HUD Official Speaks the Unspeakable: Selling The Projects
As we’ve mentioned before, rumors about the privatization of certain public housing projects in parts of rapidly gentrifying areas of Brooklyn have been circulating for a couple of years. Most recently, we wrote about the theory that the Ingersoll and Whitman Houses in Fort Greene were being emptied in anticipation of such a move; it’s…
As we’ve mentioned before, rumors about the privatization of certain public housing projects in parts of rapidly gentrifying areas of Brooklyn have been circulating for a couple of years. Most recently, we wrote about the theory that the Ingersoll and Whitman Houses in Fort Greene were being emptied in anticipation of such a move; it’s also not hard to imagine something similar happening at the Farragut Houses, given their close proximity to Dumbo, the most expensive neighborhood in Brooklyn. Given what a politically and emotionally charged issue this is, however, no public official has ever said anything in its favor, as far as we know. But, on Tuesday, Sean Moss, the regional administrator for the federal Housing and Urban Development Department, went out on a serious limb. In light of the New York Housing Authority’s dismal financial position (an annual shortfall of $200 million), he said, selling public housing buildings in the most upscale areas could make sense. “It may displace some people, and that is a concern,” Moss said. “That is not necessarily a bad thing if you can create more housing [elsewhere] with that.” We’ll see whether political pressures force him to backpedal in the coming days.
Feds Eye NY Building Sale at Housing Projects [NY Daily News]
Bye Bye Public Housing, Hello Luxe Condos? [Curbed]
What’s Really Going on at the Ingersoll Houses? [Brownstoner]
Benson…please note that 3:11 was addressing other people’s usage or the term “monstrosities”…and certainly not “distorting people’s statements”. Some contributors today have made some really lousy cracks. Not quite sure why you took 3:11’s comment personally. It wasn’t aimed at you.
Okay…this thread has done run its course. See you’all tomorrow!
FG/GL
3.11;
Stop distorting people’s statements. I never called the tenants in the projects “monstrosities”. In fact, I advocated giving them ownership of their apartments.
It will never stop with defenders of the status quo. Scare tactics, distortions, quoting housing advocates who are invested in the current system, etc.
Keep putting the fingers in the dike, until it all washes away, like the old welfare system.
Benson
thank you benson for telling it like it is
Hang on a minute. Isn’t there pretty much a consensus among housing advocates locally and nationally than NYCHA projects are far superior to the large-scale public housing complexes in most other U. S. cities? In the late ’90s, I lived across the street from Whitman/Ingersoll and it was no biggie. The buildings — and their tenants — can hardly be called “monstrosities”. Just utilitarian buildings filled with working families making their way. A lot like Stuy Town and Peter Cooper Village when ya think about it.
AY will be worthless once the projects are built.
The projects are going to suck once AY is built.
1:04 – I realize that these are not projects but my question was CAN something like this be considered instead of putting people out of their homes of 30 years, with grants and other forms of assistance I think it could work, or maybe you all just want all of these “Ghetto” people to leave,
Read carefully:
http://www.brooklyneagle.com/categories/category.php?category_id=5&id=15456
I agree with 1:03 PM. Sell the units to the current occupants. If more money is needed to improve things afer that I suggest means testing rent control so that we can end that we can stop subsidizing rich people.
FG/GL;
My point about welfare reform was political. If liberals in NY keep trying to defend the undefendable (i.e. the projects are just great the way they are) they will not have a place at the table when it becomes apparent to everyone else but them that they are NOT working.
I am 50 years old and grew up in NYC (in the Red Hook projects, as I mentioned). I vividly remember the cancer that spread through NYC from the old welfare system. It was as plain as day. For reasons I will never understand, the reigning liberal othodoxy refused to allow any discussion on the topic. Any suggestion that the system needed reform was met with loaded, emotional charges (just like we see by the defenders of the projects in this post).
As Alan Greenspan once stated: something that is not sustainable eventually fails. So it was with the old welfare system, and so it is with these projects. Those who deny reality and defend the status quo are setting themelves up for the same fall that happened with welfare regorm. Liberals did not have a place at the table for welfare reform legislation. If they continue to deny the realities of these projects, they won’t be there when the reckoning comes. That is a fact of life.
That is my final two cents.
benson