Allan Appel Photo
The housing authority is ready to help a new owner renovate a subsidized Goffe Street apartment complex that’s vulnerable to heavy storms.
At its regular monthly meeting Tuesday afternoon, the Elm City Communities/Housing Authority of New Haven (ECC/HANH) Board of Commissioners voted unanimously for an “intent to issue” up to $12.5 million in bonds to be used to help New York-based Fairstead Affordable LLC acquire and renovate the St. Martin Townhouses on 200 Goffe St., across from the Dr. Reginald Mayo Early Learning School in the Dixwell neighborhood.
The complex has 63 townhouses with federally subsidized low-income renters.
The townhouses suffered serious flooding during a torrential April rainstorm, resulting in the evacuation of 19 people when heavy rains and blocked drains caused residents to be evacuated.
Should they be issued, the bonds will come from the Glendower Group, an affiliate of the Housing Authority, which functions as a developer/financier of affordable having in both the prof it and nonprofit sectors.
HANH staff, in a presentation to the commissioners, emphasized that the proposal voted upon wasn’t actual issuance of special obligation bonds, but approval for an intent or permission to issue.
Before the bonds can actually be issued and offered for sale, HANH/Glendower would have to have the approval of the state’s Office of Policy Management (OPM) as well as the Connecticut Housing Finance Authority (CHFA).
Fairstead officials did not respond to requests for comment for this story.
Glendower Group, a development subsidiary of HANH, is a decade old and has issued bonds before, most recently in support of the development of Hamilton Street Clock Factory project.
Commissioners queried HANH Executive Director Karen DuBois-Walton about whether the authority would have any ownership of the townhouses, and she answered: “We in no way take an ownership. We’re a conduit for” the private owners.
In her executive report to the commissioners, DuBois-Walton said HANH’s Glendower first issued bonds in 2007 and trecently received an A‑plus grade from credit-rating agencies.
