[Music]
today’s theme is reinvention and I think
that we need to reinvent development why
if I don’t think the process of
development as it currently happens is
working all that well and I’m not
talking about downtown I’m talking about
in the neighborhoods that surround the
city I want you to imagine now that I’m
walking on a tightrope over a dangerous
gap between the past where everything is
perfect and the future where nothing is
certain you can see how nervous I am up
there just by looking at it but as a
neighborhood developer that’s how I feel
a lot of the time people fondly remember
the neighborhood as it was and they
forget all its flaws but they
automatically assume that any change
that comes is gonna be for the worst
academics and activists called a
negative downside of Neighborhood
Development gentrification and what they
talk about in particular is a loss of
character loss of affordable housing
loss of commercial space and community
conflict and there’s no doubt that all
those things are potential negatives
just to show you how badly we really do
need to reinvent development I’ve got a
little example we all know how this
works right you type the beginning of
your search phrase into Google and based
on millions and millions of other
searches Google fills in the rest of the
phrase for you well guess what folks
this is what people think of property
developers property developers are scum
evil scum
obviously there are negative side
effects of development sometimes the new
doesn’t blend with the old people are
displaced you can’t simultaneously smash
down a building and live in it right but
people also think that developers are in
it for themselves that they’re trying to
make a buck off people
and they get in they build something out
of character they create community
conflict make a buck and they get out
obviously and that tightrope I don’t
want to tilt too far to the one side
right but if I tilt too far to the other
side there’s also a tremendous danger
and that’s disinvestment first
individual properties but then entire
neighborhoods without the positive
forces of redevelopment and change can
fall into a downward spiral of
disinvestment the visible signs of
disinvestment are decay in disrepair
lack of civic maintenance trash being
left around territorial tagging people
thinking that the curb is a great place
to store old coaches and lawnmowers for
instance evidence of drug use and other
social disorder and eventually houses
fall into disrepair
they don’t get fixed they get boarded up
and the whole cycle kicks into overdrive
less trust between neighbors is more
crime eventually people with legitimate
business in the neighborhood start
steering clear and what’s left is
largely dysfunction in 2003 a key
landowner in the heart of my
neighborhood raised rents amidst a cycle
a broader cycle of disinvestment the
rents were higher than was reasonable
and the businesses that were in the
building moved out no new businesses
moved in eventually the windows got
broken the building was boarded up
squatters broke in and started living
upstairs there was drug use and I’m not
talking about dope I’m talking about
heroin it was drug dealing there was the
violence and theft that goes along with
those habits there was prostitution it
was a tremendous source of human misery
that building but what’s the solution
the city tried an enforcement approach
they sent in
by law officers they levied fines
against the owner the police came they
evicted the squatters eventually that
the city cut the power and the water but
that didn’t change anything actually
because a few hours later the squatters
broke back in and resumed living there
in the dark so the power of the city to
legislate or enforce better community
outcomes is limited what about the
market can see the building was for sale
and for lease but as a business owner
can you imagine moving into that
building no thanks and in terms of you
know someone picking it up on the cheap
there was no no deal though the
landowner wanted his price which was
more than the building was worth so
who’s left enter the neighborhood
developer in this case a community
center half a block away providing
Family Services and other programs for
families and neighborhood at that time I
was the president of the board of
directors of a failing organization in
the middle of a failing neighborhood and
how we turned our organization around as
a story that’s too long to tell today
but I really came down to this we had
become so desperate that we were no
longer afraid to fail so we took a
tremendous risk we bought the boarded-up
building but the thing is when you want
to buy a commercial building unless you
got a lot of money in your jeans you
generally need a loan and the thing that
is really challenging about getting a
loan is that you need to show proof of
income that building had no legal
tenants no tenants no income no income
no loan so we compounded our risk we
took a loan from the owner and we gave
the owner of the building all of our
existing assets and that at that point
it was a beautiful character house six
blocks away we gave him all of our
existing assets as a down payment and
then we did the one thing that the best
investors will tell you never to do we
overpaid because
the land the landowner wanted his price
which was more than the building is
worth but we wanted our neighborhood
back and at that point no price was too
high well the good news is I’m here to
tell you today a dozen years later it
all worked out
with tremendous support from the
neighborhood and generous support from
funders we stripped the building out and
put it back together there’s now four
units of affordable family housing
upstairs for businesses in the
commercial level and along the way we
got enterprising because we own and
operate two of those businesses
ourselves through a subsidiary taxable
corporation and the profits flow back
into our charitable activities down the
street a couple years later we
identified another opportunity in this
case a vacant lot couple blocks away
there was collecting rubbish and you
know on the odd bit of trouble it was a
great opportunity but it was across the
street from a row of beautiful character
homes on Yukon Street for those who know
it when the neighbors heard that we
intended to put more affordable housing
for families but on their beautiful
Street they were horrified and some of
them actually came to public hearing and
spoke against the project to try to get
it overturned if you can imagine they
actually preferred vacant lot with
rubbish piling up in it than affordable
housing for families but that’s that
fear of the unknown that I’m talking
about right but we prevailed we built
this beautiful six Plex of affordable
family housing in 2008 and when you know
we designed it in such a way that it
actually mirrors and fits right in with
beautiful homes across the street and
when the funders came to cut the ribbon
they had to ask which house is the new
one because they couldn’t tell which one
it was
flash forward five years 2013 we
identify another opportunity in this
case you know it was a home that it
wasn’t boarded up yet but it was an
opportunity that was ripe for
reinvestment let’s just say we did a lot
of neighborhood consultation and buy a
lot I mean
half a dozen meetings anyways over a
period of years really we envisioned
ultimately because this was right
adjacent to the core of our village just
expanding our village a little bit in
this case a mixed-use building with
housing upstairs and commercial below
and as we were getting ready to go to
public hearing the most amazing thing
happened last summer I was out for a
walk I went into our cafe and I saw one
of our tenants from this building having
a drink with his neighbor
did you catch that he was having a drink
with his neighbor from across the street
who eight years earlier had absolutely
not wanted to have family housing in the
vacant lot and so then our tenant
introduced me to Harry and Harry
confessed and told this story about how
he and his wife had been so opposed to
our project right up until they saw the
beautiful families moving in and now
they love those folks and I asked Harry
if he would be willing to write an
article for our neighborhood newspaper
describing his experience and he did and
there it is NIMH beetle Oso NIMBY of
course for those who are not aware
stands for not in my backyard in this
case it was across the street so it’s
more like in his front yard but even he
admitted that he had been a NIMBY but
that he had grown to love his new
neighbors I also asked Harry if he’d be
willing to come and talk at public
hearing in support of our new project
and he said he would and he did and so
did dozens of other people as we were
getting ready to go to public hearing we
canvassed all the neighbors within 200
meters we got a hundred and sixty-five
signatures on our petition and you can
see there there’s a pretty good
dispersion like almost everybody that we
could find at home was willing to sign
our our petition
and so when we went to public hearing it
passed unanimously but the most
interesting thing about that evening was
that the same night that we were
successful a public hearing another
proud
in the next neighborhood village over
got sent back to the drawing board and
one of the counselors drew a very sharp
contrast between our project and the
other one he said our project would add
character add vibrancy and build
community and not potentially harm it
like he thought the other project would
so now you can see I’m no longer nervous
on the tightrope I’m dancing because I
know that if I tip too far either way
that the community is going to put me
back up straight I started out by saying
that the negatives of Neighborhood
Development are a loss of character a
loss of affordable housing loss of
commercial space and community conflict
and it’s taken us a long time but I’m
here to tell you that it’s possible to
reinvent development we are building
repairing you know adding new buildings
that are completely in character with
the surrounding neighborhood we’re
building affordable housing we’re adding
commercial space where possible through
mixed-use development and we’re doing it
all after 12 years with tremendous
community support that’s how we’ve
reinvented development in our
neighborhood thank you
[Applause]
you
today’s theme is reinvention and I think
that we need to reinvent development why
if I don’t think the process of
development as it currently happens is
working all that well and I’m not
talking about downtown I’m talking about
in the neighborhoods that surround the
city I want you to imagine now that I’m
walking on a tightrope over a dangerous
gap between the past where everything is
perfect and the future where nothing is
certain you can see how nervous I am up
there just by looking at it but as a
neighborhood developer that’s how I feel
a lot of the time people fondly remember
the neighborhood as it was and they
forget all its flaws but they
automatically assume that any change
that comes is gonna be for the worst
academics and activists called a
negative downside of Neighborhood
Development gentrification and what they
talk about in particular is a loss of
character loss of affordable housing
loss of commercial space and community
conflict and there’s no doubt that all
those things are potential negatives
just to show you how badly we really do
need to reinvent development I’ve got a
little example we all know how this
works right you type the beginning of
your search phrase into Google and based
on millions and millions of other
searches Google fills in the rest of the
phrase for you well guess what folks
this is what people think of property
developers property developers are scum
evil scum
obviously there are negative side
effects of development sometimes the new
doesn’t blend with the old people are
displaced you can’t simultaneously smash
down a building and live in it right but
people also think that developers are in
it for themselves that they’re trying to
make a buck off people
and they get in they build something out
of character they create community
conflict make a buck and they get out
obviously and that tightrope I don’t
want to tilt too far to the one side
right but if I tilt too far to the other
side there’s also a tremendous danger
and that’s disinvestment first
individual properties but then entire
neighborhoods without the positive
forces of redevelopment and change can
fall into a downward spiral of
disinvestment the visible signs of
disinvestment are decay in disrepair
lack of civic maintenance trash being
left around territorial tagging people
thinking that the curb is a great place
to store old coaches and lawnmowers for
instance evidence of drug use and other
social disorder and eventually houses
fall into disrepair
they don’t get fixed they get boarded up
and the whole cycle kicks into overdrive
less trust between neighbors is more
crime eventually people with legitimate
business in the neighborhood start
steering clear and what’s left is
largely dysfunction in 2003 a key
landowner in the heart of my
neighborhood raised rents amidst a cycle
a broader cycle of disinvestment the
rents were higher than was reasonable
and the businesses that were in the
building moved out no new businesses
moved in eventually the windows got
broken the building was boarded up
squatters broke in and started living
upstairs there was drug use and I’m not
talking about dope I’m talking about
heroin it was drug dealing there was the
violence and theft that goes along with
those habits there was prostitution it
was a tremendous source of human misery
that building but what’s the solution
the city tried an enforcement approach
they sent in
by law officers they levied fines
against the owner the police came they
evicted the squatters eventually that
the city cut the power and the water but
that didn’t change anything actually
because a few hours later the squatters
broke back in and resumed living there
in the dark so the power of the city to
legislate or enforce better community
outcomes is limited what about the
market can see the building was for sale
and for lease but as a business owner
can you imagine moving into that
building no thanks and in terms of you
know someone picking it up on the cheap
there was no no deal though the
landowner wanted his price which was
more than the building was worth so
who’s left enter the neighborhood
developer in this case a community
center half a block away providing
Family Services and other programs for
families and neighborhood at that time I
was the president of the board of
directors of a failing organization in
the middle of a failing neighborhood and
how we turned our organization around as
a story that’s too long to tell today
but I really came down to this we had
become so desperate that we were no
longer afraid to fail so we took a
tremendous risk we bought the boarded-up
building but the thing is when you want
to buy a commercial building unless you
got a lot of money in your jeans you
generally need a loan and the thing that
is really challenging about getting a
loan is that you need to show proof of
income that building had no legal
tenants no tenants no income no income
no loan so we compounded our risk we
took a loan from the owner and we gave
the owner of the building all of our
existing assets and that at that point
it was a beautiful character house six
blocks away we gave him all of our
existing assets as a down payment and
then we did the one thing that the best
investors will tell you never to do we
overpaid because
the land the landowner wanted his price
which was more than the building is
worth but we wanted our neighborhood
back and at that point no price was too
high well the good news is I’m here to
tell you today a dozen years later it
all worked out
with tremendous support from the
neighborhood and generous support from
funders we stripped the building out and
put it back together there’s now four
units of affordable family housing
upstairs for businesses in the
commercial level and along the way we
got enterprising because we own and
operate two of those businesses
ourselves through a subsidiary taxable
corporation and the profits flow back
into our charitable activities down the
street a couple years later we
identified another opportunity in this
case a vacant lot couple blocks away
there was collecting rubbish and you
know on the odd bit of trouble it was a
great opportunity but it was across the
street from a row of beautiful character
homes on Yukon Street for those who know
it when the neighbors heard that we
intended to put more affordable housing
for families but on their beautiful
Street they were horrified and some of
them actually came to public hearing and
spoke against the project to try to get
it overturned if you can imagine they
actually preferred vacant lot with
rubbish piling up in it than affordable
housing for families but that’s that
fear of the unknown that I’m talking
about right but we prevailed we built
this beautiful six Plex of affordable
family housing in 2008 and when you know
we designed it in such a way that it
actually mirrors and fits right in with
beautiful homes across the street and
when the funders came to cut the ribbon
they had to ask which house is the new
one because they couldn’t tell which one
it was
flash forward five years 2013 we
identify another opportunity in this
case you know it was a home that it
wasn’t boarded up yet but it was an
opportunity that was ripe for
reinvestment let’s just say we did a lot
of neighborhood consultation and buy a
lot I mean
half a dozen meetings anyways over a
period of years really we envisioned
ultimately because this was right
adjacent to the core of our village just
expanding our village a little bit in
this case a mixed-use building with
housing upstairs and commercial below
and as we were getting ready to go to
public hearing the most amazing thing
happened last summer I was out for a
walk I went into our cafe and I saw one
of our tenants from this building having
a drink with his neighbor
did you catch that he was having a drink
with his neighbor from across the street
who eight years earlier had absolutely
not wanted to have family housing in the
vacant lot and so then our tenant
introduced me to Harry and Harry
confessed and told this story about how
he and his wife had been so opposed to
our project right up until they saw the
beautiful families moving in and now
they love those folks and I asked Harry
if he would be willing to write an
article for our neighborhood newspaper
describing his experience and he did and
there it is NIMH beetle Oso NIMBY of
course for those who are not aware
stands for not in my backyard in this
case it was across the street so it’s
more like in his front yard but even he
admitted that he had been a NIMBY but
that he had grown to love his new
neighbors I also asked Harry if he’d be
willing to come and talk at public
hearing in support of our new project
and he said he would and he did and so
did dozens of other people as we were
getting ready to go to public hearing we
canvassed all the neighbors within 200
meters we got a hundred and sixty-five
signatures on our petition and you can
see there there’s a pretty good
dispersion like almost everybody that we
could find at home was willing to sign
our our petition
and so when we went to public hearing it
passed unanimously but the most
interesting thing about that evening was
that the same night that we were
successful a public hearing another
proud
in the next neighborhood village over
got sent back to the drawing board and
one of the counselors drew a very sharp
contrast between our project and the
other one he said our project would add
character add vibrancy and build
community and not potentially harm it
like he thought the other project would
so now you can see I’m no longer nervous
on the tightrope I’m dancing because I
know that if I tip too far either way
that the community is going to put me
back up straight I started out by saying
that the negatives of Neighborhood
Development are a loss of character a
loss of affordable housing loss of
commercial space and community conflict
and it’s taken us a long time but I’m
here to tell you that it’s possible to
reinvent development we are building
repairing you know adding new buildings
that are completely in character with
the surrounding neighborhood we’re
building affordable housing we’re adding
commercial space where possible through
mixed-use development and we’re doing it
all after 12 years with tremendous
community support that’s how we’ve
reinvented development in our
neighborhood thank you
[Applause]
you
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