Housing Starts: Public Housing in Limbo | Safer Streets | Apocalypse in Camden

(credit: Jessica Kourkounis)

1. In public housing, units languish in limbo.  With nearly 179,000 apartments, the authority plays a key role in preserving the affordable housing the city already has. Although the authority has reduced the number of unoccupied units in recent years, it still allows many units to stay empty for long periods, long enough in some cases for the deterioration to spread. As recently as this year, internal auditors faulted the agency for a lack of strategies to return apartments to the rent rolls more quickly. But housing officials say a lack of money is the main impediment to prompt repairs. The agency, which relies on federal housing funds, estimates it has a capital budget shortfall of $6 billion. Many vacant apartments are in limbo, and more are at risk, the officials said, because of the steady decline in federal subsidies. [The New York Times – 12/15/13]
2. A before-and-after guide to safer streets. In the past decade or so, New York has seen a considerable decline in traffic fatalities (30 percent since 2001) and an even more dramatic decrease in the risk of serious injury among cyclists (72 percent since 2000). At the heart of these public safety achievements is better street design. City streets are far from perfect, but as officials have reduced space for cars, they’ve improved mobility for everyone. [The Atlantic Cities – 12/16/13]
3. Investing in NYC’s emerging markets. Seth Pinsky, former president of the New York City Economic Development Corp., is focused on neighborhoods like Jamaica, Queens, with RXR Realty. At RXR, Mr. Pinsky will use the dealmaking skills he showed in arranging redevelopment plans for Willets Point, Coney Island and the Kingsbridge Armory. [Crain’s New York – 12/15/13]
4. Apocalypse, New Jersey: A dispatch from America’s most desperate town.  Camden is just across the Delaware River from the brick and polished cobblestone streets of downtown Philadelphia, where oblivious tourists pour in every year, gobbling cheese steaks and gazing at the Liberty Bell, having no idea that they’re a short walk over the Ben Franklin Bridge from a full-blown sovereignty crisis - an un-Fantasy Island of extreme poverty and violence where the police just a few years ago essentially surrendered a city of 77,000. [Rolling Stone – 12/11/13]
5. De Blasio takes his urban agenda national. Residents of New York, the biggest U.S. city, have come to expect their mayor to play a major role on the national stage, said Howard Wolfson, who oversaw Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s advocacy efforts as deputy mayor for governmental affairs. ‘The mayor-elect has a real opportunity to take a national role on issues he cares about,’ said Wolfson, who worked with de Blasio on Hillary Clinton’s 2000 Senate run from New York. ‘Being mayor of New York gives you a big platform, a big canvass. People listen to you more. [Chicago Tribune – 12/15/13]
6. Mobile homes settling in on Upper West Side. Everyone knows there’s a shortage of affordable housing in New York City. Some people have found an interesting way around the problem: They’re living in mobile homes parked on the street. [CBS News – 12/15/13]
7. Pushing poor people to the suburbs is bad for the environment.  In recent years, an overhyped counterrevolution has emerged in America. Millennials from the suburbs and their empty-nester parents have been flocking to certain desirable urban neighborhoods. This has led to a lot of chin-pulling about ‘demographic inversion,’ wherein the cities become richer and whiter and the suburbs more non-white and poor. Skeptics note that suburbs are in the aggregate still richer and whiter than central cities and most middle-class families still settle in suburbia. [The Grist – 12/13/13]
8. Tenants in soon-to-be demolished LES building demand answers from city.  The last six tenants in a soon-to-be-demolished building on Grand Street are fighting for answers about what will happen to them when they’re forced to leave their homes. The tenants live in 400 Grand St., a city-owned affordable housing tenement that is set to be torn down to make way for the massive Essex Crossing development in the Seward Park Urban Renewal Area. [DNAinfo – 12/13/13]
9. Poll finds hope is running high for next mayor of New York City. With Bill de Blasio’s inauguration less than a month away, New Yorkers are highly optimistic about his mayoralty - but they remain skeptical that he can achieve major changes on some of the core issues that defined his candidacy, like the widening gap between the rich and poor and the scarcity of affordable housing, according to a New York Times/Siena College poll. [The New York Times – 12/13/13]
10. NY Senator Jeffrey Klein to push $750 millions housing plan, paid maternity and family leave. Senate co-leader Jeffrey Klein will unveil a plan for the upcoming legislative session calling for $750 million for middle class housing over five years, along with a requirement that workers receive six weeks paid maternity and family leave. [New York Daily News – 12/13/13]