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POPSCommunity Land Trusts This is my newest obsession. Please note that this clip is from a press release, not a news article, and so should be take "grain of salt"-style.
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POPSAffordable housing? Here? I'll sue! Bradenton snobs are afraid that affordable cottages will lower the value of their McMansions. How about this... maybe it's the fact that they overpayed for gigantic houses that will lower their values! The story quotes a school teacher who bought a cottage, which justifies the residents' concerns about who the buyers will be, right?
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POPSBelltown: a daylight visit to Seattle's Haven of Hip Okay, nothing to do with affordable housing, but Belltown is the coolest neighborhood in any city I've ever been in. If you're ever in the Emerald City, swing uptown and dine at either Mama's Mexican Kitchen or the Noodle Ranch.
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POPSAnchorage can demand higher quality in affordable housing An editorial from the Anchorage Daily News. The houses look great, if a bit large. You might not know it, but garages are actually a new idea in Alaska, so that's nice that these include them! Right now, the Anchorage housing market is still insanely tight, as it was in the 1980s. As long as oil prices stay high, developers will only want to build low-quality, high-priced homes. Tons of speculation going on up North! But then, check out Cook Inlet Housing Authority's other projects. Everything is high quality.
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POPSHousing crisis hits rentals The credit crunch from the mortgage meltdown is slamming developers of low-income rental housing. Our country's only real rental housing strategy is actually administered by the IRS: the low income housing tax credit program LIHTC. The scary part is that it's not so different from the "bundled" mortgages that led to the current problems. The tax credits are sold for cash by a developer to a Wall St. broker, who then bundles them and sells them on an open market. If that market dries up, then the system falls apart and there is no way to build new subsidized rental housing.
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POPSMake McMansions Pay! Big-Hair Houses! Ha! This is a pretty cool idea, using transferable development rights for house size.
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POPSSmart Growth & Racial Justice An article from 1999, reprinted by Cleveland's community land trust. Mr. Powell raises some great points. I think he simplifies the issue by concentrating only on race, but I also think he has to do that... from where I watch, the issues of race and concentration of poverty almost never surface as elements of a regional planning agenda. For more, read Myron Orfield's "American Metropolitics" and learn how White Fight really happens.
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POPSCottages come to Juneau "The density is a little too much for that area," according to one commissioner. As I see it, the density reaches the SHOCKING total of 6.2 units per acre! Still, the concessions from the developer, and Juneau's very-strict cottage ordinance, have given the project enough momentum to get approval. I'll be watching this one closely.
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POPSMass Selectmen Oppose Cottages The impact on schools? Just how many kids do they think are going to be squeezed into 680 sq ft!!! I also love the exception to being against affordable housing if it's just for old people, not poor people. As soon as someone says "it'd be okay if it was age restricted to seniors," then you know it's all about who is going to be living there.
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POPSKirkland, WA, Cottages This town on the east shore of Lake Washington borders Microsoft and seems to be home to some highly-paid employees. It's funny how residents are complaining that giant mansions are ruining their town, but little cottages would ruin it too!
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POPSLong Island affordable housing scaled back The developer is using voluntary inclusionary zoning as it is intended: increasing the number of market-rate houses--and therefore his profits--while adding two subsidized lots... until the neighbors showed up. So, instead of 8 large single family homes and 10 affordable homes with 10 affordable apartments, there will be only 2 affordable homes--one 1.5 acre lots!--with 2 apartments.
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POPSThe Right Answer in New Orleans A 1-1 replacement of affordable housing units should be part of any redevelopment. In the Allentown area, federal projects have also resulted in a net loss of affordable units.
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POPSNIMBYs cry on Fox News The density of this project is less than 7 units/acre--hardly a "high density" neighborhood! I wonder how many entrances there are to Ms. Becerra's subdivision... I'm guessing she lives on a cul-de-sac herself. Instead of arguing over the supposed density, maybe residents should have argued over neighborhood amenities, like getting the developer to chip in for a new school or park, or preserve open space... but that's not really the point here... it's that residents don't want to live next to the kind of people who would live in "high-density" housing. Also, good job to Fox News for pointing out that "three to two" is "a close margin."
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POPSMortgage Scam in Alaska The house is "sold" three times! Nine people are going to jail on this one. The ultimate victim is the buyer who winds up paying $340,000 for a house only worth $240,000... also the lenders who will eat that loss themselves when the house forecloses and neighbors who pay inflated prices & taxes for their houses because of the fake appraisals. Yikes!
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POPS$280,000 affordable housing The write down to $150-175K puts it in the affordable range, but I think they should concentrate on projects where the cost to build is around $180K and the subsidized sale price is $80K. The county is also funding a townhouse project where the units will be sold for $95,000.
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POPSLancaster TND draws NIMBYs! This development would be the second in the region (that I know of) to utilize voluntary inclusionary zoning to increase density and provide affordable housing... if the East Hempfield Supervisors approve it.
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POPSVirginia town approves housing 100 LIHTC apartments. The NIMBYs at their most paranoid about this... but maybe the developer could have done more to win them over with good design and addressing the traffic question.
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POPSFeds to rule on Inclusionary Zoning The Tallahassee system is interesting because it doesn't make any long-term requirements for affordability or public subsidy... it just says that some units should cost less. This kind of opening of the marketplace to all consumers is what I'd like to see. On the other hand, I don't see any mention of anything that compensates the builders--usually it's a density bonus--so their argument about a "taking" might be valid. We'll just have to see what the court of appeals thinks!
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