Press Releases
Date: June 26, 2003
Release Date: Immediately
FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT
Reba V. Hicks, Public Information Officer
(856) 968-2748
rhicks@camdenhousing.org
THE HOUSING AUTHORITY OF THE CITY OF CAMDEN ANNOUNCES RIBBON
CUTTING/GRAND OPENING CEREMONY OF BALDWIN'S RUN (FORMERLY
WESTFIELD ACRES)
"CELEBRATING HOMEOWNERSHIP"
The Housing Authority of the City of Camden (HACC) will celebrate
"Homeownership" with the Ribbon Cutting/Grand Opening of
Baldwin's Run on Friday, June 27, 2003. The ceremony will take
place at 3165Westfield Avenue (formerly Westfield Acres) and begin at
10:00 a.m.
This mix of rental and homeownership units at the same location is
representative of, or just like any other inner city neighborhood.
Therefore, the Grand Opening/Ribbon Cutting will highlight both the
newly completed homeownership and rental units. The date, June 27,
2003, for the ribbon cutting ceremony was selected to coincide with
HUD's National Homeownership Month, which is June 2003. Confirmed
speakers at the event include New Jersey Department of Community
Affairs Commissioner, Susan Bass Levin and the Honorable Mayor of
Camden, Gwendolyn Faison.
We mark the beginning of Baldwin's Run with the dedication of the
flagpole that stood in front of Westfield Acres for over 60 years that
had been removed during demolition of the prior units and has been now
reset. It carried America's colors in good times and bad. We
celebrate a bright, new future for the people of Baldwin's Run and
the surrounding neighborhood.
The Westfield Acres HOPE VI development consists of ten (10)
construction phases. Nine of the construction phases will create 516
units of affordable housing in East Camden. The remaining phase will
be for the construction of a Community Center that will provide
offices for management and maintenance staff. There will also be
office space available for the provision of Support Services and
Resident Council activities. The Community Center will also provide a
Multi-Purpose Room for facilitating larger community activities.
There will be 219 homeownership units. Presently, the 100 fully
rehabilitated homeownership units surrounding the former Westfield
Acres public housing site are complete, sold and occupied. Another 119
new homeownership units will be constructed on the former Westfield
Acres site. Ninety-three (93) of these units are already under
construction, nine (9) of which will be complete and approximately
eight (8) of them occupied during the next few days. Approximately 85
of the units are pre-sold. more
In addition to the 219 homeownership units, 297 rental units will be
newly constructed. Seventy-eight (78) of the units, which are on the
former Westfield Acres site, are completed and are now being occupied.
There is also another 49 rental units at Carpenter's Hill that
have been completed and are now occupied. The remaining 127 rental
units to be built off-site will be completed over the next two years.
The 78 rental units received a reservation of 9% tax credits from the
New Jersey Housing and Mortgage Finance Agency (NJHMFA), which raised
approximately $8.8million of private equity. In addition, the rental
units are receiving approximately $3.6 million from the New Jersey
Balanced Housing Funds. The 93 homeownership units under construction
were funded in part with $2.2 million of the Urban Homeownership
Recovery Program/Homeownership Incentive Fund (UHORP) and a NJHMFA
Construction Loan of approximately $2.4 million. Without the
combination of the state funds with HUD's HOPE VI Grant of $35
million this development would not be possible.
Dr. Maria Marquez, Executive Director, stated, "It gives the
Authority great pride to include the ribbon cutting/grand opening of
Baldwin's Run during HUD's National Homeownership month.
Housing opportunities are greatly needed in Camden and we are pleased
to provide more affordable opportunities to our residents."