Mayor Lee Announces HUD’s Selection of Alice Griffith Hope SF Transformation Plan as Finalist in Choice Neighborhoods Grant Competition
March 22, 2011 – (RealEstateRama) — Mayor Edwin M. Lee today announced that the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) has selected San Francisco’s HOPE SF transformation plan for Alice Griffith Public Housing Development and the surrounding Bayview neighborhood as a finalist in its Choice Neighborhoods Implementation Grant competition. The Alice Griffith Plan was one of 42 plans submitted by communities nationwide competing for the $61 million in total funding and one of six finalists to enter the second application round.
“Revitalizing Alice Griffith Public Housing Development and the surrounding Bayview neighborhood is the type of investment our City needs to build better public housing, create jobs, support sustainable communities, provide educational opportunities and promote economic development in a community where we need it most,” said Mayor Lee. “I am thrilled that HUD has chosen the Alice Griffith community and the larger Bayview neighborhood as a finalist in the Choice Neighborhoods Initiative Grant.”
“The Choice Neighborhoods Initiative expands on the bipartisan success of the HOPE VI program by recognizing that we must link affordable housing with a mix of incomes and uses with quality education, public transportation, good jobs and safe streets,” said HUD Secretary Shaun Donovan.
HUD’s Choice Neighborhoods Initiative promotes the transformation of impoverished areas into viable, mixed-income neighborhoods with access to economic opportunities. Choice Neighborhoods focuses on the public and private sectors working together to revitalize severely distressed public housing and generate investments in well-functioning services, effective schools, public assets, public transportation, and improved access to jobs.
The Alice Griffith Plan implements the mission of the Choice Neighborhoods Initiative through a public-private partnership between the City, the San Francisco Housing Authority (SFHA), Redevelopment Agency, San Francisco Unified School District, and the development team comprised of McCormack Baron Salazar, Lennar Urban, and Urban Strategies, Inc. Together, this team is leveraging the benefits of the Redevelopment Agency’s and Lennar Urban’s development plan for Hunters Point Shipyard-Phase 2 and Candlestick Point, which includes the complete revitalization of Alice Griffith, over 10,000 new market-rate and below-market housing units, new parks, retail, and transportation improvements, and investments in job and workforce development, education, and community health and wellness programs.
“We are honored to be selected to apply for the Choice Neighborhoods Initiative grant in Round Two,” said Richard Baron, Co-founder, Chairman and CEO of McCormack Baron Salazar. “Under the leadership of the Housing Authority, and with our partners Lennar Urban and Urban Strategies, the implementation of the Alice Griffith revitalization is a crucial component of assuring housing opportunities for all incomes in the larger Shipyard redevelopment.”
“I am pleased that HUD has chosen the Alice Griffith transformation plan as a finalist for the Choice Neighborhoods award,” said SFHA Executive Director Henry Alvarez III. “In a time of shrinking financial resources, the Choice Neighborhood grant would allow us to offer the Alice Griffith residents the type of quality housing, neighborhood services and vibrant surrounding community where their families could thrive.”
