Land bank supporters say bill can save cities
Experts say it’s Buffalo’s best hope for remedying its vacant-housing crisis.
The question is whether Gov. David Paterson will let it happen.
Paterson will decide soon whether Buffalo and other New York cities will have access to regional land banks, a tool other states use to revitalize inner-city neighborhoods.
“This is watershed legislation,” said Joseph Schilling, an urban affairs professor at Virginia Tech and a founder of the National Vacant Properties Campaign. “We hope the governor will sign it.”
If Paterson does sign the bill, it will be over the strong objections of New York’s mayors, including Buffalo’s Byron W. Brown.
“This makes no sense when you consider that blighted vacant property is primarily a city issue,” Peter Baynes, executive director of the State Conference of Mayors, said in a letter to Paterson.
The mayors’ opposition pits them against a wide array of land bank advocates. They range from an institute at the University at Buffalo to local and national housing groups to some state legislators to county legislators and at least one suburban supervisor.
Schilling’s organization, which has been at the forefront of the vacant housing issue nationally, sent a letter to Paterson outlining the legislation’s benefits to Buffalo — a city his group studied extensively — and urging him to sign it.
And he’s not alone. At least a dozen groups and individuals have sent letters asking the governor to sign the legislation authorizing the creation of countywide land banks across New York.
Supporters say a regional approach is needed because the vacant-housing crisis is spreading to Buffalo’s first-ring suburbs, to places like Cheektowaga and Depew.
“The scale of the policy should match the scale of the problem,” said Kathryn Foster, director of UB’s Regional Institute. “Therefore, a countywide approach to land banking is appropriate.”
Land banks are becoming more popular because they do more than acquire and demolish houses. They also double as redevelopment authorities.
“A land bank puts all the tools and resources in one place,” said Anthony Armstrong of the Local Initiatives Support Corp., the national nonprofit group that oversaw the 2006 study of Buffalo.
The study, “Blueprint Buffalo,” recommended the creation of a land bank and suggested the city could serve as a “living laboratory,” where experts from across the country would help guide the city’s revitalization efforts.
The state legislation that will go before Paterson later this summer — the bill passed the Assembly and Senate last month — is one of the outgrowths of that study.
Brown acknowledges the need for a land bank but thinks it should be a city-only land bank, a position echoed by Rochester and others.
“This bill is bad for Buffalo,” the mayor said in his letter to Paterson. “These properties need the direct management and local accountability of the City of Buffalo.”
In his letter to Paterson, the mayor notes that Blueprint Buffalo, an award-winning report, recommended a city-based land bank. He points out that the state would create the land bank and warned that could be a repeat of when a state agency bought tax liens for several hundred properties a few years ago and the properties deteriorated.
“The solution is not another level of bureaucracy,” said City Finance Commissioner Janet Penksa. “The problem of blighted and vacant property is a city problem, and there needs to be a city role in how we address it.”
The authors of Blueprint Buffalo say their goal was always a regional land bank and that the recommendation for a city-only land bank stemmed from their belief that suburban communities like Cheektowaga would oppose a countywide approach to the crisis.
In fact, the opposite proved true. It’s now the city fighting the idea.
“A regional land bank was always the intent,” said Michael Clarke of the Local Initiatives Support Corp.
Paterson would not comment when asked last week what he plans to do with the bill, although the state lawmaker behind it predicted Paterson would sign the measure.
“This is a governor who’s driven by good government and good public policy,” said Assemblyman Sam Hoyt, D-Buffalo. “I can’t imagine a circumstance where he would veto this legislation.”
The bill’s supporters point to Flint, Mich., as the best example of why a regional approach is needed.
In Flint, the county-run land bank has become the city’s biggest landowner and the primary vehicle for putting its huge inventory of housing back into productive use.
The agency oversees about a dozen different programs, including a foreclosure-prevention service for homeowners falling behind in their taxes, a program to protect renters living in foreclosed housing and a rehabilitation arm that renovates and sells or rents 25 to 50 vacant homes a year.
The land bank also sells vacant lots and helps neighborhood groups turn vacant lots into gardens as part of a “clean and green” program.
“I think its a good strategy for dealing with vacant and abandoned property,” said Kathleen Lynch of the city’s Anti-Flipping Task Force.
Lynch, like many others, has sent a letter of support to Paterson. So has Cheektowaga Town Supervisor Mary Holtz.
Holtz has seen the city’s housing crisis make its way into Cheektowaga, into neighborhoods around Pine Hill and Walden Avenue.
“Our town can’t do this alone,” she said of the need for a countywide effort. “We have to have everyone on board to make this work.”
County lawmakers also are wading into the debate — they now have a Distressed Properties Task Force — and have asked Paterson to sign Hoyt’s bill.
“Sadly, this is not a Buffaloonly problem,” said Majority Leader Maria R. Whyte, D-Buffalo. “We need all hands on deck. The city doesn’t have the resources to do this alone.”
Penksa says the suggestion that Flint is an ideal model is flawed because of the dramatic differences in how New York and Michigan handle foreclosed property. She also wonders how a countywide land bank would handle the day-today tasks the city now handles.
“Who’s going to manage the property?” she asked. “Who’s going to cut the grass? Who’s going to put out the fires that occur at so many of these properties?”
For some, the battle over Hoyt’s land banking bill has more to do with politics than public policy.
Hoyt and Brown have been at odds for years, and Hoyt’s backers are not shy about suggesting the mayor’s opposition is really about their feud, not what’s best for Buffalo.
Brown says the allegations are baseless.
