The bulldozers were parked on a vacant, snow-covered parcel of land, but they symbolized more than just the spring thaw on March 4. Local, state and federal officials were gathered to launch the last phase of an effort to revamp the concept of housing projects in Jersey City. They were present for a groundbreaking ceremony for the fourth and final phase of Gloria Robinson Court Homes.
The project, which was started in 2004, has become a model for redevelopment of older-style housing projects throughout the city.
Federal, state and city officials were among the several dozen dignitaries who came out to celebrate a change of approach to public housing. They hope this development will serve as an example of the successful transformation of a crime-ridden housing project into a low density, mixed-income apartment community.
Renamed after a well-known public housing activist, the housing complex has gone under numerous names over the years, and most of them became associated with high crime and intense poverty.
Wooden pilings installed intermittently across the lot on Duncan Avenue marked where the foundation of new horizontal development will be laid. When completed, the community will provide 274 units on a 7.6-acre site. While the buildings will be less dense with fewer residences, the tenants displaced from the previous units will receive Section 8 vouchers that will allow them to relocate elsewhere.
“This is a great day; it is a really exciting day.” – Joyce Watterman
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The final two phases will be developed by Pennrose Properties, LLC, in partnership with the Jersey City Housing Authority. The property will be professionally managed by Pennrose Management Company.
The final phase will also include a 10-classroom Head Start facility administered by Greater Bergen Community Action that will include a large community space, a full kitchen, conference rooms, management offices, and on-site laundry available to the building’s residents.
Deputy Mayor Vivian Brady- Phillips said the number of children in Jersey City is growing and there is a high demand for quality early childhood programs. Head Start will serve children ages zero to five.
Enabled by an imperiled program
The project is part of a HOPE VI Revitalization and receives HOPE VI federal funding from the JCHA.
The financial boost to the project was the purchase by Bank of America of Low Income Housing Tax credits from the New Jersey Housing and Mortgage Finance Agency and Sandy Relief funds. The Low Income Tax Credits program has helped transform numerous outdated projects on other sites in Jersey City and around the state.
The program is at risk, however, of being lost by changes proposed by Congress, said Tim Henkel, senior vice president of Pennrose Properties.
Anthony Marchetta, executive director of NJ Housing and Mortgage Finance Agency, said the quality of the homes will be the same as those in the private sector, which were built by the same contractors he used on this project.
He said his agency isn’t well known, but has become an effective vehicle for constructing affordable housing throughout the state. He has been very busy in Jersey City, he said, noting that this project uses revenues from a number of sources that make it possible.
The fourth, final phase will consist of 70 market rate, affordable, and public housing apartment units, community amenity space, and a mixed-use building that will house the 10-classroom Head Start facility at a cost of approximately $21 million.
Replacing the Duncan Towers
Raj Mukherji, executive director of the Jersey City Housing Authority, said this project represented a partnership between private investors and the government on all levels. This development, he said, brings jobs to the community and provides housing for people near to employment and accessible by public transportation.
“For those that remember the old Duncan Projects when they were high rise towers in the vicinity where we are today, these were decried by activists and scholars and government as concentrations of poverty,” Mukherji said. “And through HOPE VI federal funds, we were able to take down tower high rises and construct new developments in townhouse style with participation of the residents.”
He said broken down elevators, high crime, disrepair of the towers, were problems that the redevelopment solved, allowing residents to feel pride in their community, their neighborhood and their homes.
“Most importantly, what we’ve tried to be mindful of in all of our developments in Jersey City, affordable housing should be indistinguishable from any other housing,” Mukherji said, noting that market rate and affordable are indistinguishable from each other.
“This is a great day, it is a really exciting day, and even though it is raining on the outside, we’re getting a lot of sunshine on the inside,” Councilwoman Joyce Watterman said. “This is a testament to a group of people who would not quit.”
Named after a community leader
Gloria Robinson, for whom the new development was named, grinned from ear to ear as the project broke ground. The ceremony fulfilled a lifelong dream for the one-time resident of the towering projects that once overlooked Duncan Avenue near Route 440.
“Gloria Robinson is a community activist and a tireless advocate for this community, and throughout the affordable housing in the city, and she is a leader for whom these homes are so aptly named after because this development like she will inspire the youth of this public housing complex for years to come.,” said Mukherji.
“She has been an active spokesperson for this community since the 1970s,” said former Housing Authority Executive Director Maria Maio, who has since become regional director for Housing and Urban Development (HUD) in the state of New Jersey. “She was an inspiration to me. She could argue without being disagreeable, and showed the kind of lady she really is.”
The mother of 11 children, Robinson became an advocate and the matron of thousands of residents of the housing project which, like many, was constructed more than a half century ago, had become infested with crime.
There were good people living in them, she said, but often the poverty that plagued families were made worse by the high crime rate.
She became an unabashed advocate for the residents, fighting to get improvements made as she sought to help people feel safe.
“Head Start is deep in my heart,” Robinson said. “I was with the program for 32 years.”
Al Sullivan may be reached at asullivan@hudsonreporter.com.