At least they didn't say crumbling mill town....

Commonwealth Magazine has an in depth piece on the WinnCompanies' involvement in campaign donations and the company's success at securing tax credits and low interest public loans.  We've had quite a debate in this city regarding affordable housing projects, and while I love the idea of affordable housing, this sort of cozy relationship makes me very uncomfortable.  Is there a better way to create affordable housing without questionable campaign contributions and public money?

Here's the money quote about Worcester's Canal Lofts:

"In downtown Worcester, sitting in the shadow of Interstate 290, there’s an old mill building that has seen better days. A century ago, when Worcester was an industrial hub, the four-story brick complex was an envelope factory. That business faded in the 1970s, and eventually a furniture manufacturer moved in. When the property hit the market a few years ago, two-thirds of the Water Street mill’s square footage sat idle, and several windows had been boarded up. The mill had its location working for it, though. It was a quick walk from Worcester’s train station, and it stood in a neighborhood city officials were trying to fill with new restaurants and residences. The WinnCompanies saw potential, put the mill under agreement, and got the site permitted for the construction of 64 apartments. In June, Winn paid $2 million for the building and a parking lot across the street. The Canal Lofts, as Winn dubbed the project, illustrates the dramatic impact various pools of public subsidies have on Winn’s development projects. Half of the project’s apartments will be set aside as affordable housing units. Because affordable housing restrictions necessarily limit developers’ potential profits, federal and state policy­makers have put a number of subsidies in play to encourage affordable development. The Canal Lofts development is a $25.3 million project. Winn is borrowing $16.3 million from a pair of banks, and another $3.3 million in long-term, low-to-no-interest affordable housing loans from various public agencies. That would leave the developer on the hook for the remaining $5.7 million in development costs. But at Canal Lofts, Winn is tapping $2.2 million in state historic tax credits, $2.5 million in state low-income housing tax credits, and another $711,000 in federal low-income housing tax credits. Taken together, the credits lower the amount of cash Winn has to put into the development from $5.7 million to $314,000."

Housing Debate

22Barcelona a unique vision that could make Worcester an interesting place to live, and retain all those college students who live here for four years and then disappear. (Article on Boston.com)

The best part for me about this idea is the recognition that not everyone can buy a condo, house and car.  It creates a viable city where people live, work, eat, shop and play.  Worcester needs this sort of transformation, especially when it comes to open space and

Jeff Barnard for City Council!

I would vote for his tax plan.  It makes sense, and it rewards behavior that the City of Worcester desperately needs.

I've never met Jeff, but seeing that his blog is always full of well thought out ideas, he's probably too qualified and too smart to enter politics.  I can still write him in though, despite Bill Eddy's disapproval.

2010 is going the be the year of Dual Tax Rate and Affordable Housing debates.  I hope all involved remember that we are in the middle of a recession and budget crisis created by the same bad ideas.  New ideas like Jeff's make sense and might actually work!

Affordable Housing.

This past week has seen a huge uptick in stories regarding Affordable Housing.  I can't get into specifics like Bill Randell or Paul Collyer on the business side, but I can talk about the human side.  Jeremy Shulkin's article in Worcester Magazine lays out the main question for Worcester: Where do we go from here?

Mr. Shulkin states that an individual making less than $35,720 qualifies for affordable housing at a cap of $10,716 for rent or mortgage.  That equals $893 a month for the top end of the scale.  What happens at the bottom of the scale?  The minimum wage in Massachusetts is $8.00 per hour.  At 40 hours a week, 52 weeks a year, the bottom end of the scale (in theory) is $16,640 with $4992 for rent or mortgage, which equals $416 a month.

Your prospects are limited enough at $893 a month for home or condo ownership, so the answer is an apartment, with roommates.  At $416 a month you end up living in a three decker somewhere in Worcester, filled to the brim with your friends and relatives, working multiple jobs.  More often than not you're scrambling for rent and a way to pay bills.  You end up moving more than you should, and you end up in some shady apartments where the landlord doesn't maintain the property, and certainly doesn't live in it with you.  Code enforcement and Housing Courts are backlogged with good and bad tenants and good and bad landlords.  There's little relief in sight, and the best most people caught in this loop can hope for is an escape for their children.

That's a pretty grim reality.  How do we fix it?  Not with quotes like this:

"More emphasis should be placed on attracting a higher class of people, who in turn would improve the commercial vitality of the City, and allow the City to leverage more private investement [sic]."

I don't want to pick a fight with whoever said that, but I do want to pick a fight with the mindset that creates a quote like that and gets a lot of heads nodding in agreement.  I don't deny the reality of Worcester's inner city neighborhoods.  I've lived here my whole life, and volunteered as a coach for over 20 years at a little league that draws from the Piedmont area.  There are a lot of reasons why it's bad and anyone who thinks that it is either society's fault or the individual's fault isn't going to solve the problem.

I understand that Mr. Randell wants to improve the City, and he makes excellent points on his blog on ways to improve our housing stock and increase ownership.  Worcester has been searching elsewhere for a 'higher class of people' for as long as I've been alive.  There's always been a call from City leadership for an Arts District, or an Outlet Mall, or Mixed Use Parcels, or a Regional Airport that will save Worcester and bring the classy people flocking to us with open wallets.  So far, none of those have worked.

Looking elsewhere for saviors is useless in the middle of a recession.  I don't care how many reports, slogans and studies the City Council, the Chamber of Commerce or the Research Bureau have issued.  Until we improve ourselves, the surrounding area is going to look at us with disdain (largely because we do the same thing to ourselves.)

Here's my plan: Education, Jobs, Renovation, Re-use and Ownership.  The first two are pretty obvious.  If we improve our educational system and opportunities, then our residents will be more desirable as a work force.  If we create better jobs in the area from the bottom up, our inner city will improve.  The third is more complex, and is exactly where the affordable housing debate gets murky because we haven't done the first two things consistently.  We haven't managed our rental market properly at all.  We need a vigilant Code Department that can respond to problems properties and get solutions.  We need to cut down on the rate of absentee landlords.  We need to encourage ownership and occupancy as much as we do investment (much like Joe O'Brien did personally). 

If we do those three things well, then the higher class of people will be the people already here.  And when we get these things right, the 'higher class of people' elsewhere will realize that Worcester is 'The Paris of the Eighties', and move here.

Then we'll complain about outsiders ruining our City.  But that's a story I'll leave to Rosalie or Diane.