The weekly link roundup is a collection of links related to Newburgh, revitalization, urban planning and anything else that might inspire change or create dialogue. “Saleboat on the Hudson” by NR flickr user John Leighton.
Newburgh seeks to put price tags to properties [THR]
Letter: Newburgh revitalization plan improves city, brings hope [THR]
RAW (Re-imagining the Arts inWynwood) [Project Wynwood]
Born in Brooklyn, Now Making a Motown Move [NYT]
Newburgh transit service to expand [Mid Hudson News]
Add your own photos depicting city life to the Newburgh Restoration flickr pool to be used on the blog, or email me. **Flickr users please do not forgot to remove disabling of downloading of pictures. Otherwise I can’t use them**
– “The city shouldn’t be in the real estate business,”. Really? It is and so is any other municipality dependent on a property tax base. ‘Prices are all over’ because price discovery has been circumvented through policies and practices such as this.
– :He suggested I get the word out so other concerned citizens would better understand the project and how it is being funded.” Keep tooling. Grants and Tax credits originate from the tax payer. This particular project is funded by such and also receives an ongoing subsidy. Do the math: $42,000/15 buildings =s $2,800 per building paid in property taxes. ‘Interesting how the rational of property taxes having a correlation to usage is used with discretion. Btw, buildings don’t cause blight.
– Brooklyn to Detroit, more anecdotal evidence that ‘cities Are in the real estate business’. As per Detroit
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-DT7bX-B1Mg.
-‘Newburgh Area Bus Service Expansion is scheduled to begin on December 15 with free fares through the holidays…The expanded service was made possible through the allocation of federal Congestion Mitigation and Air Quality funding.” So, it’s more like ‘pre-paid fares’.
– RAW…an awesome project worth keeping an eye on.
Community Development meet Reality…aka devaluations and claw backs. While the CD seeks to ‘mark RE values to fantasy’ the ‘City quietly pleas no contest to those betting to differ.
http://www.cityofnewburgh-ny.gov/sites/newburghny/files/agenda/agenda-file/website_agenda_materials_12-15-14bilingual.pdf (resolutions 306/307)
Napkin scratch math, it’s short of a $4,000,000 assessment reduction in the aggregate over the periods cited and amounts to a combined claw back of over $200,000 in property and school taxes. More power to them. Inflated property values are becoming a liability as the relative carrying cost,i.e. taxes, have out stripped the ‘stored’ potential of the underlying asset. If these resolutions are any indication, watch for contagion in the commercial RE sector and spill over into the residential market. Deflated values equates to a shrinking tax base and a growing inability for a municipality to meet its expenses. Take it from there.
That said, come Grievance Day it might be worth the paper to print those above resolutions when presenting a reconsideration.
Let’s hope this city effort to value properties is the beginning of the end to handing properties to poverty industry non-profits like the Land Bank- unless they’re willing to pay the same prices. Otherwise there’s a huge conflict of interest at work. Get ready for the lawsuits.
Doubt it. If the the city can’t sell properties, the LB can buy ’em for a buck or they’ll go to the state for cash as they have been. Lawsuits best remain private, ‘else any awards will be routed to the Tappan Zee and any other unfunded project. Trying to pull demand forward through price intervention and there is going to be a snap back eventually. Aside, those properties in the resolutions were, for the most part, commercial.