Kenney Reaches Deal on General Funding for Affordable Housing As Alternative to Construction Tax
(Mid-rise housing construction on North Broad | Photo: Jon Geeting)
Mayor Kenney struck a deal with City Council on affordable housing funding Thursday, with a counter-proposal to Council's construction tax bill which narrowly passed the full chamber with a narrow vote of 9-8 back in June. Kenney's alternative proposal would increase general funding to the Housing Trust Fund by $53 million over 5 years, with an additional $18 million projected to come in from in-lieu payments from Mixed Income Housing bonuses.
Read moreThe Kenney Administration Left Money on the Table in Provident Mutual Building Sale
The saga of the old Provident Mutual Life Insurance Co. building at 4601 Market continues, as Jacob Adelman reports the city has found a tenant who's proposing a new public health campus on the property.
Read moreThe Case for Enlisting Landlords in Registering Philly Renters to Vote
Renters now make up about 48% of Philadelphia households, according to a new study from Zillow—a break from the city's traditionally higher-than-average homeownership rate that brings us closer in line with other big cities.
New Study Measures Philly's Parking Surplus, Finds More Parking Spaces Than People
(Surface parking coverage in central Philadelphia | Image: Research Institute for Housing America )
A big new study from data scientist Eric Scharnhorst for the Research Institute for Housing America measures the parking supply in five large U.S. cities and finds that Philadelphia is actually flush with parking, with a parking density about 3.7 times greater than the density of homes.
Read moreDarrell Clarke, Use Councilmanic Prerogative to Save St. Laurentius
(St. Laurentius | Photo: Jon Geeting)
Councilmanic Prerogative is one of Philadelphia's more problematic governance traditions, but if it's going to exist at all, it should at least be used to solve local problems in cases where no other policy tools will suffice. Saving Fishtown's St. Laurentius church from demolition is exactly one of those occasions, and it's time for Darrell Clarke to pull out the big guns.
Read moreWhy Is City Council Making Major Housing Decisions Before the Mayor's Housing Plan is Done?
(Photo: Jon Geeting)
City Council passed a flurry of legislation in their final session day yesterday, summarized here by City & State, including a big housing package they had been debating over the last several months, the centerpiece of which was a new 1% construction tax.
Read moreIn Trimming the Abatement, Let's Not Create a Housing Slowdown
The Controller's office's report on the 10-year tax abatement has a lot of good insights into the economics of housing in Philadelphia in 2018, and raises some important questions about the different scenarios under discussion for reforming it.
Philly Added More Jobs in the Last 10 Years than Amazon Has Projected for HQ2
(Amazon HQ1 | Photo: Jon Geeting)
Philly has tended to lag many of our peer cities in job growth since the Great Recession, but this week we got some good news from real estate research firm JLL about the city's jobs picture that shows we've at least made some big improvements on our own past performance.
Read morePhilly's Too Complacent About Middle-Class Housing Affordability
(Image: Neighbors for More Neighbors)
The Wall Street Journal might have chosen a more sympathetic protagonist for their article about rising home prices in Philadelphia, but there's been a surprising reaction to the article by some of the online commentariat that reveals the true roots of the budding middle-class housing affordability issues in greater Center City.
Read moreWait for the Housing Plan to Debate Inclusionary Zoning
(The Granary)
One of the more under-discussed moments at Monday's inclusionary zoning hearing was when Anne Fadullon, the Director of Planning and Development, testified that the Kenney administration has been doing pre-preparation work for a comprehensive Housing Plan for Philadelphia.
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