Bloomberg and Quinn announced the creation of a pilot program to buy up unsold condo projects and turn them into ‘middle’ to ‘moderate’ income affordable housing. While this strategy to create affordable housing certainly makes more sense than pumping hundreds of millions of tax dollars into mega developments like Atlantic Yards, and a slight bit more than inclusionary zoning rules, the actual program is a step so meager to be negligible.
gothamwars at RoomEight hits the nail on the head (despite hyperbole) – this is the TARP bailout for developers. They’re not even hiding it: the program has virtually the same name, HARP – Housing Asset Renewal Program. The city is buying up potentially worthless assets for a fixed amount, instead of pursuing perfectly legal takeover strategies that would cost taxpayers substantially less – in this case eminant domain takeovers. Developers have no right to turn a profit on their bad building decisions, and even if they did, the right to housing certainly outweighs it.
Also, the program is laughably small. The pilot program will convert just 400 units citywide – that covers less than 1/10th of the units that will go to market in Williamsburg ALONE in the next year or so. Additionally, it will impact only small to medium size developments, meaning the mega-blight high rises appearing on the waterfront or downtown will remain largely empty for the near future.
