Roger Hannigan Gilson has an article in the Times Union today about 76 North Seventh Street: "Hudson Depot Lofts accepting applications for mixed-income apartments."
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| Photo: Will Waldron | Times Union |
The apartments will initially be marketed and rented to people in the AMI brackets, Baxter Vice President Eric Baxter said. He called renting to these people the “priority,” but said the rentals will be opened up to people of any income level if they are not snatched up by the intended groups.
Twelve of the 63 apartments are priced to be affordable to households with incomes up to 80 percent of the area median income (AMI), and the rest are priced to be affordable for households with incomes up to 130 percent of the AMI. (It is not known in which category the 64th apartment, being created in an unused space in the building, will be.)
In 2021, the building was granted a twenty-year PILOT and other tax abatements based on the idea that it was to be "workforce housing," affordable to households with incomes between 80 and 130 percent of the AMI. Baxter's statement raises a number of questions: If the rentals are "opened up to people of any income level," does that violate the terms of the PILOT agreement? If so, what penalty would there be? How does the IDA (Industrial Development Agency) monitor what is actually happening with the rentals and pricing in the building to determine if it is in compliance with terms of the PILOT agreement?
The actualization of what started out as Mayor Kamal Johnson's "huge plan for housing" seems to be getting more disappointing every day.
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🤯 Stunning... how is the DA or some NY State authority not all over this?
ReplyDeleteA billionaire 's foundation got a multi-million dollar multi-decade tax break from a very poor town... in close collaboration with the mayor and his appointees (Kamal, who lives in Galvan housing) and the Hudson Catskill Housing Coalition (a 501c3 that is politically active with leaders who lived in Galvan housing at the time)...
in exchange for building "affordable" "work force" housing in an area that really needs it.
Logically, when the number of residents go up and tax revenue goes down via one big tax break, thousands of homeowners now have to pay more taxes to make up for the multi-decade tax gift to Galvan.
Then recently... it turns out only some of the apartments are "affordable"... and now as they get ready to open... it turns out today... the affordable apartments are available... "for a limited time only!"
So when will the rentals "be opened up" to the market?
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And I guess tonight the Planning Board will vote on the next contorted version of this... Mill Street... also a project only possible with tax breaks and/or NYS grants... and somehow I fear Hudson's taxpaying homeowners will end up holding the bag.
Even in the 3rd world this sort of Hudson Depot Lofts switcheroo would be investigated and there'd be clawbacks of tax breaks.
But hey, the coffee is great in Hudson and we have a really large and pristine Waterfront...
Anything associated with Galvan will eventually sour, and city residents will be left to clean up their mess and pay for it in one way or the other.
ReplyDeleteTwo years ago, Galvan and and their buddy engineering firm Creighton Manning fabricated a parking study full of false data for this building, a study that was required by the Planning Board. And the PB fell for it hook line and sinker.
And anyone who lives over here near 7th & State knew, regardless of AMI and workforce blah blah, that this was an awful idea and never should have been approved by the Planning Board.
ReplyDeleteGalvan is suggesting that their tenants walk BLOCKS to and from their parked cars -- even if they have purchased a $125 parking permit for their lot on Washington, as well as from the City Hall lot ($250 permit), toting groceries and children. It's all so obscene -- for their tenants and for the residents of the area who will be battling for parking spaces on State Street and its side streets.
Thank, Kamal, you're doing a hell of a job!