Town-gown teamwork on affordable housing

Cornell University is a longstanding member of the International Town & Gown Association (ITGA, www.itga.org), which addresses challenges, emerging issues and opportunities in college towns big and small.

In addition to past service on its board of directors, our Office of Community Relations was proud to receive ITGA’s 2016 Presidential Excellence Award for our longstanding work related to race, economic development and campus-community leadership, all of which have served as a model for other colleges and universities and their home communities.

One of the presentations at this year’s ITGA conference focused on the Community Housing Development Fund (CHDF), a joint effort of Tompkins County, the city of Ithaca and Cornell, with support from the towns of Dryden and Ithaca.

The fund helps communities and organizations throughout Tompkins County respond to the diverse needs of local residents, and projects must include units of affordable housing for low- and moderate-income households.

A well-attended ITGA conference session led by Megan McDonald from Tompkins County’s Department of Planning and Sustainability and Jeremy Thomas, Cornell University Real Estate, focused on the fund that had an important role in a key quality-of-life challenge.

To illustrate, CHDF data to date:

• $5.4 million awarded
• 486 affordable housing units built/under construction
• CHDF grants are important demonstrations of local support, making Tompkins County projects more attractive when competing for limited state funds for affordable housing
• Leveraged and estimated $242 million from state and federal funding sources (i.e., Low Income Housing Tax Credit program) and other funders
• On average CHDF awards represent just 2% of all development costs

The CDHF is touted as a model initiative by New York State Homes and Community Renewal, and other counties and jurisdictions have reached out to learn how to replicate its success, including in recent days, following last week’s ITGA conference. At this writing, anticipated CDHF projects constitute 324 additional affordable units that are approved and in the works.

As noted by McDonald and Thomas, the CHDF will always require long-term commitment, building awareness and a steady pipeline of projects and related available sites, willing developers, additional funders/lenders and supportive local land use regulations/processes. McDonald and Thomas also noted that rehabilitating existing units can provide large “wins” if placed under formal affordability agreements.

On many other fronts, national town-gown life has and always will be an inexact science, perhaps never more since March 2020. Other sessions (go to ITGA site) at this year’s conference discussed pandemic-related campus-community communications, including one segment titled, “Engaging Against All Odds: Communicating through Doubt, Distrust and Division.”

From where I sit, gratefully, this has not been the norm over the last year-plus, as everyone has had to row in tandem, for the common good. Part of that shared success has been steady relationship building over many years.

In our little unit, we have been proud of our collective town-gown connectivity, represented, in part, by dozens of town halls (http://communityrelations.cornell.edu/local-covid19-updates-and-resources) and other collaborations and conversations, many under the radar, since March 2020.

Our next Greater Ithaca Town Hall is June 22 at 9 a.m., and we hope you can join us, specs on above link. Between now and then, if my office can assist in any way, please email gjs28@cornell.edu or call (607) 227-5531.

Thanks to so many of you for your steadfast advice and digging in during the toughest of times. As a native of the Finger Lakes and a 30-year Ithaca resident, I have never been prouder to live here.

East Hill Notes are published the first and third Wednesdays of each month in Tompkins Weekly. Gary Stewart is associate vice president in Cornell University’s Office of Community Relations.