City To Use Stimulus Funds For Affordable Housing

Note how he didn't thank President Obama for the stimulus money. he hates Obama

Shit, my *sarcasm* html tags didn't show....

So ungrateful!

There is plenty of affordable housing in NJ or Utah for that matter. I never understand why poor people try and live in expensive places.

Seriously. If you're underemployed, and you don't have satisfactory housing, move somewhere else that has a less challenging cost of living. Hard knocks.

Why exactly does the fact that people naturally bid up the prices of desirable assets over less desirable ones represent a "housing crisis" or crisis of any sort? Since when are people who don't own property or who can't afford rent entitled to live just anywhere they want to?

Someone has to work at the local Duane Reade/McD -- attitude and all.

Do what the French do. Ship them out to the suburbs.

you make too much sense for this board... people dont like to see or hear reality.

too late,

there used to be a time in this city when developers worked with the city to help rehab run down buildings as concessions to build.

and what about the schools? for the first time ever children can't get into their zoned school due to bad planing.

there also was a homesteading program in the S. Bronx. yes, homesteading, when was the last time you heard that term?

So much for Harlem gentrification.

You're running roughshod over a lot of large concepts here. First of all, "Harlem" is a huge neighborhood, with considerable variation from one area to the next. The developments referenced in the article are in East Harlem, which could surely use a boost. And this announcement does represent a "boost."

Second, "gentrification" is a process that takes place over years and decades, and it does so inexorably. The process is continuing, even in this down cycle. In the context of Harlem, and East Harlem in particular, it is helped along -- not hurt -- by the construction or rehabilitation of buildings in the neighborhood.

Also note that these are not "projects" in the traditional (very low or no income, warehoused intergenerational poverty) sense. These appear to be some kind of public/private partnership that will provide "affordable" rentals to "middle" (below median) income families. Although other approaches such as "mixed-income" developments are better overall, the key is to get a greater diversity of incomes and economic conditions into the area. In the context of East Harlem, new middle-income developments will represent a contribution to that end.

And how many dollars were given to the city for the construction of new public schools for the children of those families? If you guessed $0, step up to claim your prize: A newspaper from 3 years in the future with a front page story about how overcrowded NYC public schools are.

Urban planning. It's hard.

schools???

the city raised over a billion and a half dollars for two new stadiums. more great urban planning from amanda burden and bloomberg.

Stadiums generate income, poor people drain resources. It's not rocket science why you plan for some projects and not others.

It's not like "those" 700 families are springing up out of nowhere. They're most likely going to be families and individuals that already live somewhere in the city and are struggling to make ends meet. If you fall into that income bracket, you're in. This city has a severe shortage of affordable housing, and you're trying to spin it to be a bad thing?

And a front page story on overcrowded schools? Try just about every other day, buried somewhere in the NYT.

of course those 700 families aren't sprining out of nowhere.

the city has the highest amount of homeless families since 1983 thanks to bloomberg's "planning". the shortage of affordable housing is a symptom of bloomberg's (and amanda burden's) poor city planning. the stimulus money for affordable housing will help some families but this is just a tiny bandage on a serious problem. bloomberg hopes by throwing some struggling families a bone he'll look like a good guy and get some extra votes.

The shortage of affordable housing is the product of neglectful housing policies that have been going on since before the Reagan administration, long before Bloomberg was a candidate for mayor.

What do you expect the guy to do, *not* announce that the city has secured federal stimulus money for affordable housing under his watch? You don't just get that money thrown at you, you have to bargain for it. I'm not an ardent Bloomberg supporter myself, but anything remotely positive that brings attention to the city's housing crisis is a good thing as far as I'm concerned.

Especially since it's supposedly adding affordable housing for *700* families into the city's stock, as opposed to the 6-20 units of affordable housing that we so rarely see being tacked onto the bottom floors of high-rise luxury buildings (another product of the Bloomberg administration if I'm not mistaken).

Hotcup, can you explain to me why segmenting the housing market in a million different ways (by implementing rent control, rent stabilization, tax incentives, income restrictions, etc.) isn't precisely what makes living in New York so prohibitively expensive for many people?

no one said he shouldn't announce it. just saying this a long time coming and that he made things worse to begin with.