Johanna Anderson of Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services | Founders Way in Ithaca | Changing Needs, Changing Housing
Courtesy of Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services
Changing Needs, Changing Housing
The racially-charged NIMBY, or ‘not in my backyard’, phenomenon is at the core of zoning laws, particularly in the greater New York City area. In this episode, I take us back to the early 1900s to look at the nation’s first zoning resolution and examine how it continues to affect communities today. I also revisit a conversation with developer Johanna Anderson, the executive director of Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services, to learn more about a mixed-use affordable housing development in upstate New York.
Founders Way is a mixed-use structure that boasts two separate wings with a new addition of studios to four-bedroom homes, as well as office space for rental and for sale. With a project of this size, Johanna discusses how she involved the community to preserve the existing design of the neighborhood and enhance structures, without creating a stark difference in architecture.
We also touch on some barriers to housing such as racial disparity and affordable housing stigma. We define what exactly these concepts are and the impact they’ve had on Ithaca, as well as how climate change has affected housing in the area.
“When we build a development, we’re not planning to sell, we’re in it for the long haul. Some of these regulatory agreements are lasting over 50 years. And in some cases, in the case of our for sale housing, we have a commitment to make sure that home maintains its affordability for the next 198 years. Our organization is really in this for the long haul, and we are managing them. And I think that goes a long way when our partners, our community, our neighbors, know that if there is an issue, they can call the organization. And we’re just very responsive.”
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
2:26 – The history of zoning in the greater New York City area as a means of separating uses, and how mixed-use projects work in addressing the negative effects of those practices.
8:34 – What is affordable housing? And how did you become interested in it?
11:25 – What are the differences in how affordable housing is developed, managed and even perceived in these three different places?
15:50 – Could you talk a little bit about the specifics of the homelessness issues in Ithaca that you're facing there?
19:45 – How are you financing this project?
22:31 – 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?
26:33 – Could you talk about some of the reasons why there aren't enough places for people to live that are affordable?
29:11 – 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?
37:51 – 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?
40:56 – 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?
Additional Resources
Connect with Johanna Anderson:
LinkedIn (Johanna Anderson)
LinkedIn (Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services)
Ithaca Neighborhood Housing Services
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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