revolving GATHER PROJECT Loan Funds TEAM Equitable Finance The STORY BANK Project could be catalyzed by a core Time Bank team of long-term community members, new local creative professionals and local arts and culture Community Block Grant
Su er or t pp
Community Wealth Building
Members
Each of the groups mobilizing in this effort has a remarkable amount in common. Each of these groups may be displaced within the next ten to fifteen years if current trends are not abated.
6. PLEDGE 5. ANTI - DISPLACEMENT PROCESSION
There is a strong history of walking tours, street parties and protest in Bushwick. The Procession Against Displacement builds off this tradition. Through the live telling of stories, multimedia projections on buildings, street theatre and music, the event would publicly honor stories of struggle, celebrate collectively controlled assets, and identify sites of opportunity including viable vacant buildings.
CEREMONY
The Procession could coalesce in a Pledge Ceremony, where individuals, organizations, and public officials would pledge a contribution towards the creation of a Community Trust. Contributions could be as simple as volunteer hours or in-kind legal services. Large organizations could pledge staff power, or even pledge to their properties for the future Land Trust.
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STORY BANK
COLLECTING STORIES FOR REFLECTION AND ACTION
DISPLACEMENT / COMMUNITY CONTROLLED ASSETS / SPACES OF OPPORTUNITY
1. GATHER PROJECT TEAM
The STORY BANK Project could be catalyzed by a core team of long-term community members, new local creative professionals and local arts and culture organizations committed to anti-displacement community organizing. As the project develops other partners could join. The Story Bank could symbolically launch the Bushwick Commons with the collection of local knowledge through a Participatory Action Research framework. It will be a starting point to build a new discourse around urban change in Bushwick.
4. CO-CREATE PUBLIC PRESENTATION
The STORY BANK project team would work with the Story Assets to develop a performative event that presents the stories back to the community in the form of a Parade Against Displacement. The group will define a route, write a script, produce multimedia installations, and invite other local organizations to contribute. Additionally Bushwick Collective will create a series of murals inspired by the STORY BANK meta themes and real stories of community members.
3. BUILD STOR BANK
2. GATHER STORIES
The story assets wouild be collected within an online STORY BANK, where people cound watch stories, and add new ones. All stories would be located on a map, allowing for a spatialized analysis. The STORY BANK would not just be a database. It would be used as a generative pedagogical and organizing tool.
Our team of local adults and youth would pan out into South Bushwick visiting significant sites, some of which have alreaduy been identified. The team will meet with residents and gather digital stories about three meta themes: 1. Gentrification and displacement 2. Community controlled assets 3. Spaces of opportunity
6. PLEDGE
CEREMONY
5. ANTI - DISPLACEMENT PROCESSION
There is a strong history of walking tours, street parties and protest in Bushwick. The Procession Against Displacement builds off this tradition. Through the live telling of stories, multimedia projections on buildings, street theatre and music, the event would publicly honor stories of struggle, celebrate collectively controlled assets, and identify sites of opportunity including viable vacant buildings.
The Procession could coalesce in a Pledge Ceremony, where individuals, organizations, and public officials would pledge a contribution towards the creation of a Community Trust. Contributions could be as simple as volunteer hours or in-kind legal services. Large organizations could pledge staff power, or even pledge to their properties for the future Land Trust.
KEY PRECEDENTS EVERGREEN COOPERATIVES Evergreen Cooperative Corporation 501c3 Non-Profit
Evergreen Coops are a network of worker-owned businesses in Cleveland, OH. The organization began in 2009 with a ‘green’ woker-owned laundry and a worker-owned solar energy cooperative. The network expanded in 2012 to include an urban farm and newspaper, both worker-owned. Worker-ownership allows workers to make decisions about the future of the businesses, and receive their share of profits. A 501c3 umbrella organization ensures that the mission of community wealth building and sustainability are followed throughout the companies. Soon, Evergreen will create a Community Land Trust along with ever more worker coops in order to further integrate itself in Cleavland. www.evergreencooperatives.com 38
Evergreen Cooperative Development Fund (Funds new co-ops)
Cooperatives: Ohio Solar
Business Services
Land Trust
Evergreen Laundry Green City Growers (Urban Agriculture) Neighborhood Voice (Paper)
Cleveland Neighborhoods
PROPOSED LEGISLATION NEIGHBORHOOD OPPORTUNITIES PROGRAM (NOP)
HPD Urban Homesteading
CREATING OPPORTUNITIES FOR COMMUNITY DRIVEN AFFORDABLE HOUSING AND SMALL BUSINESS DEVELOPMENT In neighborhoods such as Bushwick which are experiencing the fact paced erosion of affordable housing, there is a need for renewed City support for community driven affordable housing and small business development. As such it is proposed that New York Housing Preservation Department (HPD) introduce such a program. The Neighborhood Opportunities Program (NOP) would support community based organizations to undertake the rehabilitation, management and acquisition of clusters of distressed multifamily privately owned buildings that have either been in Liens or vacant for more than 2 years. NOP support would be made available in specific neighborhoods experiencing exceptionally high rates of housing market inflation and the loss of affordable rental housing. It is our belief that given the political will this legislation could easily be put together by HPD utilizing fragments of past and existing law including the Homesteading Program, and Neighborhood Entrepreneurs Program (NEP), and the HomeWorks Program. A minimum of 60% of rental units developed in each building under NOP would be made available low-income (50% to 80% of MFI) or very low income residents (30% - 50% of MFI).
HOW IT COULD WORK
HUD Multifamily + Local properties Urban Homesteading Program
Philadelphia UH HPD NEP Program
HPD Multi Family Preservation Program
FRAGMENTS OF LEGISLATIVE PRECEDENCE - Temp conveyance by NPHDFC - Funding package of Rehabilitation grants + loans, Low Income Housing Tax Credit, low interest City loans, + more. - Access to HPD vacant property
- Building purchase funds (Assessed land value) - Technical Assistance - Rehabilitation funds - Gov. Facilitated purchase of vacant or distressed private Property
- Authority to fast-track Foreclosure of vacant buildings
- Building purchase funds for Multifamily distressed + In-liens buildings.
A NEW MODEL FOR THE ACQUISITION AND REHABILITATION OF VACANT PROPERTY
BUSHWICK COMMONS
NOT FOR PROFIT
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IDENTIFY PROPERTY CLUSTER AND SUBMIT A REQUEST FOR QUALIFICATIONS TO HPD
HPD ACCEPTANCE
WORK WITH HPD TO DEVELOP FULL FINANCIAL PACKAGE + SITE DEVELOPMENT MANAGEMENT AGREEMENT (SDMA)
HPD NEGOTIATED PURCHASE OF PROPERTIES
OWNERSHIP TRANSFERED TO NEIGHBORHOOD PARTNERSHIP HOUSING DEVELOPMENT FUND CORPORATION.
BUILDING REHABILITATION
HPD BUILDING INSPECTION
TRANSFER FULL OWNERSHIP TO BUSHWICK COMMONS
TENANTS SELECTED
HPD (NOP)
PRIVATE OWNERS
TEMP PROPERTY CONVEYANCE TO BUSHWICK COMMONS
SWEAT EQUITY BUSHWICK COMMONS
TECH ASSISTANCE
BUSHWICK COMMONS
STRUCTURAL RENO.
POTENTIAL CLUSTER
456 Central Avenue Year built: 1910 2 fam with one store
454 Central Avenue Year built: 1915 3 Units
452 Central Avenue Year built: 1910 2 fam with one store
630 Central Avenue Year built: 1910 5-6 fam with 1 store
621 Central Avenue Year built: 1910 6 fam with one store
Market Value: $363,000, Assessed: $6,152 Current Status: Vacant Owner : Private owner Years vacant: Unknown
Market Value: $430,000, Assessed: $14,804 Current Status: Vacant Owner : Private Owner Years vacant: Unknown
Market Value: $310,000, Assessed: $11,734 Current Status: Vacant Owner : Private Owner Years vacant: Unknown
Market Value: $533,000, Assessed: $51,608 Current Status: Vacant Owner - Ivie LLC Years vacant: 10 +
Market Value: $501,000, assessed: $16,338 Current Status: Vacant Owner : Private Owner Years vacant: 8 +
COOPER SQUARE COMMUNITY LAND TRUST The Cooper Square MHA/CLT is a shining New York based example of a working collective ownership model that removes housing from the speculative market, and holds it under community control for permanent affordability. It is the result of six decades of community-based planning and political organizing. Today the Cooper Square MHA manages 25 buildings, 399 units of affordable housing, 14 lofts, and 24 storefronts. Tenants own their buildings collectively as part of a ‘scattered-site’ non-profit cooperative under a Mutual Housing Association (MHA). The housing stock is thus managed at an economy of scale, which supports both affordability as well as the adequate maintenance of housing for future generations. The land under these buildings is owned by a Community Land Trust (CLT), a non-profit organization, which stewards the use of this land for the purpose of low-income housing in perpetuity. A rigorous board structure in each entity, distributes the balance of power between tenants and a broader group of community members, assuring accountability and protection from internal and external threats.
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BUSHWICK INCLUSIVE Gabrielle Andersen, Charles Chawalko, Bonnie Netel, April De Simone, Ferhat Topuz, and Charles Wirene.
TOWARDS INCLUSIVITY & NONDISPLACEMENT There is a chronic housing crisis in New York City that is founded in limited access, unaffordability, a speculative real estate market, and the precariousness of tenure for both renters and owners. The effects from this crisis reverberate throughout the wider community and influence health, economic vitality, educational opportunities, and other social capacities. The Brooklyn community of Bushwick represents both acute and extreme cases of these conditions and therefore provides a fertile opportunity to co-design innovative solutions that drive social change. Our framework is based on the belief that if a more inclusive community of stakeholders have access to socially innovative tools, resources, and networks that take into account their skills while engaging their participation, community projects will have a greater impact - leading to overall systematic change instead of just local interventions. This project’s end goal is to create an innovative and sustainable social impact venture to build affordable housing alternatives. These alternatives will be fundamental in generating a variety of transformative and developmental experiences to spur economic development, educational growth, and community engagement. We believe our model supports a healthy
and positive balance by bringing together existing and new residents of Bushwick to enjoy simple, comfortable, and affordable living in both the short and long term. Additionally, the proposal’s flexibility means the model can extend beyond housing to generate opportunities throughout the community, improving the overall quality of life for ALL. Instead of the sorting out and separation of different people that has characteried New York City’s evolution over the last few generations, our work aims to (re) establish a more integrated city, made up of healthier, more diverse, and inclusive neighborhoods. This proposal begins with affordable housing, but naturally extends to the other systems that make up the city.
WHO’S LIVING IN BUSHWICK Bushwick is a melting pot with a population of over 112,000. The existing neighborhood is in part represented by the nearly 66% of Hispanic origin and 20% is African American. It is important to note that the minority is the majority in Bushwick since the largest population of Hispanic/Latinos in New York City resides here. When looking at homeownership, as of 2007, 17% of Latino residents have owned their home in relationship to the 31% of African Americans and 10% of Whites. However, the percentage of renters in Bushwick is evenly spread in which 82% of both White and Latino populations rent in Bushwick.
HOW DO YOU BUILD THAT AWARENESS BETWEEN NEW PEOPLE AND PEOPLE WHO LIVE IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD—AND HOUSE SOME KIND OF UNITY BETWEEN PEOPLE FROM BOTH SIDES? LAURA GOTTESDINER, FREELANCE JOURNALIST
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This neighborhood has seen a history of redlining and other neighborhood challenges, however, have also been seeing waves of growth most recently. Part of this growth is due to the moving in of young professionals and other members of the creative class. This pattern has also taken place in the bordering neighborhood of Williamsburg. The 2010 Census shows us that the white population of Bushwick has increased over 200%, including an increase of the population of whites over 18 by 270% (since 2000). This represents that the rate at which these new residents are moving in is increasing dramatically. One concern with these new residents is that with or without knowing, their short-term residency in an area such as Bushwick causes a quick turn over of increased rents. This turn over then causes those that have roots in the neighborhood to move due to unaffordability. According to a survey conducted by the Design and Urban Ecologies program at Parsons, residents in Bushwick that had a longer tenure of over 20 years still rented, including those born in the neighborhood. This population of people is being pressured to leave due to increasing rents. While this influx of new short-term residents creates an increase in the local revenue (by opening bars, restaurants, creating community gardens, and galleries), these new residents (new graduates/ young professionals and artists) remain in a similar precarious economic situation as the local long term residents, and may not even know it; hence their reasoning for moving to a more affordable community. Long term or new, 85.1% of the people in Bushwick are renters, and 58% of those people pay more than 30% of their income toward rent. Housing must be inclusive of all people based on this commonality.
WHAT WILL THE NEW ECOLOGY OF HOUSING LOOK LIKE? TO THE RIGHT IS A VACANT BUILDING SHOWING THE POSSIBILITIES OF INNOVATIVE RENOVATIONS; THE MAP BELOW ILLUSTRATES THE IDEA OF BUILDING CLUSTERS AND IS USED IN THE FINANCIAL MODEL PROJECTIONS BELOW.
3rd
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1st Floor: E xisting Fam ilies
nits
Units
- 2 Units
PROJECTED FINANCIAL MODEL
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THE HYBRID IMPACT MODEL
STRUCTURE: FORM THE B-CORP The Benefit and B-Corp structures legally allow for-profit businesses to include social impact goals in their corporate charter and by-laws, defending the pursuit of social and environmental bottom lines in addition to increasing share holder value. Third party evaluators certify and rate the B-Corp’s performance, allowing potential investors to compare the company’s activity to their social mission. B-Corps allow for more innovative and unrestrictive financial modeling, which can be tailored to meet community needs or creatively support non-traditional models. Prominent New York City development models that already exist are Community Development Corporations, aka CDCs, the New York City Housing Association, aka NYCHA, and private developers. CDCs are not-for profits created to manage local government economic development projects. CDCs are exempt from laws that guide governments’ operations and financial transactions, increasing the risk of waste, fraud, or abuse of taxpayer dollars and assets. NYCHA is a public authority with an enormous operating shortfall ($60 million / year), disappearing housing subsidies, and troubled relationships with their residents. Private developers focus on maximizing profit by replacing affordable real estate with luxury housing and displacing those who cannot afford market prices. Taking these things into account, the B-Corp offers more flexibility, transparency, and community involvement in the processes, alongside access to more diverse financing sources and a wide community of social change agents.
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STRATEGIC ANALYSIS The strategic analysis component of our model promotes an informed design process. In this phase, we expand our understanding the socio-demographics, challenges, goals, values, as well as the constructed environment of the targeted community. Further, we encourage a participatory process by working closely with community members to facilitate an informed analytical lens that seeks to promote inclusive strategies. Using census and other demographic survey data, we can understand who lives in the neighborhood and the changes happening there before speaking and working with local residents. Additionally, we are able to visualize the public amenities and services in Bushwick to get a better understanding of the neighborhood’s infrastructure and resources, or lack thereof, and the possible opportunities to improve them. In addition, using a survey and spatial analyses we identified potentially vacant property clusters that serve as possible areas to begin the acquisition and occupation processes. The clusters are made up of smaller one to four story residential buildings whose proximity to one another creates better opportunities to share resources among and create services for residents. They also recognize the possibility for efficiencies that come with undertaking multiple projects within a certain distance from each other, such as bundled property buying, coordinated volunteer labor, or shared decentralized power generation.
IDENTIFY INVOLVEMENT From the strategic analysis we look to expand the scope of potential stakeholders and identify collaborative partners to form Collective Action Agreements, aka CAAs, with. CAAs define the terms and conditions of the partnerships while outlining the B-Corp’s mission to have positive community, educational, and economic impact. CAAs bring community stakeholders into the development process while ensuring the B- Corp’s activity aligns with the community agreement. One partnership our B-Corp model looks at is with academic institutions and the potential of expanding their role as community anchors. Students, faculty, and university staff need and pay for housing, while the university’s costs of acquiring and maintaining dedicated student housing are quickly becoming unsustainable. A partnership and CAA between the B-Corp and The New School or other academic institution would: – Establish a pre-identified source of income to support the return on investment, aka ROI, schedule, which acts as an incentive for social impact investors to invest; – Create research opportunities on the effectiveness of academic institutions becom ing a community anchor through collective agreements in and with communities; – Generate opportunities for students and faculty to offer services to community members in exchange for affordable housing, student debt forgiverness, funding opportunities, etc. An alternative to the dominant narrative of university development models accelerating gentrification and displacement, this agreement transforms the inescapable student housing process into a vehicle for social impact, inclusion, and neighborhood stability, making the university part of the solution towards a new ecology of housing.
RESOURCES In addition to standard affordable housing incentives - Affordable Housing Tax Credits, 80/20 New Construction Housing program, 421A Residential Property Tax Breaks, Inclusionary Zoning, etc - what makes this development model unique is the B-Corp’s opportunity to access private and for-profit sources of capital with a focus on social & environmental impact, including Social Impact Investors, Development Impact Bonds, and Crowdfunding. Social Impact Investments, aka SIIs, create positive impacts beyond standard financial returns. They provide capital, with the expectation of some financial returns, to businesses dedicated to creating positive social and/or environmental impact. SIIs will take risks that traditional investors or lenders are not willing to, specifically into innovative models that deliver these social impacts. Examples of Social Impact Investor Platforms: Mission Markets RSF, Investors Circle J.P. Morgan. Social Impact Bonds, aka SIBs, raise private investment capital to fund prevention and early intervention programs that reduce the need for expensive crisis responses and safety-net services. The government repays investors only if the intervention successfully improves social outcomes, such as reducing homelessness or the number of repeat offenders in the criminal justice system. SIBs are also called Pay for Success
or Social Benefit Bonds. Crowdfunding can replace traditional grant applications and fundraising with a more grassroots approach of crowd participation and smaller investments pooled to achieve a larger outcome. Although popularized by smaller social, personal, and cultural endeavors, new streamlined approaches can quickly implement crowdfunding for small-scale or sudden needs, while structures are being created to further formalize and legitimize the tool for investors with different strategies.
INCLUSIVE DESIGN MODEL & COMMUNITYSTEADING After on the ground analysis, strategic partnering, and securing funding, the development process begins. Having identified and acquired properties through donation, government subsidies, and individual or bundled purchases, we can start to design living spaces. This process will question standard housing design, working with community members to ensure appropriate living spaces. Considering both the long-term and newly arriving Bushwick residents, innovative possibilities for shared amenities and spaces, as well as considerations of different housing needs, create an entirely new housing model - a model responding to the reality of the neighborhood. Once designed, the build-out process will include local residents, organizations, and volunteers, while utilizing sweat equity, local unions, and other local tradesmen. These partnerships will help reduce the project costs while also forging new relationships and cultivating the seeds for a healthier, stronger community. The rehabilitations must take advantage of sustainability and building efficiency resources to further cut their build-out costs as well as residents long term operating costs. This process will also engage residents to take more agency in their infrastructure and housing ecology. Residents will enter into a CommunitySteading Agreement which commits them to acting as engaged members of the community. By providing skillsets and and expertise to the neighborhood, the model promotes daily interactions among diverse residents, strengthening the social fabric and community network. Examples of this CommunitySteading could be working in a local grocery, supporting a childcare cooperative, starting a local clinic, working in a community kitchen, providing tenants’ rights or public defender services, or collecting community organic waste for the community garden
POLICY To address the structural vacancy and speculative purchasing trends happening in Bushwick, there should be property tax and other financial penalties for keeping spaces permanently unoccupied. An example is charging property owners a higher Class 4 tax rate if they own a vacant Class 1 or 2 property, responding to an inherent problem with the City tax code. Another penalty could be created for vacancies existing for more than six months. Additionally, if these regulations are not followed, legislation can be proposed for the city to acquire these warehoused properties for entrance into a land bank and eventual community land trust. In tandem with these first policies, New York City should create a formal land bank that can acquire vacant building or lots for the purpose of developing affordable housing. This land bank should be held in the stewardship of qualified housing advocates and community representatives, acting as a check against the incursions of speculative developers. Finally, we can pursue the creation of a State-Appointed investigation committee to look into the current problems with the NYC Housing Court. From previous conversations with housing advocates working in the city, major interventions by landlords and developers in the housing court system give them unfair representation and friendliness. This makes it incredibly difficult for renters to voice their complaints or situations in a system that was originally meant to allow them the opportunity to try their cases.
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ENGAGING LOTS
Shirley Bucknor, Caitlin Charlet, Jonas De Maeyer, Wendy van Kessel, Luca Filippi, Jessica Kisner Giraldo, and Thomas Willemse.
DIVERTING THE CAUSES OF DISPLACEMENT
DISPLACED PEOPLE
RENTS
RISE overcrowding
We believe the aim to divert the causes of displacement will lend the foundation towards a more engaged community. Through agreements with the owners of vacant lots, the actors can begin to build a space for the community to gather and pursue their shared image of the neighborhood. Other spaces are set up to divert the problems of displacement. The creation of skills and jobs are crucial as it can provide the people with a tool towards a more self-sustained future. The goal is to create permanent spaces of habitation both for the people at risk and already displaced people.
residents move out
first newcomers move on followed by more affluent newcomers
NEWCOMERS
residents move out
Nowadays, Bushwick finds itself at the centre of a culture quake. New, hip and young people are attracted to the neighborhood bringing with them new lifestyles and identities. New bars and places to eat are popping up, streets are cleaner and properties appear to be well maintained. This wave of newcomers therefore appears to be a positive influence in the neighborhood; however, the new popularity has had some major effects on the housing stock of the neighborhood that may not be viewed as favorable to the local residents, of which not all newcomers are aware.
house renovated house deregulated landowner stops upkeep of rent-controlled house
DEVELOPERS
DISPLACED PEOPLE
NEWCOMERS
new large developments for affluent newcomers residents move out
MONEY FLOW OUT OF COMMUNITY
Short Leases: First of all he short stays of students and young professionals have provided the perfect opportunity for very fast readjustments of rental prices every time a new tenant moves in. This has made these short-term tenants preferable to the landlords compared to the long-term contracts which most of the local residents have. At the same time, there have been instances where landlords persuade and help the long-term residents vacate properties sooner by presenting incentives such as refunding moving costs, airplane tickets, pay-
out stipends, etc. The houses are then renovated and the rents multiply. The local residents are being displaced by the rapid rent increases and have pressingly become people at risk of entering into the shelter system and facing the overall reality of homelessness.
MONEY
Speculation: This wave has also brought the overwhelming interests of profit-driven developers. New condos are erected at an alarming rate, targeted for affluent populations that are coming from outside the neighborhood, and excluding local residents, who mostly fall within lower income brackets. The money flow coming from rents of the newcomers benefits absent landlords instead of the local economy.
INSIDE
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RETURN DISPLACED PEOPLE
FLOW
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s nt e re ris
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SI O N
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DEVELOPERS
DEVELOPERS
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MONEY FLOW OUT OF COMMUNITY
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When we look at a map with the new developments in Bushwick it is clear that they follow a general direction from EastWilliamsburg into West-Bushwick, but have not yet crossed Myrtle Avenue where the M-train line is currently being renovated.
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Together these effects instigated by the newcomers together with the speculative developers that followed them, form a powerful change within the community of Bushwick, displacing local residents in the process. We believe that a strongly engaged local community can counteract this process, welcoming the changes and new residents on the one hand, but preventing the displacement on the other hand. The strong engagement of local residents can separate the speculation that is happening from the wave of newcomers that is moving in and create a double diversion: First to divert the short-term newcomers away from competing
with the permanent housing stock and engage them and secondly to divert speculative development. Under the heading of “prevention is better than cure”, our aim is to first prevent the displacement of long-term residents out of their (rent-controlled/rent-stabilized/foreclosed) apartments. Secondly by using the money flow of the newcomers, instead of letting it flow out of the community through speculative development, we aim to bring back the displaced people, intertwining both groups in the process. 1. Spaces of habitation: Rather than just providing new houses for already displaced residents, we want to tackle the problem at the root; increasing home-ownership in Bushwick for the long-term residents to counteract the volatile market fluctuations. To transform the home-ownership and turn these dwellings into permanent housing - spaces of habitation – we need a strategic and supportive system of other
spaces. These are the spaces of meaning that both expose and sustain a new housing strategy for Bushwick. The spaces we identified are: 2. Spaces of engagement: providing informational support. It can be a space for the education of tenants in their legal rights but it is also a physical space to come together and find communal support. 3. Spaces of production: providing job support, creating work- and learning places for people at risk to eventually become more self-sustainable. 4. Spaces of transition: providing financial support, generated on vacant lots from temporary housing for temporary residents. These spaces can absorb the pressure, created by the newcomers, on the permanent housing stock, to at least slow down the increase of rents, causing displacement. They could in future become permanent.
TOWARDS SPACES OF HABITATION
CURRENT SITUATION
rent $
government support $
rent controlled
market conform
resident owned
shelter
vacant lot
408 lots
market conform
vacant house
resident owned
85% rents
127 houses
15% rents
SHELTER
newcomers rent +4%/yr
SPACES OF ENGAGEMENT/SPACES OF PRODUCTION
displaced people rent +20%/yr
The interplay between newcomers and developers causes higher rents. The long-term residents consequently are displaced and move into shelters. This gives the opportunity to developers and homeowners to start renovating and the rents rise accordingly. Spaces of habitation are needed for the current temporary residents, to prevent them from being displaced. The great number of vacant lots forms a potential to start this.
seed capital $
A strategic and supportive system of spaces is introduced here, starting with both spaces of engagement and spaces of production. These physical spaces both enable the community to reinforce and come together on vacant lots, and to support and create jobs for the people in need of a stable income.
SHELTER
lease (a) job income (b) a. lot owner b. displaced people c. community corporation
income $ people at risk
community members divert rent $
SPACES OF TRANSITION Here, spaces are introduced for temporary residents, providing a money flow that financially supports the founding of spaces of habitation for people at risk of loosing their homes and already displaced people through a CLT. These spaces can absorb the pressure – created by the newcomers – on the permanent housing stock, to at least slow down the increase of rents that cause displacement.
reinvestment $ lease (a) job income (b) rent (c) a. lot owner b. displaced people c. newcomers community corporation
divert newcomers
CONTINUING SPACES OF HABITATION
investment capital: income out of rent $
With financial support from the CLT, current long-term residents that are at risk of loosing their apartment, spaces of habitation are created to prevent them from being displaced of their (foreclosed) homes. The CLT and the residents together buy the property. Eventually, residents become co-owner and the CLT owns the land.
lease (a) job income (b) rent (c) a. lot owner b. displaced people c. newcomers community corporation
lease (a) organisation asssets (b) a. residents (people at risk) b. CLT (owner building/land)
tenants
NEW SPACES OF HABITATION
generated income investment capital: income out of rent $ lease (a) job income (b) rent (c) a. lot owner b. displaced people c. newcomers community corporation
sweat equity & lease (a) organisation assets (b) a. residents (displaced people) b. CLT (owner building/land)
SHELTER
Following the same strategy, displaced people, temporarily housed in shelters, are supported to become a co-owner of a renovated vacant house. Sweat equity - learned through skill training and their income, supplemented by the CLT’s assets is used to buy the property. Eventually, residents become co-owner and the CLT owns the land.
displaced people lease (a) job income (b) rent (c) a. lot owner b. displaced people c. co-owners / CLT
co-owners CLT
SPACES OF HABITATION
co-owners CLT
The people at risk of the first street have become secure homeowners through the co-op, the displaced homeless people from the shelter have found a new permanent home in one of the former vacant houses. Once the spaces of transition have supported the creation of spaces of habitation, it can itself transform into a space of habitation.
SHELTER
co-op
market conform resident owned
co-op
shelter
market conform
co-op
resident owned
BUSHWICK GOES VIRAL Starting with grounds for agreement, vacant lots will be transformed into spaces of engagement or spaces of production. Subsequently, spaces of transition will be established on these lots, creating a money flow that enables us to transform houses from people at risk and vacant houses into spaces of habitation for long-term residents.
spaces of engegement/production ground for agreement spaces of transition spaces of habitation
45
PHASE 1: DISCOVERING PLACE SPATIAL ANALYSIS
What happens in the neighbourhood? What facilities, public spaces and public services exist? Who lives here? What skills and jobs exist? What are the development patterns? What are the zoning policies? How many vacant lots and buildings exist?
LOTS
Where are these lots located? Who are the owners? What types of lots are these (Benevolent or Speculative)? Identify condition of lots- paved, plumbing infrastructure, unpaved, abandoned, parking lot etc.
PEOPLE
Identify the people that can help Identify the organizations from the neighbourhood Identify local authorities Identify potential lot owners Continue dialogue with potential players Pilot: Identified groups: The church, school, local shelters and neighbours
PHASE 2: ENGAGEMENT PROCESS IDENTIFY NEEDS
Identify the needs of the key players and representatives of community Pilot: The following needs have beenidentified: COMMUNITY •Education •Skill DEVELOPMENT RESOURCES •c ommunity CENTRE
CHURCH •Parking •SPacE for EVENTS I.E. BIBLE STUDIES, GATHERINGS
FORM COMMITTEE
Identify specific roles within committee • Vacant lot & research group • Administrative group • Grant writing & treasurer Look for funding through the following: • Crowdfunding • Grants • Sponsorship • Investments • Development & design group Look for potential partners to build.
PHASE 3: GROUNDS OF AGREEMENT
PHASE 4: DESIGN PROCESS
MAKE CONTACT
DESIGN
• Identify a potential owner • Direct conversation with lot owners • Possible development discussion (Proposal) • Agreement types Define lease terms and development of vision of permanent structure with lot owner Pilot: Lot will be leased through a 99 year agreement with the owner In talking with the church, we discussed the need to establish a working partnership with Bushwick Leaders’ Highschool to negotiate use of the school’s parking lot
Collaborate with the design committee to co-design the shared vision of the community. In the pilot, the following space unctions have been determined: -Spaces of engagement -Spaces of production -Spaces of transition -Spaces of habitation Follow-up with any revisions or updates until a general consensus has been attained within a reasonabletime frame. This design should reflect the needs the community.
LEGAL REGISTRATION
METHOD
Create an organization or company to be recognized as a legal entity. Define whether it is a nonprofit, for profitorganization or an LLC with a social context, for example a B-Corpmodel, under a Co-op or / and a Community Land Trust (CLT).
Design - Assembly - Deliberation Redesign - Assembly - Deliberation... Consensus - Approved project LIMITED EQUITY COOPERATIVE ORGANIZATION OWNS
Pilot: Start with a Non-profit and then form a Limited Equity Cooperative (Fig. 2) in hopes of establishing a CLT in the future.
BUY SHARES
MEETING SPACE
RESIDENTS
If possible find a space to gather = “A space of engagement” Invite the lot owner to meet Make a presentation Pilot: This space has been identified as the bigger lot owned by the church on Stanhope Street. (See image 2)
SHAREHOLDERS
THE RESIDENTS BECOME SHAREHOLDERS AND ARE ENTITLED TO A LONG TERM LEASE AND A VOTE IN THE GOVERNANCE OF THE CO-OP. THEY BECOME BOTH THE ‘TENANTS’ BECAUSE OF THEIR LEASE AND ‘OWNERS’ BECAUSE THEY HAVE STOCK OWNERSHIP Fig. 2
METHODS METHODS
PAR (Participatory Action Research methods) Conduct Fieldwork & ethnography • Surveys & interviews Identify secondary sources: • Look-up archived information via internet, libraries Mapping: • Retrieve archived maps
Owner: Iglesia Cristiana Sinai Margie Santiago 718-443-0289/718-443-1757 Price: 992,000 Zoning: R6 Lot #: 31-29 Block #: 3265 Lot area: 9447sq. ft. Front: 79 ft Depth: 360.09 ft
• Sociogram/ fluxograms to understand power relationships, problems and networks in the community • Spiral method to understand the strengths and weaknesses of the committee and the community as a whole• Focus groups • Programs •Park activities • Sidewalk bus (Metro World Child) •Other activities...
34.5% PRIVATE INDIVIDUALS 8% CITY 5.5% GARDENS 4.5% CHURCHES 0.5% NON-PROFIT 47% CORPORATIONS
CORPORATIONS
LS LOTS 18.5% BENEVOLENT 81.5% SPECULATIVE
Chart of Lot Ownership - Fig. 1
PILOT SITE 46
NON-PROFIT
PRIVATE INDIVIDUALS
CITY
COMMUNITY GARDENS
CHURCHES
Map of Vacant Lots in Bushwick - Image 1
SPACE OF ENGAGEMENT The spaces of engagement will seek to provide information and enhance community support. For example, these spaces can serve as platforms for the education of residents in knowing their legal rights and how to avoid unwarranted evictions or foreclosures. Inherently, these spaces will serve as physical locations to come together to find communal support and build solidarity.
SPACE OF PRODUCTION The aim behind the spaces of production is to provide training, jobs, and skill development for people at risk of displacement either from work or home to eventually become more self-sustaining. Here, a community kitchen will serve as the place of production to develop cooking skills and serve as a profitable component while creating jobs.
SPACE OF TRANSITION
SPACE OF HABITATION
The goal of these spaces of transition is to provide housing to the short term residents likely to stay for less than 3 years
The spaces of habition is the proposal’s aim. These spaces will serve to house permanent local residents at risk of losing their homes and those who have been displaced. These residents can eventually become owners by the purchasing the units under a cooperative model governed by the CLT.
Function of space: • Housing for short term residents
FOR SALE
To define the physical component of the proposed space, a first and strategic space of meaning could be a gathering room. This room can be used to strengthen the ties between people as they organize to meet.
Function of space: • Community Kitchen • Events
Function of space • Construction Workshops • Education • Meetings • Assemblies • Events
The spaces are always spaces of production in the phase of construction. Construction skills can be developed and shared between the novice and expert groups.
OR
Why is this important? It is a strategy to maintain the flow ofmoney within the community Income out the rent charged will remain within the community to support and invest in people at risk of displacement as well as aid those already displaced.
For whom is this space for? • Open to the public Who is going to construct this space? • Actors • Social architecture organizations • Local construction companies • Community members (novice & experts) • Members from the local shelter
possible partners not for profit income
not for profit
income LEC
income LEC
CLT income
vacant house
income LEC
CLT LEC
foreclosure
income
for profit
TRUST
committees
LEC
production
possible partners
profit
vacant lot
B-corp
engagement
transition
possible partners
47
JUST AS QUICKLY AS YOU READ THIS...YOU ARE NOW INVOLVED
DESIGN AND URBAN ECOLOGIES SPRING ’13 STUDIO
DEVELOPED FOR Graduate Program in Design and Urban Ecologies Miguel Robles-Duran, Director School of Design Strategies Parsons The New School for Design The New School
COORDINATED BY Gabriela Rendon Architect and Urban Planner Adjunct Professor School of Design Strategies Parsons the New School for Design Frank Morales Housing Activist and Writer Adjunct Professor
RESEARCH AND DESIGN STRATEGIES CitySteading in Bushwick: A Way Forward Developed by Stefano Aressti, Joshua Brandt, Braden Crooks, Kaitlin Killpack, Katya Levitskaya, Alberto Salis Bushwick Inclusive Developed by Gabrielle Andersen, Charles Chawalko,Bonnie Netel, April De Simone, Ferhat Topuz, Charles Wirene Engaging Lots Developed by Shirley Bucknor, Caitlin Charlet, Jonas De Maeyer, Wendy van Kessel, Luca Filippi, Jessica Kisner Giraldo, Thomas Willemse
School of Design Strategies Parsons the New School for Design
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS We would like to thank Tom Angotti, Dan DeSloover, Brenda Stokely, Hannah Dobbz, Brent Sharman, Lenina Nadal, Gladys Puglia, Andres Perez, Howard Brandstein, Laura Gottesdiener, Sister Katie Maire, as well as all the members of the Bushwick community that participated in this research and design project.
Except where otherwise noted, this work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. To view a copy of this license, visit: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/
IN THE CITY