Affordable Housing Program Coming to Westchester

The issue of affordable housing has been a highly debated issue countywide and will continue to be for the next few years.

Affordable housing is based entirely on income levels, the program will bring a number of newly priced homes to Westchester. The homes are designed to be affordable for a single person making $55,000 per year or a family of four with a combined income of $95,000.

The implementation will take place over the next 10 years. The county is looking for one or two family houses and not looking at large apartments. The locale and type of building, and how the housing will be divided, is up in the air. 

 Mayor Joan Walsh said that the program has not been finalized.

"There's no way of telling yet what the plans will be," Walsh said. "There's nothing in writing and nothing being whispered."  

While county attorneys prepare the plan we will not know exactly how many units there will be in Harrison. At this point, it is not even clear whether or not the program will reach into Harrison at all. 

"We meet most of the guidelines that they're talking about, you just don't know what the settlement is going to say," Walsh said. "Until the county files their response with the monitor, and he accepts it, nobody will know."  

Harrison residents have a huge variety of incomes.  They meet the minority population requirements of affordable housing (with a diverse Hispanic population but not a large population of African Americans) and are over the requirement for other nationalities.

"I think we're a fully integrating community, but we have to wait and see what the monitor says," said Walsh. "The settlement said that there were a certain number of units that have to be built over a period of 10 years and that there's this much money set aside for the purchase of land or buildings to rehabilitate."

County Legislator Martin Rogowsky, who represents Harrison, Rye Brook and Port Chester, said that after the plan was filed with the Federal Government on January 31 it was not accepted and deemed "insufficient." The implementation plan will be re-submitted March 12th. Rogowsky said after that date he will be able to comment on the matter further.

Walsh said she has not had any input from Harrison residents in regards to affordable housing.

"It's totally in the county's curfew and they're the ones to establish something with the monitor," she said. "Seventy-five units a year is not all that much within 31 communities."

For more information on affordable housing, log on to: http://www.westchestergov.com