Gentrification Vampires Vanish From Plan

Gentrification Vampires Vanish From Plan.

Not Yet.Not Until they get there keys and sign the lease.In fact taking bets.The Gentrification Vampires will bet back in some form.

The obligations include a mortgage from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD), which covers much of the rent at Antillean through Section 8 rental subsidies,

Not if this happens.

Ben Carson Offers New Take on Trump's HUD Cuts

In Jacksonville, Florida, he opined "on the virtues of housing vouchers," Oscar Perry Abello wrote for Next City in April, adding that the Trump administration "has proposed cutting HUD's Section 8 programs, including vouchers and project-based Section 8 buildings, by $600 million."

What? No GVs? Dagnabbit!

Be careful what you ask for. Its historically evident that in New Haven, housing complexes which serve only low income tenants fail, and properties with mixed income tenants do better.

"not the people with jobs working to get ahead and {GASP} able to afford market rate housing"

Oh good, more people can pay half their income toward rent like me, yay.

Gotta say I agree with robn. Segregating the poor in housing-for-the-poor-only is not a good idea; never has been, never will be. Creating diversity of income at the door-to-door is not at all the same thing as "gentrification." It's the antidote to ghettoization. And ghettoization leads to exploitation, abandonment, and eventual decay. It gives undue power to that minority among the ghettoized whose economic insecurity does result from bad choices or antisocial personal characteristics, to drag the whole community down with them. Ask any hardworking woman trying to raise a family in the projects.

Also, as 3/5 to the Gentrification Vampires, so I am to the arrogant architectural experimenters of the 1960s and 70s. What were they thinking of, designing dwelling units that looked like that (and were made out of crap materials besides)?? People deserve houses that look like homes, not strip malls or worse, prisons. Also they deserve WINDOWS. Geez.

Given the location, what would be the market-rate for these apartments? I suspect it might be below what HUD pays, which is based on a very broad market rather than recognize the reality of markets rates varying block by block.

agree with urbancarpenter and robn. Subsidized housing is almost always a failure on every measure. It requires more and more money every year to saty afloat. There is little incentive to maintain or improve so the structures crumble. Crumbling structures and residents who have no skin in the game contribute to drag down the neighborhood.... Crime, drugs, prostitution soon follow. And then, way earlier that anyone can imagine, the place is broke and broken and needs to be torn down and rebuilt with more taxpayer money. We must end the cycle if we are to have any chance of making these neighborhoods safe again

Rents, taxes, utilities, insurance here overcharge. I consider it a form of red-lining or Jim Crow.
The city and Yale C. have dough and could help working class and indigent citizens rebuild or renovate appropriate housing using local labor and ideas. We have a "school of architecture" in the middle of town...and a "school of public health"....it is not healthy to be thrown out into the street.

urbancarpenter and robn your exactly right. Congratulations New Haven The Return of The Housing Project. Yes Wendy we have a school of architecture. A school that spent thirty years defending The Coliseum and its own concrete slab building The Independent runs yearly stories on the future small boxes they think everyone will want to live in. Perhaps there is a future Howard Roark studying there now. Whatever is designed and built government will have to add its input guaranteeing its failure.

I agree with the general sentiment expressed here, as well. And I know firsthand about the government giving responsibilities to a community like this that they are not prepared to handle, even if they care. Now that the residents have been informed of their duties, they would do much better to sell it on the open market. Especially with the ambiguous claims by Carabetta that are not attached of record. I fear outside interests that want to perpetuate the ideology by which this debacle has occurred are not being entirely genuine, as evidenced by the replay.

Is it possible or has anyone considered reconstituting failed cooperative housing developments as Mutual Ownership Trusts, which are typically more financially sound than traditional co-ops? Whereas the moderate-income housing cooperatives like Florence Virtue on Goffe Street, Seabury Housing Co-op on Howe Street, and Friendship Houses on Olive Street have remained successful, it seems like all of the low-income housing cooperatives have failed (Trade Union Plaza, Antillean Manor, Dwight Co-op, Ethan Gardens, Hill Central Co-op).

JH: I wouldn't say Hill Central failed. They have just, or are in the process of, selling their interests for a profit. That outcome doesn't strike me as failure. But, yes, most of these co-ops failed, and failed quickly, sometimes repeatedly. A lot of folks in these places are there because they made bad life choices. Even those who are there through plain bad luck usually have a lot of issues, and don't have the "bandwidth" to govern and manage an apartment complex.

Lookout: These places can work with engaged management. Union Plaza was bought from HUD in the 1980's by a local family and friends partnership. After a major investment of owners' sweat and other equity, one of the partners acted as an on-site manager, with a day office in the complex and sharing a home across the street with another partner. He had a lot of incentive to run a tight ship, and he did. Troublesome tenants either stopped being troublesome or the partnership invested the time and money to evict them. Most of these places, of course, are run by absentee, professional management, which doesn't have the same motivation to do what it takes to run them well. Moreover, what do we do with those who cannot conform their behavior to social norms? Evicting nuisance tenants helps the complex, but the folks themselves wind up on the Green or under a bridge. Whether it's a Yale prof walking the Green, or a Goatville resident, few want the public substance abuse, smell, car burglaries, etc., that come with many of the homeless, especially the drug-addicted.

"Whatever is designed and built government will have to add its input guaranteeing its failure."

The new public housing projects are actually doing reasonably fine. Quinnipiac Terrace for years at this point

Madcap: Quinnipiac Terrace isn't that old. Look at the projects across from Ferraro's. They were rehabbed not long ago, but were recently razed and new apartments being build at the absurd price of $500k/unit. There's no good reason for housing to fall apart so quickly. Heck, when I was a kid, one of my best friend's lived in a house that was 300 years old, and not much changed in that time.

So long as the risk of any failure of the investment in the rehab of this property is NOT borne by government (read that as taxpayers), who cares. Market rate or not, if this can succeed as a low-income HUD housing project, go for it.

As some say, continuation of housing like this reinforces the cycle of poverty. That may be. But if a private developer is going to bear all the risk, then good for them. While I disagree with 3/5ths and the constant cry over so-called gentrification vampires, Bass slapped a great buzzfeed style click bait heading on this story. Time will tell. Success or failure is ultimately up to the developer, the management and the residents.

1644,
Thanks for the information. For some reason, I was incorrectly under the impression that Hill Central was going through foreclosure and being sold like the other low-income cooperates and not that it was voluntarily being sold.

1644, unless I am mistaken, Quinnipiac Terrace, like Monterey Place, is now mixed-income. Like so much else -- e.g. public schools, public services in general -- public housing is going to work better when some folks with higher income, more education, and a personal record of confidence, skills, and (let's be honest) entitlement, privilege, and personal connections, are invested in these places. Ghettoization of low-income folks is just plain bad news. They will always, always, get the short end of the stick.