Kelly Street Plans Firm Up, New Future is on the Clock

With help from city, development group lands dollars to renovate five horrible slums on Kelly St. in Bronx

Workforce Housing Advisors gets $16 million to rehab Bronx slums

BY DANIEL BEEKMAN / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS

Friday, January 6 2012, 6:00 AM

The front door at 916 Kelly St. had no lock Wednesday. Yellow paint peeled off the walls in the lobby and a skinny kitten mewed outside an abandoned apartment.
The Longwood walkup is among the worst slums in the Bronx, with broken windows, leaks and no heat - but it won't be a slum much longer.
It and four other rundown Kelly St. buildings are slated for a multi-million dollar makeover, following a city crackdown on their previous landlord.
New landlord Workforce Housing Advisors has closed a $16 million public-private financing deal to renovate 916, 920, 924, 928 and 935 Kelly St. The buildings, with 80 units between them, boast hundreds of dangerous housing code violations.
"I'm just hoping the new company is better," said tenant Gamaliel Morales, 59, breaking into a relieved smile. "I've been through hell with this building."
During the 1970s, when the Bronx was burning, the five Kelly St. tenements were the only well-kept buildings in Longwood. But they changed hands during the 1990s and began to decay. The buildings were left for dead soon after their landlord took out a bloated $5 million mortgage, just as the housing market collapsed.
Now four years of lawsuits and enforcement by the city Department of Housing Preservation and Development have paid off, said HPD Commissioner Matthew Wambua. "Kelly St. has been emblematic of the struggle of neighborhoods to exist and endure in up and down markets," he said, vowing the buildings will become "secure, safe havens" for low-income tenants.
The buildings were named among the 200 worst in the city by HPD starting in 2007 and the agency spent hundreds of thousands of dollars on emergency repairs there. Last January, Workforce bought the debt on the slums and local community group Banana Kelly was appointed to manage the abandoned buildings.
Workforce foreclosed on the buildings and then bought them at auction in August. Now the firm, led by ex-city developers, has cobbled together a financial package to rebuild the block.
With loans of $3.4 million from HPD Chase bank and $9.28 million generated by low-income housing tax credits, Workforce will install new windows, walls and doors, and new plumbing, heat and electrical systems.
Workforce partner John Crotty called the deal a model for how the city can combat property neglect by speculators in the aftermath of the real estate bust. "We applaud everyone who demonstrated the courage necessary to make this renewal occur," he said.
Workforce is moving the Kelly St. tenants to other Bronx buildings during the project, which Crotty said would last roughly 18 months. When the work is complete, Banana Kelly will provide social services to the tenants.
When they move back, the tenants will keep their old rents and new tenants will benefit from low rents for 60 years.
"I'm happy, because my apartment has so many problems," said tenant Vickiana Suniel, 27. "I had rats bigger than my dog."