On his last official day in office, Syracuse mayor Ben Walsh applauded a New York State investment of $271 million in two housing projects. The East Adams Neighborhoods and the Jensen Avenue Apartments plan to add more than 518 housing units, most to low-to-moderate-income residents.
Walsh called the projects "top housing priorities throughout my time as Mayor. With financing now secured, these catalytic investments can break ground and result in new much-needed housing for hundreds of individuals and families.”
The funding, part of almost $2 billion in investments in housing projects across the state, includes $99 million for the Jensen Apartments, planned for the former Syracuse Developmental Center site on Tipperary Hill. It also includes $172 million for the East Adams project, which officially broke ground last month.
Both projects are intended to both ease the housing shortage and offer more options for lower-income residents. Syracuse's incoming Mayor Sharon Owens was the Walsh Administration's top official on the East Adams project.
Owens characterized the development as more than just homes, "an affordable, eclectic housing, living, playing, business neighborhood that will include the people who originated here," harkening back to times beore urban renewal when that area of downtown was a thriving residential neighborhood.
PROJECT AND FUNDING DETAILS
The projects include:
(Source: Syr.gov)
- $99 million for Jensen Avenue Apartments in Syracuse – Jensen Avenue Apartments is the first phase of a larger three-phase development that includes affordable and market-rate rental units, as well as homeowner-occupied townhomes. The first phase includes 261 apartments of affordable housing available to households earning up to 80 percent of the Area Median Income. The development will be built on the site of the former state-owned psychiatric hospital known as the Syracuse Developmental Center (SDC). In addition to the funding secured through HCR, the site redevelopment also benefitted from a $29 Million investment secured by the City from Empire State Development (ESD) to facilitate the demolition of the former SDC facility and to install new utility and roadway infrastructure to support the new project.
- $172 million for East Adams Phase 1 and Phase 2 in Syracuse – The first and second phases of a multi-phase redevelopment that will transform the East Adams neighborhood of Syracuse. The 257 apartments in these two phases will be affordable to households earning up to 60 percent of the Area Median Income.
