Today's "Ripple" is a real weeper. It tells of the rapid disintegration of the Mitchell-Lama housing program, which was instituted in 1955 as a means of getting developers to build for low-income tenants. Well, now that the developers, who received cheap financing and land in return for keeping rents low, can convert their buildings to market rent, they are, and that's bad news for Mitchell-Lama beneficiaries like Ronald Stubbs, who is "anxious about being able to keep his apartment." Says the News (warning: gratuitously manipulative example coming),
The 33-year-old paraplegic - who's been wheelchair-bound since a car accident in 1990 - got an apartment of his own at 3333 Broadway in February, after years of living in what he called unsuitable places. The worst was a fifth-floor walk-up he couldn't leave unless two men carried him down the stairs.Geez. In any case, the News presents a list of the pending Lama conversions, should the spirit move you to egg the buildings (or pick up a rental brochure).
· Real Estate Ripples: Affordable Housing Disappearing [Daily News]
· RippleWatch: Harlem Is Scorching [Curbed]