Update (2/13/24): The Allegheny County Housing Authority has shelved a federal Choice Neighborhoods grant application to rebuild public housing and expand market rate units in McKees Rocks, according to housing officials. The authority can apply for the grant next year, though it’s unclear if leadership will opt to do that.
After years of planning and differing visions for a proposal, last-minute meetings between stakeholders and public housing officials were held in an attempt to reach a unified front in support of a $30-50 million bid for Department of Housing and Urban Development aid. But ultimately the talks did not lead to an accord.
“We had all the momentum and support from HUD, county, state and federal politicians,” noted Rich Stephenson, chief operating officer for the authority. “This is a shame.”
Faced with a deadline of Tuesday, authority officials said that the application – itself funded by a $450,000 federal planning grant – was hindered by the authority’s failure to gain property rights for the planned expansion of the project.
Officials noted that the requirement for site control has not been achieved yet and that the demand from civic organizations for a 50-50 split in public and market rate units required more review time to see if it could be feasible. They noted that they want to apply for the grant in the future but did not specify when.
“Ultimately, the authority shares the [McKees Rocks] CDC goal of creating a revitalized McKees Rocks community with the housing, commercial and community spaces necessary for long term growth and economic prosperity,” attorney Michael Syme, representing the authority, wrote in an email to the CDC.
Update (2/6/24): With less than a week left to submit plans to the federal government for a Choice Neighborhoods grant, the Allegheny County Housing Authority’s [ACHA] leadership wants the redevelopment of a McKees Rocks public housing site to focus on affordable housing first, before creating market rate units.
“We have to find housing and help the neighborhoods and surrounding area,” said ACHA Executive Director Frank Aggazio. “There’s a lot of moving pieces and moving parts. We’re trying to secure properties. I thought we’d be further along by now. It’s been a challenge.”
“Site control is the biggest obstacle,” said Ed Primm, the authority’s senior project manager.
To finalize a grant application, the authority has to have complete control over the proposed site for a rebuilt and expanded Hays Manor community, according to Aggazio and other county housing officials. Parts of the proposed Choice Neighborhoods footprint are now controlled by the McKees Rocks Community Development Corp., a designated community partner in the plan, and other owners.
CDC Executive Director Taris Vrcek said that the CDC wants a guarantee from the authority that the Choice Neighborhoods plan will include an equal split in affordable and market rate apartment units.
Aggazio said the authority is in support of ultimately creating a 50-50 split in total between affordable housing and market rate units.
The authority is working with developer Pennrose on this project. Jacob Fisher, regional vice president for the company, noted that if they are awarded the federal funding, the plan will continue to evolve and can be amended to bring more market rate units into development as funding becomes available.
“We would like to see a 50% split but there won’t be that funding at first,” said Michael Syme, an attorney who is working on behalf of the authority in negotiations with the CDC. “The share of the market rate will increase phase by phase as success is seen by the neighborhood and investors and by governmental funding sources.”
Reported 2/6/24:
Planned McKees Rocks revamp in flux amid housing mix dispute
Debate between McKees Rocks officials and advocates over the role of public housing in the borough’s future and an impending application deadline for up to $50 million in federal aid was on display during a late January public meeting, spurring last-minute meetings between stakeholders and public housing officials.
At the center of the discussion are differing visions of what should replace the aging Hays Manor, a 138-unit public housing complex built in the 1950s, that is slated for demolition. The Allegheny County Housing Authority [ACHA], which operates Hays Manor, is applying for a Choice Neighborhoods grant – a multi-million dollar U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development [HUD] infusion aimed at diluting concentrated poverty by introducing market-rate units into rebuilt public housing communities. As of late last week, officials and community representatives were working to hammer out an agreement in time for the Feb. 13 deadline.
Some see the grant as a chance to help revitalize the borough by creating conditions that would attract new businesses and residents. McKees Rocks once boasted a population of 18,000 but has dwindled to less than 6,000.
In December 2021, HUD awarded a $450,000 Choice Neighborhoods Planning Grant to the authority to support a plan for Hays Manor and the surrounding area. A draft plan submitted to HUD last year identified a path toward construction over the next five to 10 years.
The grant is highly competitive, with housing authorities across the country applying for the same pool of funding. But visions for the community’s public housing stock remain all over the board, possibly jeopardizing the authority’s chances of getting the grant if they cannot show HUD that the community supports of the project.
The authority’s plan from last year calls for 240 new mixed-income housing units, including 138 replacements for the existing units and 102 additional units combining affordable and an unspecified number of market-rate rents.
The authority initially proposed making less than 10% of the units market rate, according to the McKees Rocks Community Development Corp. The CDC and others are pushing the authority to increase the number of new, market-rate units in the plan, elevating their number to half of the total count, in hopes of repopulating the borough.
“The plan [county] housing submitted was only for 6% market rate. We wanted 50%. We’re thinking we could get at least 35%,” said Taris Vrcek, the CDC’s executive director, in an interview. “We want to attract new renters to the area. We’re losing 100 people a year. We believe in the transformational possibilities of Choice Neighborhoods.”
The CDC and Mayor David Flick hope to complete a community benefits agreement, a tool that has been used in public-private economic initiatives throughout the Pittsburgh region. The CDC is named as a community partner in the Choice Neighborhoods draft submitted to HUD in June. Vrcek said that since the public meeting, county housing officials met several times with the CDC and indicated that they are willing to increase the number of market-rate units but agreement on the housing mix still hadn’t been reached.
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Vrcek said that during a meeting on Jan. 31 between the CDC, the borough and the county housing authority, housing officials said they would be willing to increase market rate units up to 20%, with more meetings likely this week.
Authority and borough officials did not provide PublicSource with requested comment last week.
“We don’t want any segregated areas. So all development should have an affordable [housing] component. We feel a 50-50 mix is essential,” Vrcek said.
The CDC is also pushing the authority to agree to a proposal which revitalizes the riverfront, and connects rebuilt mixed public housing to commercial centers, as does Bakery Square in Pittsburgh’s East End.
“We want restaurants and retail,” Vrcek said. “[Like] Smallman [Street], Federal Galley-style, next to the Roxian Theatre and above that is a mix of market and affordable housing. What that does, those market rate units and affordable units will appeal to the patrons of the Roxian Theatre” on Chartiers Avenue in the borough.
HUD, which will ultimately decide whether to award the grant, declined a request for comment. On their website for Choice Neighborhoods they note that the grant is focused on three goals, one being to “create strong, safe, sustainable and inclusive neighborhoods by investing in physical improvements which attract private investment, spur economic development and improve amenities and services for residents.”
Whose choice neighborhood?
While debate continues over redevelopment of Hays Manor, the authority is moving people out.
Athena Moore, 27, lives in one of the 14 Hays Manor buildings with her son and is in the process of moving to alternative housing for the duration of the demolition and rebuilding process.
“The process they’re doing right now, I don’t feel like they’re doing all that they can,” Moore said. “I feel like they’re not giving us all the information of what’s going on and it’s hard for us to know.”
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Moore said that more recently the county housing authority has become more active with helping her to find alternative housing – giving her a choice between using a Section 8 voucher to find somewhere else to live or to move to another public housing site. She opted to move to another site and is now waiting to hear on the status of the demolition.
During the January public meeting set up by the McKees Rocks CDC, borough residents pushed for a community benefits agreement to hold the authority to a higher number of market-rate units.
The roughly 30 people in attendance ranged from lifelong residents to newcomers and no fewer than four religious leaders. Some expressed hope that the Choice Neighborhoods application, if successful, would bring more investments and an increase in population.
Longtime borough Councilor Craig Myers said he’s been aware of an investor that “wanted to buy the property that Hays Manor was on but they couldn’t buy it cause it was federal land,” He said the borough needs to become a place to invest.
Others argued that any investments should first focus on renovating and reclaiming the vast swathes of abandoned properties in the borough.
One participant, Maribeth Taylor, a former borough councilor, recalled that McKees Rocks has had a few projects that came with promises of revitalization but none have delivered.
“I’m sorry; I’m negative. I’ve been here 40 years as an adult and I’ve seen all kinds of politicians and everyone else promise things,” said Taylor, citing the Roxian Theatre and the Meyers Ridge development as examples of projects that came with empty promises. “In order to get on board with anything I need guarantees, not promises.”
Reverend James Hogan, pastor of Faithbridge Community Church and a resident of the Meyers Ridge public housing complex, said that the area needed to stop building any kind of public housing.
“We could be Robinson Township but here we take more low income public housing than anywhere else in the state,” Hogan said. “Why is our goal set so low?”
Like Taylor, Hogan recalled previous developments that failed to deliver on promises of revitalization.
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“We fought hard to get a brownfield cleared and all we have to show for it is a Speedway,” Hogan said.
All agreed that the area needs revitalization.
Vrcek said that McKees Rocks has never been named a priority site by Allegheny County Economic Development and in an effort to change that, the CDC is asking County Executive Sara Innamorato to focus on the borough. He said he met with her in December, when she was executive-elect.
“We need to be creative to get to the point we want to, that still accomplishes the essential goals we have but will still be workable not just for ACHA,” Vrcek said. He said the Allegheny County Economic Development department could be “a big part of it.”
In her campaign, Innamorato promised economic development by working to rebuild “our communities with new jobs in growing industries, help struggling small businesses on our main streets” and pursue “stable, high-quality housing” for all.
Site control and leverage
Vrcek noted in an interview that the authority may have to work closely with his group because of site control. HUD requires housing authorities submitting Choice Neighborhoods plans to have control of the land that housing will be built on.
“Housing authority is proposing 200-plus units, but they only have site control for 50 units on the Hays Manor site,” Vrcek said. It needs CDC land for 100 proposed units, he said.
If the authority just builds 50 units on the Hays Manor site, he said, “That housing will be isolated. It will be the same situation that Hays Manor is, isolated from the greater community.”
If the housing authority ignores community demands, it could weaken the application to the federal government. A Choice Neighborhoods implementation grant would bring $30 million to $50 million from the federal government, and would ideally be supported by further investment from foundations and other government entities to help ensure the full transformation of the site and the neighborhood.
Attendees who spoke at the community meeting said they would support reconstruction only if it had a 50-50 split between affordable and market-rate units in the unit makeup.
Vrcek said that he and Mayor Flick met with the housing authority’s leaders and won promises to work more closely with community members on a benefits agreement to be included in the final grant application to the federal government.
The mayor was hopeful with more discussions scheduled for this week.
“Honest to Pete, I never thought we would get to the point where we‘re in a room talking about a signable document,” said Flick. “That’s different from handshakes and promises.”
Eric Jankiewicz is PublicSource’s economic development reporter and can be reached at ericj@publicsource.org or on Twitter @ericjankiewicz.
This story was fact-checked by Rich Lord.
