@oscarthinks
Senior Economic Justice Correspondent, @nextcity.org. Author of The Banks We Deserve https://bookshop.org/p/books/the-banks-we-deserve-reclaiming-community-banking-for-a-just-economy-oscar-perry-abello/21374823 Based in NYC. He/him 🇵🇭 oscar@nextcity.org
Casa Adela survived that last scare thanks to community organizing. But the broader structural issues remain. 66 Avenue C is just one of 1,200 limited-equity low-income housing co-ops across the city — not to mention other legacy affordable housing with storefronts. All facing those same pressures.
Well they can see for themselves, not to mention hearing from brokers, their neighborhood has changed. Loisaida, the East Village, the Lower East Side. All nightlife hot spots today. They can take out a loan & make monthly payments by jacking up their storefront rents. nextcity.org/urbanist-new...
Fast forward to 2022, the building has a backlog of maintenance, not to mention a laundry list of energy efficiency needs, some of which are required by law. But many of the limited-equity co-op residents above are now living on fixed incomes. Where are they going to get the cash for all that work?
Loisaida residents today still remember Casa Adela's founder, Adela Fargas, as a neighborhood pillar who put in some sweat equity of her own into her storefront at 66 Avenue C HDFC. But as a commercial occupant not residential, Fargas did not receive a building ownership share as part of the co-op.
Still, it was such a powerful model, it helped inspire the late Jimmy Carter's longstanding connection to Habitat for Humanity, after his 1984 visit with Habitat NY. The building he helped rehab on his famous trip was right around the corner from 66 Ave C HDFC. www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3Mv...
The city supported those homesteaders back then, allowing them to put in sweat equity by to help rehab their buildings in exchange for co-op owner shares after the city foreclosed on their absentee landlords. The city since has since soured on co-ops, leaving them to fend largely for themselves.
For those not from New York City or are otherwise unfamiliar, Casa Adela's building a.k.a. 66 Avenue C HDFC was one of hundreds across NY whose tenants, often squatters at the time, reclaimed after landlords had abandoned them in the 1980s-1990s. It still says "HOMESTEADERS" above the front door.
Such a complex issue with so many layers and complicating factors.
While this very well done story touches on the plight of Casa Adela, it leaves out the fact that its building is a low-income limited equity housing co-op w/ 16 units above two storefronts. So Casa Adela's landlords live upstairs.
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Oh! Did you try the DOF portal instead of the DOB portal?
propertyinformationportal.nyc.gov
Wait maybe I am missing something, it’s a literal map you can just zoom in and click around until find the one you need… is it a condo unit maybe? They can be tricky but they’re in here
& by the way if you want to find more solutions journalism, check out the @soljourno.bsky.social directory or better yet their Solutions Story Tracker storytracker.solutionsjournalism.org
If the places where you get what you call the news make you feel paralyzed, maybe just maybe those places are no longer really producing journalism. Maybe it's something else. I don't know what. But maybe just maybe what you need is journalism, not whatever it is that makes you feel paralyzed.
Maybe just maybe it's because you see or feel something of yourself in those stories, and you're seeing that part of you finally acted upon and manifesting something real and valuable for the world, instead of just feeling paralyzed and hopeless. Journalism is supposed to move us, not paralyze us.
Facts, context, compelling narrative. That's what all journalists do. Traditional or solutions-oriented.
If, after reading any of those stories above, you feel compelled to *do something* similar or not at all similar yet reflective of a more hope-filled vision of the world, ask yourself why.
It's the same for us as solutions-oriented journalists. It's not for me to decide whether you should do what the people or organizations in my reporting are doing. But I can describe for you in fine grained detail what they are doing, why they are doing it, & how they got the idea to do it that way.
When more traditional journalists report about corruption or other wrongdoing, they don't get accused of advocating that someone else should do what the subjects in their stories are doing. They are simply reporting out facts, providing context, and yes maybe a little bit of compelling narrative.
I could go on and on. I've been reporting stories like these for ten years and counting at @nextcity.org, where we practice something called "solutions journalism."
As solutions-oriented journalists, we don't advocate that anybody should do what the people & organizations in our stories do.
Since inception in 2019, Philly's Kensington Corridor Trust has acquired more than 30 properties under a "neighborhood trust" model where local residents and local business owners have power to decide which businesses they want to keep or attract to their neighborhood. nextcity.org/features/fiv...
A year ago, Brooklyn welcomed a new queer/woman/BIPOC-led cafe & cocktail bar. It's one of dozens of new worker-owned co-ops emerging across the city as workers realize they want to strike out on their own but not repeat the same toxic patterns of previous employers. nextcity.org/features/wel...
The Boston Ujima Project is just one of a handful of BIPOC-led investment or real estate initiatives across the country that are gaining momentum and raising capital to advance their work even amidst these trying times. I caught up with a few of them early last year. nextcity.org/urbanist-new...
The multi-faceted Boston Ujima Project is led & controlled by members of Boston's working class communities of color. One of those facets is perhaps the country's first democratically-managed investment fund. Last year, the fund made its first investment in real estate. nextcity.org/urbanist-new...
DYK Denver used to have a Chinatown? Colorado's communities of Asian descent are organizing to surface lost histories long tucked away in attics & basements around the region. Stories they once felt shame around, are now proud reminders of how they helped build Denver. nextcity.org/urbanist-new...
In Pittsburgh, City of Bridges Community Land Trust has rehabbed or built & sold more than 43 homes since inception in 2019, with dozens more on the way thanks to a partnership with a regional bank that models how other land trusts in other places could do the same. nextcity.org/urbanist-new...
Denver's Globeville & Elyria-Swansea neighborhoods have long been predominantly Latino, working-class areas, but they're now in the crosshairs of a massive new redevelopment project. So they started taking back power over land & development to make sure they can stay. nextcity.org/features/a-c...
Members of the Kingsbridge Heights community have been organizing for decades around the long-vacant 570,000 square-foot Kingsbridge Armory. A few years ago they started demanding the city hand over the building to them to develop. They now own 20% of the building. nextcity.org/features/nor...
Brooklyn Packers celebrates its 10th anniversary this year. As a worker cooperative, its workers democratically own & manage the business. Worker co-ops have challenges accessing capital, but that's starting to change thanks to another kind of co-op — a credit union. nextcity.org/urbanist-new...
Three years ago, Adelphi Bank in Columbus, OH opened its doors to become the first new African American-designated bank since 2003. It's since grown to $100 million in assets, including $23 million in construction loans & $35 million in commercial real estate loans. nextcity.org/urbanist-new...