Renderings of the South Bronx greenway

A deal has finally been struck between the city and a reluctant developer, clearing the way for the city to build a $6 million bridge to link the South Bronx to a greenway network that stretches from Randall’s Island to Astoria, DNAinfo reported. The plan by the Economic Development Corporation was stalled earlier this year when a private company, Harlem River Yards Ventures, would not grant an easement for a site on 132nd Street in the Bronx, which it controls. [more]

Grand Concourse at 161st Street

Like many other New York city neighborhoods with a poor reputation, the South Bronx is beginning to gentrify, according to the New York Times.

Still remembered for the crime and arson epidemic of the 1970s, the neighborhood offers low real estate prices, a decreasing crime rate and amenities brought to the neighborhood by Yankee Stadium that lure a new class of residents. [more]

State officials are deliberating over whether to revoke the Medicaid
license of Soundview Health Center, the clinic in the South Bronx run
by scandal-ridden ex-State Senator Pedro Espada, WNYC reported. Such a
measure could close the facility down. Espada, who is facing
trial on charges that he misused health center funds, is still running the
center even though he was barred from using Medicaid money earlier
this year. Espada says the center gets half of its $14 million funding from
Medicaid. [more]

Development at the Hub intersection in the South Bronx will coincide with other improvements in the area, the Wall Street Journal reported, including more public space and improved traffic routes.

“Right now, we’re not the shopping area that we once were,” said Vincent Valentino, executive director of the Hub Third Avenue Business Improvement District centered at the intersection of East 149th Street and Third Avenue. “Hopefully it will bring people down here,” he said of the improvements.

Upgrades include the removal of a small building used as a bus dispatching facility and the addition of tables, seating and more greenery. A water fountain and a sculpture by artist Lewis DeSoto will also be added. [more]

New York City Economic Development Corp. has selected Triangle Equities to purchase and develop two sites in the South Bronx, the agency announced today. The sites, a 53,800-square-foot area at 430 Westchester Avenue, and another 58,000-square-feet parcel of land between East 149th Street, Brook Avenue and Westchester Avenue, both in the Melrose area, will be developed to include a supermarket, school, office space, restaurant and other community facilities. It will also include a new 8,000-square-foot plaza at Bergen Avenue and 149th Street.

The projects will cost around $35 million, EDC said, and will create around 201 permanent jobs along with 131 relating to the construction. Seth Pinksy, EDC’s president, also predicted millions of dollars in private investment TRD [more]

New Jersey is courting the Hunts Point Produce Cooperative Association, the group that runs the South Bronx-based Hunts Point produce market, to take up residence in the Meadowlands, according to the New York Post. Governor Chris Christie is so intent on winning the wholesale cash cow, which does roughly $2.3 billion in business every year, that he sent his Lieutenant Governor Kim Guadagno, to meet with the leadership there. The marketplace’s lease on 660,000 square feet of space expires this May, and some members of the co-op say they’re being swayed to move toward New Jersey. [more]

Widely-known for its troubled past, when the neighborhood was rampant with arson, drugs and prostitution, Hunts Point is a community on the rise — and some of its residents think it’s high time their homes were landmarked. The owners of approximately 40 homes on the 800 block of Manida Street in the South Bronx neighborhood, say that their properties, which were built at the turn of the century and represent a style of Flemmish architecture rarely seen in the city, deserve recognition for their history, restoration and longevity in a community that was shattered in the 1970s. Cybeale Ross, a a homeowner in the neighborhood for more than 50 years, said that she, like other residents on her street, has taken great pains to keep her 2,792-square-foot home well-maintained, preserving the gothic arches, stained-glass skylight and other aesthetic touches on her house. “When the Bronx was burning, people were running like it was the plague,” Ross said. “We never sold our home… I said, ‘No, I live in the Bronx, I work in the Bronx, the Bronx is my home.’” Her decision to stay, however rooted in her emotional connection to the neighborhood, had an undeniable financial windfall: her home, which she bought for $16,500 in 1958, could be worth as much as $370,000 today. Although the residents on the block have made no formal landmark application yet, they said they’re considering seeking historic status.

Peter Fine

From the February issue: No one could blame Peter Fine if he expected the past year to be easy
– even amid the market turmoil. Widely regarded as one of the city’s
top affordable housing developers, Fine started last year as the
darling of the entertainment world, as the unlikely coproducer of a
Tony Award-winning musical.
With close ties to President Obama’s new urban development guru, he was also more politically connected than ever. However, while his Broadway show, “In the Heights,” has enjoyed
continued success, Fine’s political connections and real estate career
have taken a beating over the past year.  [more]

Omni New York, a real estate development company headed by former New York Mets first baseman Maurice “Mo” Vaughn, is the successful bidder of 14 troubled South Bronx buildings owned by Ocelot Capital Group, Mayor Michael Bloomberg, other politicians as well as Fannie Mae announced today. The mortgage debt on the dilapidated Ocelot buildings, which totals $23.8 million, was also purchased for a reduced price by Omni from Fannie Mae and Deutsche Bank through the bidding process. Omni plans to invest up to $1 million in emergency repairs and hopes to become the long-term owner of each property. “This is a big step in the right direction that puts these properties on the path to finding responsible ownership. Omni brings a track record of success and has worked with the city on some of our most challenging and distressed properties,” said Housing Preservation and Development Commissioner Rafael Cestero. TRD

President Jimmy Carter once called Charlotte Street in the South Bronx “the worst slum in America,” and residents during the 1970s wouldn’t have argued. But the street, once the site of daily fires set by junkies and landlords in search of insurance payments, has been transformed into a suburban refuge. In the 1980s, 92 deeply discounted homes — subsidized with money from the city — were built and sold off to Bronx buyers, and few have been willing to part with them since. The homes were sold for between $50,000 and $59,000 to buyers who were carefully selected and subjected to credit checks and homeownership counseling. They cost roughly $100,000 to build. Only one has gone into foreclosure since the most recent real estate crash, and property values have skyrocketed. The one home currently for sale on Charlotte Street (the owners of which are retiring to Florida) is listed for $459,000, CNN reported.