Update: I just received a Press Release from Gov Quinn about this project: Press Release
by: Diane Benjamin
A company called Brinshore Development bought 26 properties in Bloomington-Normal with the plans to rehab them. The houses will then be rented to low income individuals at prices set as a percentage of their income. The Pantagraph had printed only 4 properties were in Normal, that was incorrect according to the information I received under the Freedom of Information Act. You can see the entire response here: Response Doc
The developer is receiving Federal Tax Credits through the Illinois Housing Development authority. I’ve been researching these properties all morning. Many originally had loans through the Federal Government – more of your money.
The original story printed by the Pantagraph claimed these properties were the worst of the worst. Nobody else wanted them, so this group stepped in to help. I’m not familiar with all these roads, but at least some are NOT in blighted areas.
A little history:
Federal public housing buildings were tried – they were a miserable failure. Think Cabrini Green
The Feds then forced banks to loan money to people who couldn’t afford the payments – that led to the housing bubble and crash
Now the Feds have a new plan: Mixed income housing: http://www.useful-community-development.org/mixed-income-housing.html
Is affordable housing a RIGHT? Our founding documents say our rights come from God. Man-made rights can be taken away, the ones from God can’t.
Social Justice is the new term. Yes, some low income people will be able to rent nice housing based on their income. They will also become slaves to low incomes because if they succeed and better themselves, bye-bye subsidized housing.
Is keeping people permanently in poverty justice?
“I am for doing good to the poor, but…I think the best way of doing good to the poor, is not making them easy in poverty, but leading or driving them out of it. I observed…that the more public provisions were made for the poor, the less they provided for themselves, and of course became poorer. And, on the contrary, the less was done for them, the more they did for themselves, and became richer.”
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Here are the addresses of the properties:
Bloomington: Normal:
905 E Walnut 400 E Locust
1 Woodruff Dr 1003 Bull
217 Woodland 902 Timothy Court
912 W Front 1309 Hansen Dr
203 W Kelsey 1417 Kingsridge
435 Priscilla 913 Adelaide
706 E Front Lot on Kern street 14-32-226-038
1507 1/2 W Locust 1110 W Hovey
408 Krietzer
Lots 24 and 25 in block 5 in Southview addition Bloomington 21-03-461-009
816 W Mill
403 1/2 Bissell
903 S Madison
1211 Sandburg
506 S Clayton
1002 W Grove 21-05-414-005 Appears to be a lot
407 W Wood
2321 Anchor Dr
906 N Mason
1417 Eastholme
I’m reminded of a Sopranos episode.
Talking to my realtor, he said the reason cheap housing is not available is because ISU keeps tearing down dorms, but private developers are not putting up new apartment buildings fast enough. At one point, he said ISU got rid of 5,000 beds but only 2,000 new beds had been built. I’m not sure what year that was. Might be something interesting to research. Anyways, I thought these left-wing academic types cared about poor people.
I looked at 2 and they didn’t look like the worst of the worst to me