Brooklyn's Progress
August/September 2006

Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg broke ground on a 227-acre site in East New York that will create an entirely new community The development to be called the Nehemiah Spring Creek Houses at Gateway Estates, is the culmination of a nearly 20 year endeavor to create a mixed-use community. 

The Nehemiah Spring Creek Houses at Gateway Estates, a new 227-acre mixed-use community, will consist of nearly 2,200 new affordable homes, 125 units of senior housing, a 625,000 square-foot retail center and a public school. Sale prices for single family homes will begin at $158,300 and homeowners are expected to begin moving in by the end of 2007. 

The site is known as the Fresh Creek Urban Renewal Area, previously served as a municipal landfill. The development will require installation of streets, sidewalks, and storm and sanitary sewers, which will be constructed by the Department of Design and Construction concurrently with the housing and financed with funding from the sale of a parcel of land to The Related Companies.  Financing for the first phase of housing construction will be provided by a loan through Community Preservation Corporation, (CPC), loans from the Lutheran Church-Missouri Synod and the St. Paul Community Baptist Church of Brooklyn.  The City will also provide direct housing subsidies of $46,000 for each of the single-family home, as well as $30 million in infrastructure costs

“Today’s groundbreaking demonstrates our Administration’s commitment to cultivating innovative partnerships and pioneering new tools through the ten-year $7.5 billion New Housing Marketplace Plan, which will provide 165,000 affordable homes for 500,000 New Yorkers,” said Mayor Bloomberg. “This partnership between the city, private business and local churches will enable us to transform vacant land into affordable housing, retail and community amenities. We are harnessing Brooklyn’s economic success to provide the capital needed to develop essential infrastructure and build a new neighborhood that will be affordable to working New Yorkers.”

The 227-acre site will be developed through a not-for-profit joint venture comprised of Nehemiah HDFC, the housing affiliate of the East Brooklyn Congregations (EBC), and Gateway Center Properties Phase II. 
 
“Mayor Bloomberg’s administration is working to ensure that the people who make our City’s economy strong can afford to live here,” said Department of Housing Preservation and Development (HPD) Commissioner Shaun Donovan. “Through innovative partnerships we are making the needed investment in housing so the city can continue to grow and working New Yorkers can afford a good home to raise their families.” 

“This is what we mean when we talk about smart development: mixed-use, income-diverse communities with street-level commerce,” said Borough President Markowitz. “This is not a case of ‘If you build it, they will come.’ This is based on the belief that ‘If you build it, they will stay’ – and that’s what we want Brooklynites to do: stay, participate in, and benefit from the Brooklyn Renaissance today and in the days ahead.”