COMFORT ZONE

Pittsburgh seeks to preserve affordable East End housing

Pittsburgh’s Urban Redevelopment Authority has solicited proposals from property owners with rental units that are either vacant or occupied with low-income tenants in order to potentially transfer a rental subsidy after federal officials pulled it from a group of properties last year over what they said were poor living conditions.

Last year, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development ended a $109,293 per month subsidy to the privately owned Bethesda Homewood Properties, 140 units of housing in Homewood, Larimer and Garfield. Tenants also paid 30 percent of their monthly income in rent.

“There is now an interest in transferring this subsidy to one or more rental developments so that the affordable resource can be preserved in the City of Pittsburgh,” according to the URA’s request for proposals.

The city faces a shortage of thousands of affordable rental units, and tenants who live in the properties have expressed concerns about being able to find an affordable apartment in

or near their neighborhood, even with assistance from HUD.

Tenants who live in the more than 100 occupied units have the option of staying in their homes without a rent subsidy or applying for assistance from HUD to seek new housing, something many have done.

In December, the URA approved a $500,000 loan to East Liberty Development Inc., which is aiming to buy the properties and rehab as many of them as it can.

A Dec. 19 letter from Pittsburgh Mayor Bill Peduto to HUD officials said the city hopes to preserve 82 of the units that it believes can be fixed and wants to transfer the remaining subsidy to other nearby properties. It would give preference to units in Homewood, Larimer and Garfield, so residents can remain in “the neighborhoods they call home, and near the schools, neighbors and workplaces where they are comfortable.”

Kate Giammarise: kgiammarise@post-gazette.com or 412-263-3909 or on Twitter @KateGiammarise.