STATEN ISLAND, NY - Sylvia Cunningham, who spent three decades and raised two children at Markham Gardens public housing in West Brighton, is considering returning to a new apartment there at the end of the year. She left the deteriorating Markham several years ago so it could be razed to make way for a new affordable development of 240 apartments and 25 for-sale homes. She moved into the Todt Hill Houses and she likes her new apartment, but there's another reason she might not go back to her longtime home at Markham.
"I wanted it for the younger generation, too, because the younger generation really won't be able to afford living on the outside," said Ms. Cunningham, a former tenant leader whose son also applied for an apartment at the remade development.
The new generation at Markham will benefit from a collection of "green" buildings that meet high environmental standards; a new recreation building with basketball courts, and a business center equipped with computers with high-speed Internet access, a fax and a copy machine, according to developers who have been advertising the application process in the Advance.
So far, hundreds of people have responded to two sets of ads this month for an apartment lottery, said Matthew Schwartz, a principal with co-developer Domain Companies who expects thousands of applications will come in before the Sept. 24 deadline.
The 240 new apartments, which are expected to be finished by the end of the year, will have rents ranging from $664 for a studio to as much as $2,066 for a four-bedroom apartment for low- and middle-income residents who qualify. Renters can be both those who rely on public assistance to help pay for housing and those who don't.
Former Markham residents get first crack at the rental units, and so far close to 80 of the 200 families who left public housing there have committed to returning to the privately-owned, apartments. A total of 360 units of public housing were demolished at the site, and many of those units were already vacant before residents left and demolition began.
"I think for a multi-family project, you'd be hard pressed to find another development that offers this level of amenities, not just the physical amenities, but in terms of the way the development will be run. For example, the business center will have a residential portal, an online Web community where residents can communicate and exchange information," said Schwartz.
Domain partnered with Arker Companies to bid on and secure the rights to create the $60 million development on the site of former public housing. With funding from the city's Department of Housing Preservation and Development and the Housing Development Corporation, the builders have agreed to keep the apartments affordable for at least the next 99 years.
Ads placed earlier this month for 214 apartments were geared more toward low- and moderate-income tenants. For example, a three-person household with an income of $31,672 to $41,460 could be eligible for a two-bedroom, $856-a-month apartment at Markham.
The latest round of ads running for 25 apartments is targeted more to middle-income residents, with the same two-bedroom apartment open to a three-person household for $1,519 a month. Those who qualify must make between $56,203 to $69,100 a year.
Lottery ads for the 25, two-family homes started running Saturday. With the help of Neighborhood Housing Services of Staten Island, the developers have been qualifying public housing residents to buy some of those homes, which are priced at $395,560. Informational seminars on home buying will be held today and Sept. 9 from 6 to 8 p.m. in the West Brighton Community Center, 230 Broadway.
"It's very important to the Housing Authority to turn former public housing residents into homeowners," said Claire Mitchell-Dumas, executive director of NHS on Staten Island. Another developer plans to build 80 apartments for low-income seniors at Markham by 2011.
Source: SIlive.com