CITY LIMITS

COMMUNITY HOUSING NEWS

FEBRUARY 1978 VOL. 3 NO.2
PROTEST BREAKS DEADLOCK
IN COMMUNITY MANAGEMENT
by Bernard Cohen
Chanting "Holdup is a crime-Contracts must be
signed!" , 200 people who were frustrated by the long-
stalled community management program gave the
Koch administration its first big demonstration.
The Feb. 9 protest, which began at City Hall and
spread to the State office building across the street,
broke a three-month impasse between city and state
officials and cleared the way for approval of new com-
munity management contracts by the Emergency
Financial Control Board.
Resolution of the issue, which concerned how rent
should be collected, and subsequent EFCB approval of
the contracts constituted a major victory for 18 com-
munity-based housing organizations that either have
been managing or wish to begin managing city-owned
apartment buildings.
Under the new contracts, the organizations will re-
tain the authority to collect the rent in buildings they
manage, a practice they had argued for strongly.
Despite its problems, community management has
been it very important program for rescuing landlord-
abandoned buildings in low income neighborhoods.
Since 1972, an increasing number of community
organizations have served as the managing agents for
buildings that came into the city's possession after the
owners defaulted on their real estate taxes. Under con-
tract with the city, the organizations have hired staffs to
make repairs, purchase equipment and arrange for ser-
vices, advise tenants and collect rents. The groups
receive management fees from the city that help pay for
their own rent and other expenses.
The money for each contract comes from two sources:
rent from tenants and federal Community Development
funds from the city.
Last year, some 56 buildings totalling more than
1,000 dwelling units were under community manage-
ment in 10 neighborhoods in Brooklyn, the Bronx and
Manhattan. Under the new contracts, the figure is ex-
pected to double to 2,000.
Community management has proved to be an
important to management by the city of its
own properties. "The city is no better than an absentee
landlord," said one participant in the program. "It
responds only when pressure is applied and even when
pressure is applied the city shows up with a band aid for a
serious problem."
All of the existing community management contracts
expired last July, the beginning of a long series of
delays. Twice the contracts were extended while city
auditors examined the participating organizations'
books.
In early December, the city approved 18 new con-
tracts. Those that exceeded $100,000 (most of them)
went to the EFCB where they became bogged down by
questions raised by the state and tardiness of the city to
respond.
Because the dollar amounts were not raised at the
same time the contracts were extended, the latest delay
put many of the organizations in a serious financial
bind. One, the West Harlem Community Organization,
ran out of funds and had to borrow money to pay its
staff and to buy fuel for its six community managed
buildings.
Los Sures in Brooklyn said it was within a week of
reaching the limit of what it could spend (once an
organization has reached the aggregate amount of its
budget according to the contract it can spend no more
even though it has funds through rent collection.)
Adopt-a-Building, which manages four buildings and
11 units, estimated it would be out of funds by March
15.
These and other community organizations faced the
prospect of having to layoff staff, leaving no one to take
care of routine repairs or maintenance emergencies.
Work on fixing up apartments for new tenants would
have come to a halt.
According to all parties, the issue holding up the
2
contracts centered on the existing practice of rent col-
lection by the organizations in the community manage-
ment program.
The State deputy controller's office, which advises
the EFCB, took the view that tenants should pay their
rent directly to the city rather than to the groups. State
officials cited Section 126 of the New York City Charter
requiring all city revenue, including income from city-
owned property, to go into the general treasury.
The position of the community organizations and, ul-
timately, the city was that the groups should collect the
rent since they have responsibility for managing the
buildings. To turn rent collection over to the city would
undermine the ability of the groups to manage, they
contended, and mar the efficiency of the program.
On December 6, several weeks after the State con-
troller's office first raised the rent issue, the city
corporation counsel's office was asked for a legal
opinion.
City housing and legal officials acknowledge that the
matter languished for months before the corporation
counsel's office drafted an opinion strongly supporting
continued rent collection by the organizations. Mean-
while, the contracts missed two chances for EFCB
approval.
Asked why it took so long to prepare an opinion, one
corporation counsel lawyer blamed lack of staff and the
volume oflegal work, adding, "Frankly, we take these
issues as they become critical."
On Feb. 8, two days before the next EFCB meeting,
there was no indication that the legal and accounting
dispute was being solved and-despite city pressure to
call it off-the community organizations went ahead
with plans to launch the demonstration the following
day.
While the 200 tenants and community workers were
picketing, a meeting of city and state officials, chaired
by Paul Dickstein, then first deputy commissioner of
the Department of Housing Preservation and Develop-
ment, was taking place at HPD in an effort to resolve
the rent issue.
By several accounts, the state officials were not
moved by the city's legal arguments at the meeting but
by the end of the day, Deputy State Controller Schwartz
announced that the state was withdrawing its
objections and would not oppose the contracts.
Asked why the change of mind, Schwartz said "The
law was not easy to reconcile. Suffice it to say that ...
where you have two possibilities and the city corpora-
tion counsel argues for one, it is not likely to be over-
turned."
On Feb. 10, the Emergency Financial Control Board
approved the contracts. They are for three months only
and will have to be renegotiated in the spring. 0
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I
1
J
DEMOLITION BY DYNAMITE
LIGHTS COMMUNITY'S FUSE
Demolition by dynamite, which set off an explo-
sion of community protest when first slated for a
test last month on abandoned buildings in the
South Bronx, will take place, City housing aides
insist, after an explanation of the technique to
affected Community Boards.
"We have not junked the idea by any means,"
said Frank Juliano, director of Community and
Site Services for the Department of HOllsing
Preservation and Development.
The demolition-by-dynamite technique, known
as "implosion," is a City proposal to save money
and time in demolishing buildings condemned by
the City or by court order. There is a rapidly
growing list that now contains some 10,000 build-
ings susceptible to demolition around the city.
South Bronx community l e ~ d e r s , however,
protest that the first implosion experiment was
scheduled without any community consultation.
"They come in here and say, 'We're gOing to
dynamite your community.' There's no hearing,
no communication," complained City Councilman
Gilberto Gerena-Valentin, who represents the
area.
Juliano, who is HPD's liaison to the Community
Boards, agreed that lack of consultation with the
South Bronx Community Boards about the
January test caused a problem. "That test was
cancelled because we did believe that the com-
munity and the planning boards knew almost
nothing about this method," he said.
"They were worried about the question of
safety," Juliano noted. He also surmised that the
community feared that the implosion method of
demolition would take away jobs from neighbor-
hood residents employed on conventional demoli-
tion crews.
"If their plan hadn't been leaked to the press, it
would have gone on as scheduled, and who knows
what the results would have been," said Dana
Driskell, district manager of Bronx Community
Board No.2. An unused public school in Driskell's
district, now being levelled by conventional
means, was scheduled for implosion in the
January test.
Carlos Arce, manager of neighboring communi-
ty Board No.2, said his Board had formally joined
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the protest in a unanimous vote on January 18. In
his district three tenements which were to be part
of the test are now being taken down by conven-
tional means.
"We were told by the City that there are not
enough [conventional] demolition companies
available to do the whole job," Arce recalled. But
implosion is not the answer, he said. "This is an
issue of economic development. Minority demoli-
tion companies could be formed with City support.
The City could guarantee their bonding," Arce
maintained.
Implosive demolition has been used elsewhere,
mostly on large structures, but has until now been
prohibited in New York City. The technique
involves setting off many small, synchronized
charges of dynamite, placed at critical support
areas of condemned structures, to force them to
cave in on themselves.
Critics charge that any money saved by "im-
ploding" small buildings will be offset by the
much larger insurance and bonding required than
in conventional demolition contracts. The high
cost of insurance reflects the threat to public
safety from the procedure, they contend.
The City administration believes that only a site
test of implosion can resolve the debate over its
merits, and Mayor Koch has promised to super-
vise personally such a test, if necessary.
Charles Poidomani, director of operations for
HPD's Division of Code Enforcement, said, "You
need some experience, but you need to pick the
proper place and give proper notice. It may not be
the right thing for the South Bronx, but it may be
for Bushwick or Jamaica."
Jose Melendez, whose three-year-old Com-
munity and Church Coalition works out of St.
Ann's Church in the South Bronx, does not believe
implosion is the right thing for his neighborhood.
"What we are saying is clear. We're going to be
inside those buildings even if the Mayor himself
comes to pull the first fuse. It's not fair to the
community," Melendez contended. "It's taking
jobs away and it's costing more money.
"Look at the lack of jobs and the conditions
people are living in," Melendez concluded, "and
now they're coming to bomb us." 0
CETA, CJCC GRADUATES:
TRAINING FOR WHAT
? "A Lot of Promises
But Nothing Definite."
by Susan Baldwin
Many construction trainees in New York City com-
pleting one-year programs funded by CET A and the
Criminal Justice Coordinating Council (CJCC) are
facing the possibility of being chronically unemployed
once again.
The programs were designed to train the graduates
in the various construction trades, thus assuring them
placement in un subsidized jobs.
"I don't know where you can point the finger when it
comes to assessing these programs," Alan Weiss,
director of the Adult Work Experience Program in the
City's Department of Employment, said recently. "The
responsibility lies with the programs. and those
running the programs have to face the issue. They have
to place the people, and this is a tough one. "
Stressing the job placement difficulty, Weiss noted
that the unions are themselves struggling to find jobs
for more than 40,000 unemployed men and women New
Yorkers who have many more years of experience in the
same fields.
"We cannot solve all the city's ills just through basic
job training," he continued, "and I think this is why we
have to look at these programs again to determine what
alternatives exist."
Most critics concede that the training programs, with
some exceptions, are being well run, and conscientious
efforts being made to place trainees in un subsidized
work. But many wonder if these programs should
continue to be operated at all, much less expanded, if
there are no jobs to be found in the construction
industry.
Under the present CETA program, the cost per year
to the federal government of training a clerical worker
is only $5,000, while, according to Weiss, "In each
community-based program, it costs about $10,000 to
$15,000 per year to train each person in construction
work, and if only one-third of them get jobs, it ends up
costing a total of about $30,000 each."
How does this bleak forecast of their future affect the
outlook of government-subsidized construction trainees
at job sites around the city?
"I think they should continue these programs what-
ever they say about them," said Jose Pagan, a
carpentry specialist in the CJCC program at the not-for-
profit Manhattan Valley Development Corporation
(MVDC). Pagan and nine other enrollees are currently
completing the year-long "gut" rehabilitation of a
12-unit apartment house at 927 Columbus Avenue on
Manhattan's Upper West Side. The building, now
4
owned by MVDC, is slated for low-income cooperative
ownership by its tenants.
"The pay could be better," Pagan said. "For the
finished product it's much too low," he told a visitor
recently as he pointed out details of the workmanship in
a good-as-new sunlit apartment. "Why, regular con-
struction workers don't even come to work every day
when the weather's bad, and they still get paid. But
then, they don't learn how to put in a new boiler and a
new backyard and even fight rats."
If Pagan likes his job despite the uncertain future,
less optimistic is the view of Jose Cruz, the site co-
ordinator for the project. (Three supervisors and a book-
keeper round out the payroll.)
"I believe that this program was set up to fail," he
asserted. "All the workers here are from the neighbor-
hood, and we know them. They're not making that
much money-from $120 to $225 a week. We would like
to employ them after the program ends at better wages
on a [City-supervised] housing rehabilitation program
we have, but the City says they don't qualify for work in
a specific trade. "
This comes about, said Cruz, because the City, which
supervises the rehabilitatio}:l of City-owned multiple
dwellings managed by the development corporation,
does not acknowledge the training that CJCC workers
have received.
"The program really should go for at least two years
with the option to place the workers in our community
management program, since there is no real work
available in construction elsewhere," Cruz said.
Bob Allen, another worker in the Columbus Avenue
rehabilitation, is worried but not alarmed about the
future.
"We would all like to have a job after this one," he
said, "but, you know, right now there are a lot of pro-
mises but nothing definite. I came here last year be-
cause I couldn't find another job. I had to accept a
training program, and this is the least money I've ever
made in my life."
Allen and co-worker Joseph Reyes, who has learned
electrical skills on the CJCC project, are confident that
they will be able to find odd jobs in the neighborhood
while they are looking for permanent employment.
Reyes was a diamond-setter for 19 years before he
signed on as an enrollee.
"We will be prepared for the future," Reyes
predicted. "I'm sure that some of us will get placed."
Some of the men, like Reyes, have even learned how
to read blueprints on the job. It is a job, Pagan summed
up, that has brought "a lot of benefits and a lot of
blisters," adding up to "a lot of knowledge, but
probably not enough for union jobs."
Almost everyone interviewed on the job training
dilemma emphasizes that neither the CET A nor the
CJCC programs should be treated in such a way as to
make them synonymous with "an alternate form of
welfare. "
Roberto ("Rabbit") Nazario is director of Interfaith
Adopt-a-Building, known for its innovative answers to
the housing problems of Manhattan's Lower East Side.
He wants neighborhoods like his to look to the future
with the idea of creating more jobs for neighborhood
residents.
"We can create jobs and have created them for our
CET A graduates," he said. "They have shown the
ability to learn, have developed good work habits, and
have gone on to lead and supervise others," he said,
noting that 80 per cent of his organization's most recent
CET A training program graduates have been placed in
the group's community management program.
Nazario pointed out that the local trainees and
community residents have proven their skills in the
seal-up of abandoned buildings nearby. Now they
would like to become involved in the reconstruction of
the old amphitheatre at East River Park.
"We're going to seek jobs for community
people-many of them graduates of our CET A
program-in the construction trades to rebuild this,"
Nazario asserted. "Then, once this work is completed,
we would also like to put our people to work main-
taining and managing it."
Herman Hewitt, the director of Adopt-a-Building's
CETA program, agrees with Manhattan Valley's Cruz
about the time constraints of the job traning program.
"The recruits get started, and by the time they are
beginning to be trained, the program is over," he said.
"What we need is a program based on apprentice-
ship training which lasts at least two years and may
extend to four," he added, noting that this format
would resemble the one followed by construction
unions, and would provide a structured a.1ternative for
entry to the skilled trades.
Hewitt also said that CET A funds could be used to
organize neighborhood trade unions if the traditional
labor organizations refused to recognize this apprentice
training program.
Ronald Grey, director of the management and work
experience program at Brooklyn's Oceanhill-Browns-
ville Tenants Association, disagrees with the critics of
the CET A training program who claim that money is
being wasted in construction training.
"The main problem now is that there is not enough
time to train them all to be skilled laborers," he
asserted. "But it's impossible to agree with those guys
who say that our guys are not being trained at all."
Grey believes that the hardest part of the current, too
short program is finding a way to end it gracefully.
"Oceanhill-Brownsville is just as bombed-out as the
South Bronx, and we have a lot of people out here who
haven't worked for so long," he said. "As a reSUlt, it's
really hard to explain to them when the project is over
that there's no work."
Grey is presently trying to find work for CET A
workers whose program ends next month. "I'm hoping
that some of the smaller developers who are becoming
more interested in rehabilitating housing, since there is
not money for new construction, will hire our graduates,"
he said.
"We also found out by testing the guys here that
there were serious problems with reading," Grey
continued on page 14
Workers at 927 Columbus Ave. in Manhattan Valley relax during lunch hour. Program is slated to end next month.
SOLAR SEEN AS TOO COSTLY
FOR POORER
NEIGHBORHOODS
Solar panel atop 1186 Washington Ave. in the South Bronx.
by Bernard Cohen
At dusk, when the thick line of clouds to the north
grows dark and the new moon is a bright sliver, the glass
panel sheets that angle up from a rooftop in the South
Bronx turn into mirrors, capturing in minature the
distant city skyline bathed in pink by the failing winter
sun.
It is quiet on the roof except for the steady procession
of jetliners overhead and the occasional rattling in the
cold wind of loose metal insulation around the pipes
leading from the solar panels.
With the last light of day, the reflected image of the
city fades and disappears.
High hopes for solar energy in New York City's low-
income neighborhoods have far from disappeared, but
they have faded some as more and more has been
learned about how much it costs to tap the sun and
where the benefits appear to be going.
Solar hot water systems have been functioning since
March, 1976 at 519 East 11th Street in Manhattan and
July, 1977 at 1186 Washington Avenue in the South
Bronx. Both were paid for by federal grants.
A growing number of alternative energy specialists
are saying that while the rooftop solar collectors do
reduce fuel bills, the equipment is too expensive for
low-income people without a subsidy program that, for
e
the present, is nowhere on the horizon.
Right now, "solar energy is not a worthwhile
economic investment for anybody, much less for low-
income people, " said David Norris of the Energy Task
Force, a federally-funded education and technical
assistance organization.
Many of those who hailed solar energy two years ago
as the key to breaking the vicious cycle of escalating
energy costs, declining services and building abandon-
ment are now saying that more attention should be paid
to insulation, weatherization and other forms of energy
conservation. overlooked in the two years that solar has
been in the limelight.
Two community-based housing organizations that
were planning to mount solar energy hot water systems
on 12 tenements slated for sweat equity rehabilitation
changed their minds recently because the cost would
have driven rents too high. Instead, the groups have
applied for solar grants for two buildings. ETF and
other groups have applied to New York City for $3 mil-
lion in grants for solar projects.
Where solar energy was once seen as a strong poten-
tial source of economic development in low-income
neighborhoods, the people in those communities with
experience in the energy field are now talking more
- ~ ,.
about forming businesses more centered on energy
conservation.
"I think we've all had our eyes opened, " said
Michael Bobker, of Peoples Development Corporation,
sponsor of the 1186 solar project. "We're a lot more
realistic about energy issues and have moved into wea-
therization, which is much less glamorous than solar
but much more cost effective."
At the same time, he said, "We're trying to develop
real low cost solar energy that uses a more passive
design and materials available to any community group
and tying these things clearly into other energy
issues. "
Advocates of alternative energy stress that ways
must be found to make solar cheaper through a combi-
nation of government support, redesign of the tech-
nology and local production.
"There is no question that solar energy has produced
savings," said Michael Freedberg of the East 11th
Street Housing Movement and a resident of 519. "The
question is how can we achieve these savings with the
smallest capital up front investment.
"It is not that the cost of labor is too high or that the
cost of materials is too high, although obviously reduc-
ing those would be helpful as well. The principal prob-
lem is that the cost of money is too high," Freedberg
said.
All agree that there must be a meaningful federal
urban energy policy that combines more commitment to
research and development of solar techniques appro-
priate for low-income neighborhoods with an active
program of grants and other subsidies to solar
consumers.
The solar units atop 519 East 11th Street and 1186
Washington Avenue are called optimized glycol sys-
tems. They consist of flat plate solar collectors mounted
at angles to make maximum use of the sun. Each col-
lector is a metal box. The top is glass and the bottom is
a copper sheet with pipes running through it. Water
pumped through the pipes picks up heat from the col-
lectors and is stored in a tank in the basement.
The optimized glycol system is relatively expensive
because of the collectors, the structural supports, the
long pipes and the storage tank. Double heat exchanges
and electrical pumps reduce its energy efficiency.
Solar provided an estimated 65 to 75 percent of the hot
water needs of the two buildings over a year. Bobker said
the 1186 system boosted the water temperature from 40
degrees to about 70 degrees in winter and from 55 degrees
to 90 degrees in summer. Conventional fuel (oil) heated
the water up to 120 degrees.
The equipment cost about $14,000 for 519 East 11th
Street (13 apartments) and $33,000 for 1186 Washing-
ton Avenue (28 apartments). Installation was done by
the tenant owners of each building.
Assuming a federal 20-year mortgage at 3 percent
7
interest. the cost per apartment would have worked out
to between $5 and $7 a month if tenants had had to pay
for the solar systems. " It's not worth it when you're
already at the margin" of what you can afford, said
Charles Laven of the Urban Homesteading Assistance
Board.
Because of the uneven monitoring of the solar equip-
ment, it is harder to know accurately how much it has
saved on fuel costs. In a manual called No Heat No Rent
published in September, 1977, ERF estimated that the
11th Street solar system cut each apartment's fuel bill
by $2.54 per month.
Assuming a ten percent annual increase in the cost of
oil, the manual estimated that it would be 1988 before
the savings on fuel exceeded the cost of the solar
equipment. However, the book warned that monitoring
of the solar system was done sporadically by hand and
called the data inconclusive.
EFT has a brand-new economic analysis of the opti-
mized glycol system and four solar variations that
weighs initial cost, annual BUT output, maintenance,
fuel savings, inflation, interest rates and projected oil
and electricity cost increases to arrive at what the task
force calls a " present value benefit! cost ratio."
A ratio of less than ONE means the cost exceeds the
projected life cycle benefits. All five systems come in
under one with the optimized glycol type looking the
worst at .15 or a harsh 15-cent return on a $1 invest-
ment. The analysis concludes that solar hot water "has
a ways to go" before it can be considered economically
attractive in New York City.
The task force is now trying to design a more passive,
less elaborate solar system that would be both cheaper
and more adaptable to local production.
Called the direct gain heater, it is a compact model
that puts the storage capacity on the roof and
eliminates collectors, heat exchangers, roof to base-
ment pipes, and pumps.
The ETF economic analysis figures the present value
benefit cost ratio of the direct gain heater at .816, still
below the break-even point but close enough to surpass
it in the event of future performance improvements,
cost reductions or tax or subsidy benefits.
Proponents of solar energy for low-income neighbor-
hoods believe that the federal government could and
should significantly reduce the cost of solar through
more commitment to research and development and
through a meaningful program of grants and other sub-
sidies to consumers.
Their feeling is that since no one denies that solar
energy lowers the cost of operating a building and
reduces people's reliance on non-renewable, more pol-
luting fuels, it should be government policy to make
solar widely available.
"If solar were subjected to the same kind of subsidy
inherent in other fuels or if low-income people had
access to the same kind of tax mechanisms most other
people have, you would be looking at a whole different
picture," said Freedberg.
For fiscal year 1978, Congress has appropriated $411
million for solar or about 15 percent of the total energy
budget. Solar amounted to about 10 percent of the 1977
budget.
. Writing last year in The Nation, Bruce Welch,
director of the Environmental Biomedicine Research
Institute in Baltimore, state that by the end of 1975, the
federal government had spent $8.25 billion to develop
civilian nuclear power, the equivalent of more than 85
percent of the capital the industry itself had invested.
A spokesman for the federal Department of Energy,
acknowledging the enormous past federal expenditures
for nuclear development, said "the same thing is being
started with solar but we're not yet up to the stage
where we're spending that kind of money."
The money the government does spend on solar re-
search and grants, critics assert, favors expensive,
"active" technologies more appropriate for large-scale
commercial manufacture than for decentralized,
locally-based production. "Big companies (Exxon and
the like) are moving rapidly," says ETF. City Limits
was unable before going to press to get a breakdown of
from the Department of Energy on how research funds
are being spent.
The Department of Energy has an appropriate tech-
nology small grants program with a two-person staff
and $3 million to spend. So far, all the grants have gone
to Region 9, California, Arizona and Nevada. Beginning
Ground view of 1186 Washington Ave.
8
in April, the office will begin soliciting applications
from Regions 1 and 2 including New York and New
England.
Of the 330 demonstration solar grants given so far by
the Department of Housing and Urban Development,
10 percent to 15 percent have been for low-income
projects, a handful of them sponsored by neighborhood
organizations doing housing rehabilitation, according
to a HUD spokesman.
The spokesman said that the guidelines for the next
cycle of grants state for the first time that special con-
sideration should be given to projects sponsored by
low-income non-profit community development groups.
An example cited by critics of how poor people are
losing out on solar is President Carter's proposed 40
percent credit against income taxes since poor people
pay little or no taxes.
"The government is virtually guaranteeing that low-
income people are not going to be able to capitalize sig-
nificantlyon solar energy," said Norris. "I see solar as
principally a political issue in that it's critical that low-
income communities not only conserve but also produce
energy."
What many predict for the next five years is that
unless there is a change in policy, low-income neigh-
borhoods will probably see a small increase in
individual grants, the utilities and large corporations,
like Exxon and Westinghouse, will monopolize the solar
field and poor people will have lost a valuable chance to
recoup some control over their lives. 0
PARTICIPATION LOANS
STUCK IN BOTTLENECK
The City's participation loan program is 16 months
old, but, contrary to the Department of Housing Pre-
servation and Development's earlier predictions, it has
not been booming.
To Jan. 13, the City's figures show that only seven
buildings, totaling S60 units, have gone into construc-
tion. This represents the addition of only one building
since Aug. 31 to the total work load.
There have been no formal closings since the pro-
gram's commencement, these figures show, although a
closing for a seven-unit rehabilitation of SS St. Nicholas
Avenue in Manhattan is slated for completion in the
early spring, according to Christopher Hook, operations
director of the participation loan program at HPD.
Why have there been so many problems with the
participation loan program?
When questioned last September, Alexander Garvin,
assistant commissioner for rehabilitation and neigh-
borhood preservation, said that the loan process was
taking longer than it should, but that a new push was
then under way to get more projects under construc-
tion. He also predicted that the number of applications
submitted to the HPD counsel's office would be double
that of August by October, and that there would be a
significant increase in the number of projects receiving
feasibility approval.
As of Jan. 13, 31 buildings totaling 1,391 dwelling
units had received formal feasibility approval. Twenty-
three buildings with 1,274 units were approved by last
August.
Buildings reaching the feasibility evaluation stage by
January numbered 53, with 2,418 units. The August
figure for this stage was 29 buildings with 1,940 units.
Before they reach this stage, plans are taken into the
program and must be approved. After feasibility evalu-
ation, they are submitted to the counsel and the com-
missioner for approval and a letter of commitment.
Critics of the participation loan program list a serious
bottleneck in the HPD counsel's office as one of the
main factors causing the delay.
Last fall , this delay was attributed to the major re-
organization of that office at HPD, and also to an
uncertain political climate prior to the mayoral election.
Asked about the current political situation and its
effect on the participation loan program, Hook said
recently, ' "I'm an optimist. We have not been issuing
any new commitments and are following the status quo
right now, because we do have problems and there are
possible major changes in the budget." He did not
elaborate on the particular problems or major
budgetary changes.
HPD Counsel Robert Robbin could not be reached for
comment. 0
CITIZEN TASK FORCE
OFFERS IN REM ADVICE
Community groups interested in solutions to the
rapidly increasing epidemic of abandoned buildings
formed a citizens' task force this month on the matter.
The " In Rem" task force meets each Friday after-
noon in the office of City Councilwoman Ruth Mes-
singer (D.-Man.) at 250 Broadway.
By the end of February, the group planned to release a
working position paper on problems involving "In Rem"
buildings which it will send to Mayor Koch. The study
will also be available to any community groups or
individuais who are interested in pursuing the sub-
ject-one that is expected to reach crisis proportions by
the beginning of next year, if no action is taken. Most
recent citywide figures for abandoned buildings show
more than 20,000, with about 24,000 more projected by
January 1,1979.
Commenting on the group's reasons for forming the
task force , Messinger said, "A number of community
groups came together because they wanted to talk
about legislative issues, and, once they began talking,
they realized that there were among us a number of
people with expertise on city-owned, abandoned
buildings. As a result, they decided to make this topic
our area of concern. "
Responsibility for the "In Rem" buildings is sche-
duled for transfer from the Department of Real Estate
to the Department of Housing Preservation and
Development on April 1.
Some of the groups involved in planning the task
force's policy are: Renigades, Pratt Institute, Operation
Open City, United Tenants Association, East 11th
Street, Manhattan Valley Development Corp., Inter-
faith Adopt-a-Building, Urban Homesteading As-
sistance Board (U-HAB), People's Development Corp.,
Homefront, Forsyth Street Block Association.
Any group interested in attending the task force
meetings should call 566-0719 or 678-6911.
"Weare hoping that the mayor and key City officials
will allow for citizen input into the handling of this
growing problem." said Chuck Laven of U-HAB. "For
the most part, the people who have been coming to the
meetings are from groups which understand this
problem very well, as they represent neighborhoods
where the groups are already dealing with some of the
worst problems created by 'In Rem' conditions," he
concluded. 0
TRIMMING THE FAT
FROM "DAVIS-BACON"
Poor inner city neighborhoods seeking help promised
by federal law to reclaim their housing from the arson-
ist's torch and the wrecker's ball are finding that still
another federal law stands in the way of the help they
seek. This classic Catch-22 goes by the name Davis-
Bacon.
Enacted 43 years ago in the midst of the Great
Depression to protect local labor building a post office
in Richmond, Virginia, from the builder's attempts to
bring in lower-paid workers from outside the area, the
Davis-Bacon Act requires that construction workers on
federally supported projects be paid "prevailing
wages." These are in practice determined by the
Secretary of Labor from the wages paid to workers on
union-contracted jobs, the highest paid in the industry.
Although construction unions only recently have
begun to compete for the tradesmen's jobs to be had in
housing rehabilitation projects, all but the very tiniest of
these projects (seven units or less) must, under Davis-
Bacon, pay the union scale for journeymen if federal
money is used.
H. Davis- Bacon is killing neighborhoods
because the costs are so high . . . It pits
neighborhood people against the union . .. We
will have to overthrow Davis-Bacon."
Why do community groups oppose a provision that
promises high pay to trained workers? First, because
trained workers are hard to find in the city's poor
neighborhoods.
Second, according to Philip St. Georges of the Urban
Homesteading Assistance Board (U-HAB), "Davis-
Bacon is killing neighborhoods because the costs are so
high."
U-HAB, sponsor of many "sweat equity" rehabilita-
tions, has found that Davis-Bacon "is increasingly
keeping money from coming into the neighborhoods,"
said St. Georges. "It pits neighborhood people against
the union."
If community-based housing rehabilitation programs
are to survive, St. Georges predicted, "We will have to
overthrow Davis-Bacon."
Not everyone trying to produce low-cost rehabilitated
housing for poor neighborhoods is prepared to rally to
this battle cry just yet, however.
"Production goals have to be balanced against em-
ployment goals," -said Robert Moncrief, an official of
the City' s Department of Housing Preservation and
Development who helps supervise the rehabilitation
and maintenance efforts of the community groups in its
10
Community Management program.
"Our emphasis has been on employment and train-
ing, and everyone does make the prevailing wage in the
maintenance component," Moncrief noted of the han-
dymen and janitors who maintain tax-foreclosed
multiple dwellings while Community Management
prepares them for return to private ownership by com-
munity groups or tenant cooperatives.
As to the rehabilitation of some 1 ,000 dwelling units
that the 18 Community Management groups will
undertake this year, Moncrief wondered ,"What is a
journeyman worth?"-in terms of time saved and
higher performance standards anticipated. He agreed
that the employment question creates tension in the
community.
Moncrief voiced his hope that next year will see more
than the one-trainee-to-five-journeymen called for in
the present contract, in order to provide at least an
adequate share of job opportunities to community
residents.
Meeting the Davis-Bacon requirements on pay scales
will not afffect the rents tenants will pay when rehabili-
tation is completed, Moncrief asserted. "It's a grant
program-fairly reasonable. Tenants won't have to pay
back the salaries in the mortgages.
"I'd like to hear just how [Davis-Bacon] hurts. I'm
not an adversary of Davis-Bacon," Moncrief said.
Leila Long, assistant commissioner at HPD for Equal
Opportunity, suggested that the harsh effects of Davis-
Bacon on revitalization efforts could be mitigated by
regulations establishing: 1) lower "prevailing wages"
for rehabilitation workers, since the skills required are
not as demanding as those for new construction; and 2)
a higher proportion of trainees, perhaps three for each
three journeymen.
St. Georges pointed out, however, that the Section
312 demonstration program providing mortgage loans
at 3% interest, in which U-HAB supervises the "sweat
equity" rehabilitation of 150 units in 12 buildings on
the Lower East Side and in the Bronx, could not be
carried out without a total waiver of Davis-Bacon.
"We're working in exactly the opposite ratio-one
journeyman to five trainees-to what the unions
require," St. Georges said. "In fact, we've been ac-
cused of having an expensive CET A program."
Concerning the exemption from Davis-Bacon for
projects involving fewer than eight units, St. Georges
scoffed, "This would effectively eliminate rehabilita-
tion in the Bronx, because there are no small bUildings.
Typically they have 35 units, not seven."
James Harris, a lawyer who has closely studied the
Davis-Bacon Act for both the Association of Neigh-
borhood Housing Developers and U-HAB, said,
"Davis-Bacon has become a terrible political problem.
Unions are suffering from high unemployment; they do
not like minorities and they consider them scabs.
"Most rehabilitation work is non-union, anyway,"
Harris observed, "so what is the 'prevailing wage'?
Housing people should get the courage just to go
ahead."
As pressure mounts on government from neighbor-
hood groups to permit a break in the "prevailing wage"
scale for housing rehabilitation in poor neighborhoods,
equal opposing pressure is applied from labor and from
"traditional" liberals, to whom such labor cost-cutting
is anathema.
Stanley Friedman, assistant area director of the
Wage and Hour Division of the U.S. Department of
Labor, said recently, "Just because it's a minority
contractor doesn't make any difference to us. We go to
the contractor and ask, 'Who's funding?'" Friedman
emphasized, "What we will tell you is that prevailing
wages must be paid."
"Most rehabilitation work is non-union
anyway, ... so what is the 'prevailing wage'?
Housing people should get the courage just to
go ahead."
As a way out of the impasse, Harris has recommend-
ed that U-HAB support amendments to the
Davis-Bacon Act as it applies to federally assisted
"sweat equity" projects. These are likely to make their
way into the hands of inner-city and rural Congression-
al representatives who are beginning to speak out for
change in the law.
One among the latter is Rep. Tom Hagedorn
[R.-Minn.], who complained last December 1 in the
Congressional Record that Davis-Bacon deprives the
beneficiaries of government programs of the funds in-
tended for them.
Hagedorn said, "There is probably no single piece of
legislation that better combines the worst qualities of
special interest legislation with the worst qualities of
regulatory legislation gone awry than Davis-Bacon.
"It is legislation born of racial prejudice that still
frustrates the legitimate aspirations of racial minority
groups in our society."
Harris based his argument that "sweat equity"
projects should be exempt from prevailing wage re-
quirements on the reduced need for federal aid. Both
volunteered labor and job training and public employ-
ment funding cut down on project costs, he said.
Harris's proposed amendments would also broaden
the powers of the Secretaries of Housing and Urban
Development and of Labor to waive Davis-Bacon re-
quirements. Harris surmised, "It might be possible to
11
"Just because it's a minority contractor doesn't
make any difference to us. We go to the
contractor and ask, 'Who's funding?' " ...
'What we tell you is that prevailing wages must
be paid."
pass a law declaring that the development of a viable
'sweat equity' program is 'in the public interest,' and
thus strengthen the hand of any project seeking an
individual waiver from the Secretary of Labor."
St. Georges, whose U-HAB-sponsored Section 312
demonstration program obtained such a waiver, is,
nonetheless, pessimistic about the chances of a
coalition of union-alienated urban representatives and
anti-union rural representatives mounting a successful
challenge to Davis-Bacon.
He believes that due process and equal opportunity
litigation, based on the exclusion of the entire class of
urban poor from the opportunity of becoming urban
homesteaders and homeowners, is worth trying al-
though the outcome is equally uncertain.
Waivers ought to be sought for all "sweat equity"
projects, even under present regulations, as a means of
keeping up the pressure for change, St. Georges urged.
A major omission in the Housing and Community
Development Act of 1974, into which most previous
housing assistance programs were subsumed, is the
absence of a provision permitting the HUD Secretary to
waive Davis-Bacon requirements. And, in an opinion
dated July 29, 1977, HUD Assistant Secretary Robert
C. Embry, Jr., stated that "the legislative history pro-
vides no indication that the omission of a waiver pro-
vision was unintentional. "
In light of the overwhelming dependence of com-
munity housing sponsors on federal community
development program funds, following the failure of
such local efforts as New York City'S Municipal Loan
program, the lack of escape from Davis-Bacon not only
denies jobs to local workers, contrary to the intent of
the original law, but also drives up the costs of most
projects beyond the ability of poor and moderate
income persons to pay the rents that result.
In an ironic twist to the Davis-Bacon tale, the con-
struction unions themselves were nearly smothered by
the law's embrace one year ago. A HUD program to put
unemployed union building tradesmen to work rehabi-
litating inner city housing at 7S % of union scale was
challenged for Davis-Bacon non-compliance by Labor
Department investigators. The union workers, it
seemed, could not work for less than "prevailing
wages," even under union contract. But the Labor
Department relented, and the contracts were signed.
Will community housing groups today win a similar
reprieve from the Catch-22 that is Davis-Bacon? 0
SOMEBODY UP THERE
LOVES ARAMIS GOMEZ
by Susan Baldwin
Every time there is a major change at City Hall, or at
the Department of Housing Preservation and Develop-
ment, that's the time for community groups once again
to gird up their loins, rally the troops, and work to one
end-the removal of Aramis Gomez, the durable
deputy commissioner now in his fifth year at HPD's
Office of Relocation.
What happens? Everyone gets excited. There is a
flurry of emergency meetings, extensive letter writing
campaigns, community protests. Nothing happens.
Gomez remains.
"I don't think I've ever heard a nice thing about
him," said Doris Rosenblum, president of the
Strycker's Bay Neighborhood Council, the Project Area
Committee (PAC) that monitors sites in Manhattan's
West Side Urban Renewal Area where about 50 title-
vested tenants still remain on urban renewal properties
under the jurisdiction of the Office of Relocation.
"He always seems to have to prove that he's got a lot
of power," Rosenblum continued, noting that her
experience in countless dealings with Gomez has been,
" 'Poor people aren't worth anything. I pulled myself
up from the streets, so why can't they do the same
thing?' I really think he has a vendetta against a class of
people . . . In order to behave the way he does toward
people, he must have someone pretty strong protecting
him in his job."
Community pressure for Gomez's removal surfaced
most recently with the election of Mayor Edward I.
Koch and the appointment of Nathan Leventhal as HPD
Commissioner.
Koch had made campaign promises of various
housing reforms, and Leventhal had a reputation in the
Lindsay administration, in which he served as Rent and
Housing Maintenance Commissioner, for being
sympathetic toward tenants and their problems.
"Then, the next thing we read in the press is that
Gomez is being held over, " said Charles Ritchie, acting
director of the Cooper Square Community Development
Committee and Businessmen's Association. This Lower
East Side PAC organization helps tenants on urban
renewal "holding" sites where about 150 title-vested
tenants still remain.
"We just couldn't believe that he was still there,"
Ritchie continued. "We had had our most recent
monthly meeting several weeks ago with Max Kauff-
man to discuss site repairs and oil deliveries, and there
was Gomez. This was the first time he had sat with us
for some time. He was so nice. We had never seen him
being so pleasant, so we figured he must be going
12
somewhere else. And then we read the newspapers."
[Maxwell Kauffman is director of operations under
Gomez.]
A false report in early February that tenants on urban
renewal holding sites should expect imminent eviction
notices is what finally mobilized the groups yet another
time against Gomez.
One site tenant in the Clinton Urban Renewal Area
on Manhattan's Mid-West Side had been told by the
site manager that he would be evicted if he did not pay
the disputed arrears for increases tacked onto past
rents, and begin to pay the increased rent each month.
The City is asking for arrears back to Aug. 1, 1975.
Clinton has some 50 vested tenants.
The tenants in these three renewal areas are current-
ly paying old rents that range from $14-30 per room.
They are not required to pay more than 25 percent of
their income in rent, under guidelines established by
the federal Department of Housing and Urban Devel-
opment (HUD) for tenants residing on sites slated for
demolition and new construction. If they were to pay
the arrears the City asks for, some tenants would owe
several thousand dollars.
The unauthorized demand by the Clinton site mana-
ger, coupled with the fact that urban renewal site
tenants did not receive their February rent bills on
time, proved to be the sources of the tenant alarm.
"We are just telling people here to continue to pay
their old rent even without a bill," said Karen Jorgen-
sen, director of the Stryckers Bay PAC office. That
group, responding to the alarm, sent tenants' rents col-
lectively by registered mail to the Office of Relocation.
Housing Conservation Coordinators, the community
group in the Clinton area, did the same.
The groups currently have an agreement with the
City's Corporation Counsel, Ritchie explained, that
tenants will continue to pay the old rents while the New
York Court of Appeals ponders an appeal of the
tenants' lawsuit opposing the increases.
In this case, Spiegelberg v. Gomez, the tenants con-
tend that the proposed increases are illegal, and that
the Office of Relocation's method of attempting to
collect them or subsequently to evict the tenants is also
improper and illegal.
"We just filed our papers for the appeal," Peter
Wendt, a Mobilization for Youth lawyer whose office is
handling the case, told CITY LIMITS.
"I do not wish to discuss all the particulars of the
appeal," he continued, "as we don't want to help them
[the City] with their case ... But as far as this false
alarm goes, the groups are just telling the tenants to
continue with the old plan and pay the old rents ... It's
too bad that this one [Clinton] tenant panicked and paid
the new rent along with the arrears."
"This is just another example of why we have been
trying to use political pressure to get rid of Gomez,"
said Peggi Winslow, an actress who lives on one of the
Clinton sites. She had alerted the other groups to the
potential evictions.
"We can't continue to live like this, from day to day
worrying about being thrown out by Gomez," she con-
tinued. She stressed that the Clinton tenants believe
they are being harassed even more than the tenants of
other renewal areas because they are not as well
organized.
Noting that Gomez's typical response to any question
is, " 'If you don't like it, get out,' " Winslow added,
"It's taken me a while to realize that all the things I've
heard about him are true. Whenever you talk to him,
you have an insane conversation. It's the same as if you
were talking to Idi Amin . . . He's an irrational, mean
man, and he makes it quite clear that he can make any
decision he wants. The last time I talked to him, I was
shaking afterwards."
Neighborhood groups recite details of past
"atrocities" suffered at the hands of the Office of Relo-
cation under Gomez's command with such passion and
in such detail that it would give most observers pause to
explain why he has remained in this position of author-
ity for so many years.
The city has a serious shortage of housing suitable
for relocation of poor families burned out of or other-
wise forced to vacate their homes, say community
leaders, yet relocation crews enter urban renewal
"holding" site buildings whenever a tenant moves out,
and rip out essential plumbing and other equipment to
make the apartment uninhabitable.
CITY LIMITS attempted to reach Gomez several
times for his response to community charges, but was
told by his secretary, "He does not wish to respond at
this time. Thank you very much for calling."
Kauffman, the Gomez deputy, responded to CITY
LIMITS' first call, and invited this reporter to visit the
emergency shelter and hotel sites the department runs
for victims of fires and abandoned buildings.
Explaining that there is "not much going on" at the
renewal holding sites right now because of the lack of
new construction, Kauffman said of the charge that his
office's employes have been stripping basic equipment
from vacant apartments, "Vandals and squatters come
in and take pipes out, radiators, or whatever they can
sell for a few bucks. What we do is come in and cap all
the lines, remove the equipment before the vandals do,
and take it to a salvage area where we store this equip-
ment. But, if we decide to re-rent the apartment, we can
always bring it back."
In his defense of the office's activities, he went on,
13
"If you recall, last year was the worst winter in the city's
history, but still we did not have any buildings that
were without heat for more than 48 or 72 hours under
our management.
"We keep daily reports on how all our buildings are
doing," he added, noting that he had been with the
office for 12 years , with a background in real estate.
"What we have here is 'blood equity,' not 'sweat
equity,' " he said. "Our workers go into neighbor-
hoods trying to find places to relocate families, and fre-
quently their lives are endangered. We check every
location before we put a family in. We have a good track
record. In the last 15 years this office has placed over
100,000 families, and I believe at least half of them
were put in public housing.
"Let's face it , " he concluded, referring to the var-
ious duties undertaken by the relocation office, "No-
body likes somebody who wants to throw you out of
your house. Noboy likes the sheriff, the marshal, or the
landlord, and, in our job, we are all three. You can't
expect them [the community groups] to like us for
that. "
At press time, CITY LIMITS called Commissioner
Leventhal's office, and received a return call from his
special assistant, Edgar Kulkin, who released the fol-
lowing statement for Leventhal: " At this point in the
game, he [Leventhal] has not made any changes in his
staff. He has asked those people who want to remain for
the time being to stay."
Asked whether the commissioner plans to keep
Gomez on indefinitely as his deputy commissioner,
Kulkin added, "This is a decision he will make in due
time. Gomez is not the only one who has gotten a hard
time. There have been other commissioners criticized.
At this point, he has made no decision. Gomez will stay
on until Leventhal makes his evaluation. "
Who protects Gomez? No one will say for sure, but
many have ideas.
Several highly placed officials who have asked to re-
main anonymous refer only to his long-time friendship
with Deputy Mayor Herman Badillo, who once served
as Commissioner of Relocation.
"Friendships are irrational," one such official sur-
mised. "You know a guy for a long time, he's been your
good friend. So what are you supposed to do? Get him
fired because people don't like him?"
Leon Bogues, chairman of Manhattan Community
Board No.7, the Upper West Side planning group that
went on record three years ago asking for Gomez's re-
moval, said of the present situation, "He has been a
thorn in our side up here for years. He is un-coopera-
tive, indifferent to community thoughts and needs,
even though he lives in this community. Why he con-
tinues to remain in this job is a mystery to me. We
thought he was going to be replaced, but now I hear
that his ' savior' is Herman Badillo. I don't know
whether this is true or not, but it certainly makes one
continued on page 14

revealed. To counter this problem, the program has
retained a tutor who gives lessons in basic reading and
mathematics Monday through Friday from 3 to 9 p.m.
"It's ridiculous to expect the men to be able to read
blueprints if they can't even read at the fourth grade
level," Grey said. "That's part of why we're offering
these lessons. We also want to develop self-
confidence. "
Self-confidence seems to be the key word when one
attempts to identify the most important aspect of the
job training programs. "I know that a lot of the men
would like to be eligible for union jQbs in construction,
but I don't think that's everything to them," Grey
explained.
"We've had representatives from New Jersey unions
coming here to explain to them about joining, and most
of the guys are not interested in paying the dues to the
union. After all, there's no guarantee, even if they
make it possible for them to join, that they will get w9rk
for them."
The Department of Employment's Weiss has
stressed repeatedly the need to re-examine the present
training program with an idea to making it less
expensive and more relevant.
Hewitt of Adopt-a-Building commented on the issue,
"I don't think anyone would deny that there are
problems with these job training programs, but they
are ones that can be worked out. What we have to keep
in mind is that these programs are essential to the
survival of the communities where they provide the
only answer for generating employment.
'These programs are the key to getting those people
back to work who have not worked in such a long time, "
Hewitt concluded. "So they get in the habit of working
again, develop some skills, some self-determination,
and, even though the program does not place them in
construction work right away, they have the self-
confidence to go out and look for work themselves. As I
see it, this is a beginning, not an end." 0
Gomez continued
wonder. He just continues in this seat through what-
ever administration it is."
Badillo was out-of-town at press time and could not
be reached.
Gomez and his family reside at 689 Columbus
Avenue, one of the first Mitchell-Lama apartment
houses built in the Stryckers Bay renewal area.
"The saga of Gomez is a strange one," reflected
Sondra Thomas, a past director of the Stryckers Bay
PAC. "Badillo set up the first humane relocation pro-
cedures ever practiced in the city, complete with social
workers and other services needed to carry out this
chore ... Then his' godchild' came along and fired the
social workers and abandoned all Badillo's good work
and repudiated his good will." 0
14
IITOWN MEETING"
TERMED SUCCESS
About 100 community residents attended the tenth
quarterly "Town Meeting" February 20 conducted by
Interfaith Adopt-A-Building at "Loisada," 177 East 3rd
Street, Manhattan.
The conference lasted from one until five p.m., and
featured a general town meeting, workshops, and guest
remarks from Councilwoman Miriam Friedlander and
Manhattan Borough President Andrew Stein.
Friedlander is the Council representative for the Lower
East Side. Refreshments and entertainment, including a
slide s.!tow, followed.
The meeting had been called to introduce candidates
running from the area for the Community Corporation
elections. Although these have been postponed indef-
initely by Mayor Koch, the elections were still
discussed.
Commenting on the successful turnout, Roberto
("Rabbit") Nazario said, "The people came here and
participated. I think they are showing interest in their
neighborhood problems... There are five areas in
housing that we received as our mandate from the peo-
ple to carry out in the community." Nazario is director
of Adopt-A-Building.
Elaine Binno, training officer for Adopt-A-Building's
CETA program, added, "I think this is a very good
thing. People showed a great deal of interest in the
central issues facing us here. They spoke up at the
meeting and participated in the workshops."
Problem areas deemed important for follow-up
coverage after the housing workshops were: compen-
sation for neighborhood organizers, an end to the auc-
tioning of City-owned properties by the Department of
Real Estate, speedier processing by the City of Com-
munity Management funds in order to maintain a cur-
rent repair schedule, insurance for an community pro-
perties with a special emphasis on attacking problems
of "redlining" by banks, and the development of a
community-based program that will assist landlords in
the management and upgrading of their buildings and
tenant services.
The housing workshop found this last issue to be of
particular importance, as it felt this program could lead
to formation of a community management and
maintenance organization for these bUildings.
Adopt-A-Building's next quarterly town meeting will
be in June. .
Meanwhile, a two-day general conference on an the
issues affecting the Lower East Side is being planned,
in conjunction with other organizations, for April 7 and
8. The last time this sort of major conference was held
on the Lower East Side was in the late 1960's. 0
Anne Hartwell
Anne Hartwell, a specialist in tenant manage-
ment, has joined ANHD as director of technical
assistance.
Hartwell comes from MFY Legal Services Inc.
where she has spent the past six years as project
coordinator in the community development
housing unit.
"Whatever it took to get a building from the
loan stage to the point where tenants were able to
take over the management," was how she des-
cribed her former job.
She said nine buildings with 161 units have been
rehabilitated and converted into tenant coopera-
tives under her coordination. Four others are in
the pipeline.
Hartwell joined MFY in 1971 as a welfare advo-
cate. She is a founder of radio station WMCA's
" Call for Action" program in which listeners with
housing and other problems can call for
assistance.
The technical assistance position was created as
part of a reorganization plan designed by the
ANHD membership late last year.
The new director said her program will depend
on the technical assistance needs expressed by the
member organizations.
First on the agenda, she said, is a program that
will make available 10 CETA-paid bookkeepers to
ANHD member organizations that want help with
accounting and record keeping.
The CETA bookkeepers will help establish
sound and workable financial systems for housing
programs and will train staff in the community-
based organizations in basic fiscal practices.
The goal of the program is to help the organiza-
tions run their own programs more effectively. It is
expected to get under way in March. 0
DICKSTEIN LEAVES HPD
FOR THE POLICE DEPT.
Paul Dickstein, who served for one year as first
deputy commissioner of the Department of Housing
Preservation and Development, was sworn in Feb.
14 as a deputy Police commissioner.
Dickstein, 35, was named deputy commissioner
for administration in the Police Department with
responsibility over budget, plant and equipment
and licensing functions.
Prior to joining HPD in February, 1977, Dickstein
was a consultant to the Vera Institute of Justice and
the Criminal Justice Coordinating Council.
No successor was named immediately to replace
Dickstein at HPD. 0
.CITY LIMITS'
published monthly by the Association of Neighborhood Housing
Developers, Inc. , 29 East 22nd Street, New York, New York 10010
(212) 6747610
Editor ......................... . . . .... . ........ Bernard' Cohen
Assistant Editor ........................... . .. . .. Susan Baldwin
Design and Layout .. .. .... . .... . ...... . .......... . Louis Fulgoni
Production .. .... ... ........ ... ......... .. .. . Marianne Czernin
Copyright 1978. All rights reserved. No portion or portions of this
Newsletter may be reprinted without the express written permission
of the Association of Neighborhood Developers. Inc.
15
.'
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Community Management
Dynamiting Buildings
CETA and CJCC Graduates
Solar Energy
Davis-Bacon Act Quandary
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