NEW YORK | City to mix luxury housing with low income projects

[NYguy]

http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/short-article-1.1256450?localLinksEnabled=false

NYCHA set to lease playgrounds, community centers for luxury high-rises
The housing authority hopes to generate nearly $50 million in lease payments that will be used
to rejuvenate deteriorating housing projects and close $60 million annual deficit.



Smith Houses tenant Association President Aixa Torres opposes the NYCHA plan to build luxury apartments on playgrounds, community centers and parking lots.


By Greg B. Smith
February 5, 2013

The housing authority is planning its very own Tale of Two Cities.

To raise much-needed cash, the agency plans to lease out land to private developers who will then build some 3 million square feet of luxury apartments smack in the middle of Manhattan housing projects.

Internal documents obtained by the Daily News show the planned 4,330 apartments in eight developments are all in hot real estate neighborhoods, including the upper East and West Sides, the lower East Side and lower Manhattan. Developers will get a sweet deal: a 99-year lease with the lease payments to the authority frozen for the first 35 years. And they’ll get a big break on property taxes because 20% of the units will be set aside as “affordable,” offered to families of four that make $50,000 or less.

But the vast majority of units — 80% — are “market rate,” and in the neighborhoods chosen by the New York City Housing Authority, that rate is astronomical. At the Baruch Houses on the lower East Side, where NYCHA seeks 175,000 square feet of new housing, rent in a private building across the street is $3,100 for a one-bedroom apartment.

The high-end units will be built on top of parking lots, community centers, playgrounds and baseball fields within NYCHA developments, according to tenant leaders and elected officials who have been briefed on the plan.

NYCHA expects to pocket $31 million to $46 million in annual lease payments, all of which will go toward fixing up deteriorating buildings. The agency currently has a backlog of 420,000 repair orders and faces a $60 million budget gap annually.

Leasing land for market-rate housing is a first for an agency that has worked with developers to build what has been called moderate-income housing, such as a Chelsea Houses tower with an income cutoff of $167,000 for a family of four. Under the new market-rate plan, however, the units have no income cap.

The middle-income Chelsea Houses serves as a model to the new redevelopment plan that will generate millions in lease revenue.



This Baruch Houses parking lot will be redeveloped into luxury towers.



NYCHA Chairman John B. Rhea will spearhead the plan to revive the agency by leasing open space and playgrounds for high-end apartments.