Tenants association president Alicia Barksdale advocates for low-income residents. Photo courtesy of Alicia Barksdale

Santana, who receives welfare and Section 8 funding to subsidize her rent, claimed that since MetroNorth transitioned from the Mitchell-Lama program to private ownership under Urban American Management, home hasn’t been the same. She alleged that she was asked to pay rent she’s not responsible for and struggled to get repairs in her apartment, even going to housing court to demand improvements. According to Santana, this is harassment aimed at pushing Section 8 tenants out of MetroNorth, located on First Avenue between 101st and 102nd Streets.

Urban American Chief Operating Officer Douglas Eisenberg denied the allegations in a statement and said that the company is committed to affordable housing.

“While we are by no means perfect, we take all complaints seriously and we respond quickly and as efficiently as we can to our residents’ concerns,” he said.

Santana, however, described a vastly different situation.

“I have to beg for my home to be kept and maintained in good condition. Why should I have to go through that?” she said.

Tenants like Myra Santana, who use Section 8 vouchers to remain in former Mitchell-Lama buildings, are on the ground floor of an affordable housing upheaval. When private investors buy these buildings, new tenants move in and pay market rate rents on renovated units formerly preserved for low-to moderate-income tenants. Disparities in conditions between market rate and Section 8 units, and the alleged mistreatment of Section 8 tenants, have led to claims of harassment. Yet this is only one piece of the housing puzzle. As Mitchell-Lama buildings transition to private ownership, the long-term effects on affordable housing – and on residents like Santana – are unknown.

Mitchell-Lama Housing in East Harlem

MetroNorth, the Upper Park Avenue Community Association, or UPACA, buildings 1 and 2, and The Heritage, formerly Schomberg Plaza, are East Harlem complexes once part of Mitchell-Lama, a city program providing affordable housing to moderate-income families. According to Citizens Housing and Planning Council, a nonprofit research organization dedicated to improving housing conditions, when Mitchell-Lama began as co-operative housing in 1955, there was no incentive for private investors to enter into the program. To attract investors, the laws were re-jiggered a few years later to add rental units in addition to co-ops; landlords could eventually opt out of the program and turn a profit.

“You wouldn’t have had all this housing if they didn’t have incentives,” said Harold Shultz, a senior fellow from the housing and planning council.

The housing remained affordable under the Mitchell-Lama program until 2005, when developer Jerome Belson purchased the three East Harlem properties and two additional Mitchell-Lama buildings for $295 million, according to a 2007 report compiled by the Urban Homesteading Assistance Board and Tenants & Neighbors. Two years later, the five properties were sold to the Urban American Management Corporation for $918 million.

In 2005, rents increased to market rates, and many residents could no longer afford their housing. To prevent them from being displaced, the New York City Department of Housing Preservation and Development made tenants earning up to 95 percent of the area median income eligible for subsidies known as enhanced Section 8 vouchers.

The Section 8 Voucher Program is federally subsidized and supplements what tenants can afford to pay, thereby allowing them to live in privately owned rental housing of their choice. Tenants pay 30 percent of their income or what they paid under Mitchell-Lama; vouchers cover the rest.

Currently, HPD subsidizes 1,785 families within four of the five Urban American properties. The New York City Housing Authority also subsidizes an additional 943 households in East Harlem through the Section 8 Voucher Program, according to the agency’s research director, Anne-Marie Flately.

Yet Section 8 vouchers designed to prevent tenant displacement can’t guarantee security. According to Tenants & Neighbors, an organization dedicated to the preservation of affordable housing, Urban American indebted itself when it purchased the properties, putting tenants at risk.

“They’ve been severely overleveraged. That means the model calls for one or two things concurrently. One, to get in as many market rate tenants as possible, and two, to skimp on repairs. If you buy something where the cost can’t be covered by the rent, what are you going to do?” said Dave Powell, advocacy director at Tenants & Neighbors.

Eisenberg, the COO of Urban American, said in an email, “The suggestion that our finances are in bad shape is false. Our company is healthy, we never take on debt beyond our means and we are continuing to invest in these properties.”

Alleged Harassment

Residents at MetroNorth and 3333 Broadway, another Urban American property, alleged that getting anything fixed – from basic repairs to replacing deteriorating floors and cabinets – required continual prodding from tenants.

Alicia Barksdale, president of the 3333 Broadway Tenants Association and a longtime resident, cited discrepancies between renovated apartments rented at market value and Section 8 units – such as wood floors and new appliances compared with tile floors and older fixtures – as a form of discrimination.

“Because we’re Section 8, they feel we don’t deserve upgrades,” she said.

Barksdale also said that management put money toward improving the appearance of the buildings while ignoring issues within units.

According to Eisenberg, the changes went far beyond cosmetics. Urban American has made tens of millions of dollars in improvements to elevators, plumbing and security systems since it purchased the properties two years ago, and improved the quality of life for residents.

The City Council passed the Tenant Protection Act in 2008 to protect tenants from prolonged harassment. The legislation “creates a violation for harassment in and of itself, providing a new layer of protection for renters in New York City,” according to a March 2008 news release from the office of City Council Speaker Christine C. Quinn. Yet according to Powell, the legislation’s effectiveness was mitigated by challenges to the statutes from landlords.

“The Tenant Protection Act’s potential has not been realized,” he said.

Affordable Housing Today: Losses and Gains

As affordable housing dwindles, many residents fear that losing their apartments will force them to leave their neighborhood.

More than 65,000 units of Mitchell-Lama housing were lost throughout the city, according to Manhattan Borough President Scott M. Stinger’s Web site. New affordable housing is being created, but slowly. On Nov. 4, the New York State Division of Housing and Community Renewal announced that $7.75 million in federal stimulus funding is slated for the East Harlem Media, Entertainment and Cultural Center. The center will provide 49 units to low-income individuals and people with physical disabilities.

Around 2,000 vacant housing units are available in East Harlem based on 2007 American Community Survey data. MetroNorth contains 103 apartments available for rent, according to an annual report from the Mitchell-Lama Housing Corporation.

What is considered affordable and how many such units are available are often vaguely defined. “There’s no such thing as affordable housing, there’s housing affordable to people at specific incomes,” said Shultz.

The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development’s Income Limits set the affordability benchmark. “Low income” is considered $61,450 per year for a family of four in Manhattan. Yet low-income housing is not monolithic. For a family of four, “very low income” slightly exceeds $38,000 a year. The median family income in East Harlem is $34,700, according to the 2007 American Community Survey. At $1,250 and $1,525 a month for MetroNorth studios and one-bedrooms, respectively, units are unattainable for many longtime residents.

Availability isn’t the only issue. While current tenants can stay where they’re at, buildings hesitate to accept new Section 8 tenants.

“The larger problem is that voucher goes with them and the unit becomes market rate,” said UPACA Tenants Association President Alvin Johnson.

Yet Shultz suggested that vouchers are a viable solution. Referring to Section 8 tenants, he said, “Despite claims of harassment, they are more protected than most tenants are and substantially less vulnerable.”

Solutions

“It’s time that we stop treating housing for low-income communities as a tradable commodity for the benefit of people who own and start treating it as a basic right,” said Diego Quinones, an advocate against gentrification in East Harlem.

Some advocates suggested returning the buildings retroactively to Mitchell-Lama. A proposed housing bill in the state Senate named for Democratic Sen. Andrea Stewart-Cousins, whose district covers Greenburgh, Mount Pleasant and Yonkers, would put all former Mitchell-Lama buildings into rent stabilization.

Yet Shultz cautioned that if housing were made affordable indefinitely, the city could end up with less money and fewer units.

“Is that a trade-off you’re willing to make? I’m not even sure what the right answer is. If I predicted what New York City would need in housing today 30 years ago, I would’ve gotten it completely wrong.”

For now, Myra Santana remains in her apartment, where she hopes to stay.

The answer to the housing difficulties, according to the tenant association’s Barksdale is plain and simple.

“Fix the place. Treat us equally.”

A video by Nikolia Apostolou and Alizah Salario.

Three months after the New York City Council passed a law that would speed up graffiti removal,

many tags still remain on the streets of East Harlem. Residents discuss the benefits and drawbacks

of graffiti in their neighborhood.

Census officials anticipate that an expanded community partnership program will help to make the 2010 Census the most accurate to date.

The Census Bureau is collaborating with local organizations and community advocates to raise awareness within East Harlem’s immigrant communities about the 2010 Census. Census workers and local nonprofits agree that getting an accurate population count is an essential move toward increasing services and improving the quality of life in East Harlem.

“This is an instrument or a tool for justice. A full count is the first step to making sure everyone gets their fair share,” said Census partnership specialist Andres Mares-Muro, who works in East Harlem.

Cecomex founder Juan Caceres and his son Ivan adovcate for immigrant rights. Photo:Alizah Salario

Mares–Muro estimates that the partnership program has established over 40 connections in East Harlem. Cecomex, a nonprofit that advocates for immigrant rights, is working with the census to distribute fliers to East Harlem’s growing Mexican population. Cecomex targets local hotspots such as the 116 Street business district.

“I think it’s making a real positive impact, and I think it’s going to be a lot better this time around,” said Cecomex coordinator Ivan Caceres of the partnership.

Accurate census data could improve social services from senior citizen care to subway routes. The federal government dispenses billions in funding annually based on census data, and many non-governmental agencies use these statistics as the basis for funding requests.

“You justify giving or taking away funding through data,” said partnership coordinator Rafael Dominguez.

No one recognizes this fact better than Harlem Chamber of Commerce President Henry Calderon, who is pushing for an ad hoc community task force to address the census. In addition to census partnerships, Calderon suggests bringing information “to places where people congregate and gossip” like bodegas and beauty salons, or having social services or hospital workers who already make house calls deliver information.

“We need to bring it down to the level of the street,” he said.

According to a 2008 report by the Pew Hispanic Center, there are 12.9 million Mexican immigrants living in the United States, seven million of whom are undocumented. Census data shows that East Harlem is home to 25,000 foreign-born residents, with Mexicans making up the largest segment of this population at 33 percent.

Many Mexicans living in New York hail from the states of Oaxaca, Guerrero and Puebla, where, for some, Spanish is learned after a first indigenous language.

“They’re more traditional and more unaccustomed to the way the system works in the U.S.,” said Caceres.

Immigrants’ non-traditional living situations pose another obstacle to getting accurate data. In cases where multiple families reside in the same dwelling, the head of household might be reluctant to record additional names. Mares-Muro emphasized that the Census Bureau is not affiliated with housing authorities or landlords.

Bilingual census forms will be sent out beginning in April. The 2010 census only contains 10 questions, and does not ask for citizenship status or a social security number.

Questionnaire assistance centers are available for individuals who have problems filling out the form. All individuals living in the United States during the census are counted, regardless of citizenship.

Buckets of pig’s tails, pork snouts and salted beef were prominently displayed among the codfish and mackerel. Local customers from as far as Brooklyn and Bridgeport, Conn., visited this modest East Harlem food stall on a recent Wednesday to find the best link fish.

The place is La Marqueta, once a bustling center of more than 500 ethnic food stalls that catered to generations of East Harlem immigrants. Yet now, only a handful of merchants work in the desolate marketplace.

A mural outside La Marqueta hearkens back to its heyday

But these last bastions of the old order may soon be the first in a new wave of vendors. Located under the Metro-North Railroad tracks on Park Avenue from East 111th to 116th streets, La Marqueta is set to undergo a massive revitalization that will begin this summer, which will include building a shared community kitchen as well as space for a farmers market. Proponents said this renovation will give the neighborhood much-needed access to fresh, local food.

Now, only one quarter of food retailers in East Harlem sell fresh produce, according to a 2008 study by the Economic Development Corporation and the Department of City Planning. A 2008 special report by the Food Trust found that the number of supermarkets in the lowest-income neighborhoods, including East Harlem, was almost 30 percent less than that of the highest-income neighborhoods. A fourth of East Harlem residents suffer from obesity and up to 18 percent of the population has diabetes, the study said.

“It would be nice to see a green market here, ” said La Marqueta shopper Ivoline Anthony.

In March 2009, the city started looking for a food or agricultural-related use for La Marqueta. In August, officials decided to invest building in a 4,000 square foot fully-equipped commercial kitchen in addition to the food stalls and farmers market. The “incubator” kitchen is expected to be up and running by this summer and will provide space and access to equipment for local entrepreneurs, giving them the chance jumpstart their food businesses.

Similar to the goal of promoting access to fresh food, economic development officials hoped the shared kitchen program will create demand for locally made foods.

“I think a really great idea would be to create a facility that produced food or meals that was grown locally and distribute it to schools that are in the neighborhood,” said Harlem advocacy coordinator James Sabhudi, who runs a food justice program for public schools. Sabhudi pointed out that nearly one in four elementary school children suffer from obesity in East Harlem.

Currently, proposals are being reviewed by the City Council for potential kitchen operators. Details on the farmers market and usage of the remainder of the approximately 80,000 square foot space is yet to be determined.

“It feels like a fantastic thing to support. The city has so many chains,” said entrepreneur Amy Schreber, who has worked on the kitchen initiative. “That has a lot heart and soul behind it.”

The economic development officials hoped that the housing development across the street will offer a large customer base, in addition to drawing visitors from surrounding neighborhoods.

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