What a Difference a Week Makes on Washington
The Pratt Area Community Council demolished another floor of this old brownstone on Washington Avenue between Fulton and Gates last weekend. At the current pace, the whole thing should be gone by the end of the month. Kinda makes you wonder how much of a priority the group really places on the architecture of the…
The Pratt Area Community Council demolished another floor of this old brownstone on Washington Avenue between Fulton and Gates last weekend. At the current pace, the whole thing should be gone by the end of the month. Kinda makes you wonder how much of a priority the group really places on the architecture of the Fulton Mall.
What’s Happening at 483 Washington [Brownstoner] GMAP
It looks like PACC does good work. Telling, however, of PACC’s view of the changes in the neighborhood is the following sentence: “With the onslaught of gentrification, we are trying to provide housing for existing residents to remain in this community many of whom are seeking affordable homeownership opportunities.”
It clearly makes it sound like gentrification is a bad thing, an “onslaught”, that must be fought against. If property values and development costs are so high, PACC is not needed to ensure that underutilized properties are developed. They therefore become more of a social welfare organization designed to preserve socioeconomic diversity in a gentrifying neighborhood. I think this is a worthwhile goal if the residents/owners of the mixed income units can sell their properties at market rate after some future date.
Is this permitted? To me, that would go a long way to helping break the cycle of poverty for such persons.
Re: the last post,
http://www.cplusga.com/cgahome.htm
click on ‘multi-family residential’ link on left. Then click on 483 washington ave link.
The second to last link ‘Pratt Area N.R.P …..’ also provides a look at the historic buildings in the area that PACC is helping to gut-renovate/rehab.
Here are some links to what 483 washington will look like when it’s completed.
http://www.cplusga.com/cgahome.htm
http://www.wirednewyork.com/forum/showthread.php?t=5736&page=6
Thanks, Deb, for the response. We’ll highlight this in the beginning of next week. Not publishing anything tomorrow.
Deb’s message deserves a front-page mention. I was thrilled to learn more about PACC’s affordable housing initiatives and their desire to preserve buildings whenever possible.
PACC owns a lot across the street from me and I look forward to seeing what they do there. I also live right around the corner from 418-422 Classon which should be an incredible boon to the area once completed. I only wish PACC could get control of that Salvation Army parking lot/eyesore on the corner.
Brownstoner,
I hope you will point out this message (maybe repost it?) in a subsequent posting on your site. This whole thread will disappear into the archives in a day or two, but it deserves to be read widely, imho.
Thanks Deb for the response. Great news on Classon. Can you describe the building to be built on the Washington lot? Please tell us that your development partner is not a fedders brick box specialist…
Hi Everyone- I am the Executive Director of Pratt Area Community Council and a friend forwarded me this website conversation. Hopefully I can clear up some confusion but wow, where to start. PACC is a community-based organization in existence since 1964 serving Fort Greene, Clinton Hill, and Bedford Stuyvesant and preserving and developing affordable housing since 1980. We are not affiliated with Pratt Institute or Pratt Center. We have two offices located at 201 Dekalb and 1224 Bedford Avenues.
Since 1980 we have developed 62 rental properties and 19 homes as well as sponsoring 430 units of NYC Housing Partnership Homes, 8 low-income tenant cooperatives (71-73 Clifton, 126 Cambridge are examples) and a 12 unit condominium project at 233 Greene. We began by gut rehabbing vacant city-owned buildings as rental properties for low-income tenants and then occupied city-owned buildings, temporarily moving the tenants out and moving them back. Some examples of these buildings in Clinton Hill are 41-43 Clifton Place, 236 and 250 Greene, 501 and 155 Clinton. We also have renovated HUD foreclosed properties an example being 218 St. James and 277 Gates and previously city-owned homes at 241, 282 and 288 St. James and 55 Putnam.
Until now, we have never torn down a building and in fact we have renovated buildings with no back wall, no roofs etc. For example, 218 Gates Avenue which was mentioned, the whole facade fell down two weeks after we bought it and we restored it to its former glory, winning the NYS Historic Preservation Award in 2005. We have always believed that low-income and mixed income housing should look as beautiful as any other and that our architectural heritage should be preserved.
Now as to our plans for 483 Washington which has been torn down. This property was foreclosed on for real estate taxes owed to NYC through the Third Party Transfer Program. Neighborhood Restore, a holding corporatiion for the city, assumed ownership in 2002 and PACC as the designated transferee began to manage it in 2003. What we found were 4 SRO tenants living in horrible conditions. There had been a fire on the top floor so the roof was open, refrigerators, toilets and tubs had fallen through to the floors below. No heat, jumped electricity, and garbage filled the basement and first floor. We therefore moved the tenants to fully renovated studio apts. in our management portfolio and sealed the building. Yes, there was one individual living in the SUV out front whom we tried to convince to move to proper shelter, had neighbors speaking to him and social workers from Black Vets for Social to no avail. The actual purchase of the property was delayed until late last month but we are now in a position to move forward with the project.
It was a hard decision for us to tear this building down but in this market of escalating prices and mounting development costs with very little available land, we made the decision to maximize the use of the 50′ x 135’property. With the onslaught of gentrification, we are trying to provide housing for existing residents to remain in this community many of whom are seeking affordable homeownership opportunities. We therefore are building a 16 unit comdonmium in partnership with a private developer using no government subsidies, eight units will be affordable and eight units market rate. We will begin marketing soon and have two community information sessions which will be posted on our website. The building will be a six story brick construction which we believe will fit well architecturally with the other apartment buildings on the block.
Regarding 418 to 422 Classon Avenue. We successfully completed the purchase of 422 Classon Avenue last month. The three buildings will be preserved (not torn down)and by utilizing several sources of grants and subsidies including the NYC Landmarks Conservancy will become 12 affordable condominium units with all the historic detail restored. We are very excited about having this opportunity to preserve these wonderful buildings which were HUD foreclosed properties and should begin construction in July or August. 418 and 420 Classon were part of a cluster of 13 HUD and HPD brownstone properties purchased by PACC in April 2005 (not six years ago) which will also be substantially renovated as affordable homeownership opportunities during this coming year. Again, please check our website for marketing information at http://www.prattarea.org or call (718) 522-2613 x 10 to get on our mailing list for affordable homes or apartments.
Lastly, thank you to those who have supported PACC in the above dialog and I hope I have responded to all of the comments and issues raised. If you have any further questions please feel free to email me at the above address.
Deb Howard
We’ve had no response to our email…