Johanna Anderson of Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services | Founders Way in Ithaca | Affordable Housing Development
Courtesy of Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services
Affordable Housing Development
On this week’s episode we will be speaking with Johanna Anderson, Executive Director of Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services. We will be speaking about Founder’s Way, a major mixed-use project in downtown Ithaca, New York on the site of a former Catholic school. This project was purchased by INHS from the Immaculate Conception School at 320 West Buffalo St. in Ithaca from the Roman Catholic Diocese of Rochester. The property will be redeveloped with the intention to create a mixed-use community that includes space for nonprofit and community-based organization, and affordable rental housing serving a range of household sizes and income levels.
Across the United States, historic and ongoing displacement, exclusion, and segregation has perpetuated racial disparities in real estate. Today we will also be discussing housing affordability as a national crisis across the United States at a broader level, including Johanna’s own experience as an affordable housing expert. Join us on this week’s episode as we talk about the Founder’s Way project as well as Johanna’s current work with Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services.
“If we can remove that stigma that goes along with saying that I live in affordable housing, and we can really help people to understand that this is just one of many housing options. I think it’s really important to know that each one of us have different needs for our homes. And, you know, my home looks very different I’m sure from your home. And we have to, I think we have to be more accepting of that. The fact that there’s not a handful of models that will address everybody’s needs. You need to make sure that we are allowing for different types of housing to become available. And really encouraging that kind of diversity of housing stock. That to me, is so important.”
Courtesy of Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services
About Johanna Anderson
Johanna Anderson is the Executive Director of Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services. This nonprofit organization focuses on the development and operations of housing for lower and middle-income people in Central New York State. Prior to working at INHS, she focused on affordable housing development and support services for Native people in Maine and in Minnesota. She has also held board member roles in other nonprofit organizations working in this arena.
Courtesy of Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services
Episode Timestamps
2:11 – What is affordable housing and how did you become interested in it?
5:02 – What are the differences in how affordable housing is developed, managed, and even perceived?
6:57 – Describe the Founders Way site to us.
9:26 – Could you talk a little bit about the specifics of the homelessness issues in Ithaca that you're facing there?
13:20 – How are you financing this project?
16:30 – The real income of the average office worker has essentially stayed the same since the 1980s while that of CEO's have increased about a thousand times, according to a recent study by economists at MIT. From your perspective, what role does this play in the affordable housing crisis?
18:34 – Can you give us a little bit more understanding about this demand for affordable housing, like the types of people, so people can get a human touch to that reality?
20:11 – Could you talk about some of the reasons why there aren't enough places for people to live that are affordable?
23:19 – Could you talk more about the racial disparities that you have seen in housing as someone who's worked in this arena for a number of years and a number of different geographies?
31:47 – Are there affordable housing methods, structures, policies, or other best practices that you think that we in the United States could learn from other countries?
34:50 – Given all this experience that you have and all the on the ground projects that you've worked on, what’s your perspective on the way that we think of housing as Americans, and how that could potentially be different in the future?
Connect with Johanna Anderson:
Courtesy of Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services
About your host:
Atif Qadir is the Founder & CEO of Commonplace, a technology company making it easy for commercial real estate professionals to find and use the $100B of real estate incentives given out every year in the US.
His work has been covered by Technology Review, The Real Deal, Commercial Observer, and Propmodo. He’s also a frequent speaker on the future of buildings and cities on popular industry podcasts and at conferences, including this past year at the Commercial Observer National DEI Conference, Yale AREA Conference, Columbia Real Estate Symposium, Open Data Week NYC and Austin Design Week.
About Commonplace
Commonplace is a founding sponsor of American Building. It is a 100% minority-owned, real estate technology company founded in 2020 to make financing social impact development projects across the US easier. It is funded by venture capital investors Hometeam Ventures, Park West Asset Management, New York Ventures and Shadow Ventures.
About Michael Graves
The world-famous design firm Michael Graves is also a founding sponsor of American Building. Its namesake, the iconoclastic designer Michael Graves, FAIA was a fierce advocate for people-centric design. His work defines a generation of American architecture and includes the Portland Building, the Humana Building and the Denver Public Library. The 1st season of American Building was filmed live at The Warehouse, his historic home in Princeton, New Jersey:
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