Barbara B. Williams (1948 – 2025)

By DEBORAH E. LANS

HUDSON – On October 19, 2023, Assemblymember Didi Barrett (D-106th), joined by Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie at a press conference, announced that $1.5 million in funding is being awarded to Columbia County Habitat for Humanity to create affordable housing for first time homeowners in the county. On a per capita basis, the funding is equivalent to more than $200 million being committed to New York City.

Another $1.5 million has been awarded for Dutchess County-based Hudson River Housing to construct affordable rental units. Both organizations have committed to use a significant portion of the funds to create affordable homes – for ownership and rental – in Hudson.

This sizeable commitment to rural affordable housing was the feather in a cap-ful of recent steps to address the local housing crisis.

Under the Habitat program, Columbia County homeowners will pay no more than 30% of their income for housing (the generally-recognized measure of affordability), and the homes will be targeted for low to moderate income families seeking a starter home. Habitat has developed a quality, low cost, energy efficient (all-electric) and replicable model home that will be consistent in scale and construction with the county’s rural look and feel. Locally-sourced natural materials will be favored.

The homes will also use engineered waste disposal (septic) systems that allow for building in areas lacking municipal waste systems (i.e., most of the county) and that reduce the required lot size, allowing for greater density where appropriate. Consistent with the nature of its forward-looking plans, last week Al Bellenchia, CEO of Habitat, was named Advocacy Champion of the Year at the Habitat Northeast Regional Affiliate Conference.

Many of the speakers at the press conference noted Assemblymember Barrett’s early and long-standing commitment to affordable housing and her understanding that the issue does not lend itself to “one-size-fits-all” solutions. As architect Dennis Wedlick, who has led Habitat’s efforts to build energy-efficient homes, put it, “Didi has been with the effort all the way.”

This sizeable commitment to workforce housing also demonstrates, as the Assemblymember said, that even if statewide housing initiatives cannot be implemented, there are solutions available to ease local housing challenges.

The next day, the county Housing Task Force (Task Force) learned that its application to create a county land bank was approved by the Empire State Development Authority. That approval was the key hurdle in the process of establishing a land bank, according to Chris Brown, the Coordinator for the Task Force.

A land bank is a not-for-profit entity that specializes in the transformation of vacant, abandoned and foreclosed properties into productive use. Most commonly, land banks acquire property through the tax foreclosure system. A property is foreclosed, and then transferred to the land bank, which may pay the back taxes, so that the local taxing authority is made whole.

Land banks are recognized as an effective tool to resolve situations of tax delinquency and blight. Typically, land banks seek to sell their properties, often in aid of the rehabilitation or construction of affordable housing. For example, the Albany County Land Bank returned 118 properties to productive use in 2022 alone.

Land banks are typically run by a board that includes community residents, government officials and housing professionals. They often partner with other groups, such as financing companies, to provide low cost mortgages or to issue mortgages to families who do not qualify for traditional financing. Partnerships can also be made with developers, to create low and moderate income housing.

For example, the Albany County Land Bank created a partnership in 2021 with a non-traditional lender and expects it to have issued more than 50 mortgages by the end of this year that allow for the purchase and rehabilitation of vacant buildings from the land bank. It also formed a partnership in 2022 with Habitat for Humanity Capital District to build 100 new affordable homes in the City of Albany in five years for first-time homeowners.

As Columbia County’s land bank finishes the steps to incorporation, it will also be seeking public funding for administrative and start-up costs and then for the demolition of abandoned structures (typically a land bank’s greatest expense) and acquisitions.

Often land banks partner with Community Land Trusts (CLTs). CLTs are also typically private non-profit groups. They hold land in trust as part of a plan to provide affordable housing in perpetuity.

Often CLTs acquire land from land banks. A home is built on the land. The land is leased to the homeowner (often for 99 years). Home ownership accordingly is less expensive because there are no land acquisition costs paid by the homeowner.

The homeowners agree that when they sell the home they will do so at a restricted price, to keep it affordable in perpetuity. Usually there is also an equity sharing arrangement so that when the home is sold, the homeowner will receive some of the appreciation in the home itself.

In Columbia County an informal group has been working to establish “Trillium” (named for a locally prevalent wildflower that heralds spring) as a county-wide CLT. The Columbia Land Conservancy (CLC) and the Columbia Economic Development Corporation (CEDC) are each fiscal sponsors of more than $20,000 in grants received to assist in the planning effort. The Housing Justice Coordinator for the City of Hudson Michelle Tullo, Housing Development Coordinator for CEDC Chris Brown, and Marissa Codey, of CLC, are among the leaders of the effort.

The group expects that within the next year Trillium will be incorporated, will have established a Board, will have articulated the criteria for its projects, will have completed a business plan, and will have selected a pilot project for affordable home ownership.

These three interrelated and innovative efforts are indicative of the gathering momentum in the county to address its affordable housing issues.

Additional information about affordable housing efforts in the county can be gleaned at a forum to be held on Saturday, October 28 from 10 a.m. to noon at the West Taghkanic Firehouse featuring Mr. Bellenchia (Habitat CEO), Mr. Brown (CEDC Housing Development Coordinator) and Ms. Codey (CLC Special Project Advisor).

On November 1 at 4 p.m. the 2023 Columbia County Housing Forum will be held virtually. Mr. Brown will moderate a discussion as to pending state and local efforts to increase affordable housing. The panel members are: Darren Scott of NYS Homes and Community Renewal; Adam Bosch, president and CEO of Pattern for Progress; and Mike Borges, executive director, Rural Housing Coalition. Registration can be made through the CEDC website (https://columbiacedc.com)