Posts Tagged ‘sustainability’

Challenges in the Affordable Housing Market

Monday, December 20th, 2010

Hudson Valley Business Journal, December 20, 2010:

The New York Hilton hosted the New York Housing Conference (NYHC) and the National Housing Conference 37th annual awards luncheon and symposium “Solutions for a New Landscape.” The role of the NYHC is to advocate for affordable housing policy in Washington DC as well as in New York State. While much of the content and conversation was somber, given the current economic outlook and the result of the midterm elections for Congress, there were some bright spots brought into focus by some symposium speakers. Among these is the case for sustainability in both new building and rehab, and the breadth of the sustainability efforts.

Participants on the panel addressing “Sustainable Financing from Dollars to Development” spoke of the wide-ranging impact of sustainable practices in the affordable housing arena. A Seattle study, which Enterprise Community Partners, Inc., hopes to replicate in New York through a partnership with Mt. Sinai Hospital, demonstrated the impact of air quality improvements during rehab of workforce housing. Emergency room visits were cut to a third, with annual savings of nearly $1,500 in medical costs per family studied. While such savings do not line a developers pocket, they do make an impressive case for the impact of green practices in both rehab and new construction settings. Abby Jo Sigal, Vice President and Impact Market Leader (NYC) for Enterprise, suggests this is one way of getting Washington’s – and Albany’s – attention in funding projects.

Far less hopeful words, such as inertia and gridlock, were heard in the “Affordable Housing Post Midterm Elections” symposium. One area of concern is the lead time new leadership will require in bringing themselves up to speed on housing issues. A Senator’s staff was quoted as anticipating months that would be required to review existing programs before there’s any hope of consideration of new initiatives.

Meanwhile the aptly named “Government Funding Options in Tough Times” symposium addressed the new integrated funding process of New York State Homes and Community Renewal (HCR). This year under the leadership of Commissioner Brian Lawlor, the former Division of Housing and Community Renewal and NY Homes as well as other housing agencies have been combined into one agency to increase the efficiency and effectiveness of the programs while reducing costs. Under this new umbrella the alphabet soup of programs administered include: SONYMA, HTFC, HFA, AHC, MIF, MBBA, TSFC and DHCR.  The agency administers the Low-Income Housing Tax Credit program for the state, itself the subject of another symposium.

At the awards banquet approximately 1,500 housing and financial leaders gathered to salute awardees in the affordable housing industry. Among the honorees was the Federal Home Loan Bank of New York, saluted for its 20th anniversary year of its Affordable Housing Program. The program has supported more than 1,200 projects with grants totaling more than $350 million, creating more than 50,000 units of affordable housing and generating nearly $6 billion in total development costs.

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Pictured left to right following the awards ceremony: Robert Lehrman, Trustee of the National Housing Conference and Advisory Board Chairman of Lodestone Banking Consultancy Inc., Luncheon Chairman Alfred A. Dellibovi, President and CEO of The Federal Home Loan Bank, Steven L. Aaron, Founder and Managing Member Birchez Associates LLC and Pathfinder Sponsor of the event, Daron Tubian, New York Housing Committee member representing Bank America Merrill Lynch, and Judith Calogero, CEO, New York Housing Conference.

Going Green: Affordable housing can also be sustainable

Monday, August 23rd, 2010

08/22/2010 12:38 PM YNN for the Hudson Valley by Terry Ettinger

Click here for link to broadcast

Affordable housing can also be sustainable, energy-efficient housing – case in point, a new 66-unit senior citizen apartment complex recently dedicated in Ulster County.“Radiant heat in the floors, 70 percent of our heat and hot water is produced with solar power, a 50 kw photovoltaic electric system, every single apartment is air-blower tested for air infiltration, the air conditioning systems have the highest efficiency ratings available, the heating systems are European in design and they know about saving energy over there because they’ve been paying more than we have. Our boilers, for example, are 97 to 98 percent efficiency,” said Steve Aaron, Managing Member of Birchez Associates. Birchez Associates was able to do this in part by obtaining state grants.

“New York State has a number of programs that help support builders and developers who are interested in trying to provide a sustainable approach to construction. I divide them into two groups; one is at the single- family level (individual homes) and the other is for multi-family homes and building support as well,” said Paul Crovella, Sustainable Construction Management and Engineering, SUNY-ESF.

Paul Crovella teaches sustainable construction management.

“The single-family home, New York State currently has a program for builders interested in going through Energy Star certification for the home. It provides money for the builders to do that and essentially offsets quite a bit of the cost,” said Crovella.

Similar programs are available for multi-family construction like senior citizen housing offering incentives for developers to think green when they’re in the design stage for upgrading the insulation, window quality and the efficiency of the heating plant, like they did at the new Birches at Chambers, and Crovella believes it’s a worthwhile program.

“It makes a lot of sense in that the individual who is building a project like that, if they know they’re not going to be paying the utility bills over the life of the building then they have very little incentive to put in a better window or improve the efficiency,” said Crovella.