nothin Co-Op Rises From The Brink | New Haven Independent

Co-Op Rises From The Brink

Allan Appel Photo

Seabury Cooperative Homes Chair Demetria Lindsey.

A 46-year-old housing cooperative is replacing two ancient hot water tanks with energy-efficient substitutes — and putting its own financial and physical house in order.

That is one of several planned capital upgrades aimed at providing residents of the Seabury Cooperative Homes at the corner of Howe and Elm Streets with reliable hot water 24 hours a day plus lower electric bills.

The aim is also to provide a path to financial stability that will help preserve a cooperative housing complex with rents affordable for low to moderate-income New Haveners.

Co-op Chairperson Demetria Lindsey and Kim Stevenson and Rudy Sturk of the Connecticut Green Bank offered this reporter a tour of the circa-1973 community to illustrate their plans.

They were eager to help mark the recent closing of two loans to set the the co-op on its path. Only last year the 88-unit two-building complex was facing a staggering $300,000 unpaid bill to United Illuminating, as well as arrears in property taxes.

Bucking A Trend

Seabury was going in the direction of all too many of the city’s 1960s and 1970s era low income co-ops, where the boards lose control and developers swoop.

Enter the Connecticut Green Bank with a $500,000 pre-development loan to help organize a plan to secure financing going forward and to pay for design and architectural fees to lower those electric costs and, ultimately, to replace roof and windows.

Also enter, at the urging of the Green Bank, the Urban Homesteading Assistance Board (UHAB), a New York-based nonprofit to provide another half-million dollar loan that helped pay off those arrears and UI bills. The UHAB loans also provide technical assistance and training for board chair Lindsey on how to organize all the moving financial and capital improvement parts, how to read financial statements, how to help supervise the co-op’s managing agent, keep tenants informed, and keep the project moving forward.

It’s a complicated sauce, with many moving parts,” said Stevenson, who handles the multi-family portfolio for the Connecticut Green Bank and has been working with the Seabury Co-Op since late 2015.

Lindsey said that never more than ten or 12 of the units were vacant at a single time. But with such slim margins, the financial hole was getting bigger. Currently only three units in the two-building complex are vacant, she said.

It had high energy costs and very high maintenance and the reserve fund was always being tapped for back due bills and operational costs,” with little being done to maintain the physical plant of the place.

Physically and financially it’s distressed, and no one — in the commercial banking world — is financing co-ops.”

The buildings became like a lemon, Stevenson said. Seabury rents range from about $818 to $907 a month. The coop was spending all it had just to keep going and to barely fix operational problems, with no resources left for replacing equipment that after nearly a half century is reaching its limits.

No longer.

When I heard that the UI bill and the taxes were taken care of, I danced and I cried,” said Lindsey, a vice president of the board for three years and the president for the last two.

Lindsey, a graduate of Eli Whitney Vocational High School who retired after 18 years working for Yale-New Haven Hospital, is able to devote a lot of her time to the board and to the complex project before her.

That kind of board stability and focus is critical to the process, Stevenson said.

The two loans provide for relief from the immediate energy and tax emergency and the pre-development costs to determine the full scope of future work and how to go about it. It also includes money for training for Lindsey and her board to stabilize the governance of the co-op.

The actual capital costs for a new roof, complete new HVAC, an overall shift from electricity to gas-powered heating and cooling, new elevators, and other yet-to-be-determined capital improvements could well run to $2-$3 million.

Not For Sale

Green Bank’s Stevenson with Seabury’s Lindsey.

In order to secure loans for that money in the future, the co-op is working to convert all of its units to become eligible for federal Section 8 rental subsidies. Currently 18 of the 88 apartments are Section 8 units, for the federal government provides the difference between the rent and what the tenant can pay.

Last month, city housing authority officials spent several days at Seabury signing up the remaining 70 tenants for Section 8 eligibility, Lindsey reported.

Everybody’s on board,” she said.

The process has already been approved by the federal Housing and Urban Development (HUD) department, which has the original mortgage on the property.

That financial security will give confidence to lenders to make a couple of million dollar loans. All of this is permitting someone to see this as bankable to make a loan,” Stevenson said.

In the run-up to the Green Bank and UHAB loans, Lindsey helped organize her neighbors. We took over parts of the maintenance, cleaning outside and in. We mowed the lawn. We cleaned the vacant units. We cleaned as a team, the Seabury Community Clean Team,” she reported.

This is an important story for Connecticut about providing ongoing improvements to co-ops,” added Stevenson, who said the Green Bank is working with about a half dozen more co-ops across the state facing similar challenges. We have a crisis across the state in affordable housing. It is so important to preserve this housing. Seabury is paving the way.”

Lindsey confirmed that as board chair she has received a number of letters from developers inquiring if the place is for sale.

It’s not.

This is my home,” she said. I love it.”

Tags:

Sign up for our morning newsletter

Don't want to miss a single Independent article? Sign up for our daily email newsletter! Click here for more info.


Post a Comment

Commenting has closed for this entry

Comments

Avatar for THREEFIFTHS

Avatar for urbancarpenter

Avatar for CityYankee2

Avatar for 1644

Avatar for 1644

Avatar for 1644