The appointment of a national Workforce Housing Czar is crucial to solving the housing crisis, according to an architect with decades of experience in multifamily housing design and development.
"A Workforce Housing Czar can expand and amplify the impact of housing development programs by coordinating efforts among major stakeholders in the affordable housing community who are too often siloed," said Ariel Aufgang, AIA, Principal of Aufgang Architects, with offices in NY and FL.
"This must be done with the speed and scale required to achieve meaningful results," warned Aufgang.
The Workforce Housing Czar can "marshal and focus federal agency support and financing, coordinating with states, counties and local agencies, to maximize the impact of their programs," Aufgang said. “Solutions to this crisis require a multifaceted approach to overcome deep-rooted causes.”
"This would facilitate more public-private partnerships among commercial real estate developers, financial institutions, nonprofits and government agencies at all levels, to leverage their combined resources to expand access to housing," Aufgang said.
According to JP Morgan Chase, “across the country, (housing) supply is scarce and prices continue to soar. Most people employed in full-time, minimum-wage jobs can’t afford to rent even a modest two-bedroom apartment—in any state in the country.”
"The new administration in Washington, DC, has a historic opportunity to initiate innovative, effective approaches to create and preserve affordable housing," said Aufgang.
“A national Housing Czar can harmonize specific priorities and programs to expand workforce housing, such as environmental resilience and urban planning, commercial to residential conversions and zoning reforms,” said Aufgang.
His firm’s extensive multifamily portfolio includes:
--Edgemere Commons, a 100% affordable planned community of 11 buildings with more than 2,000 units on 9 acres, facing the Atlantic Ocean on the Rockaway Peninsula in Queens, NY. Aufgang did the development's urban planning, which includes environmental sustainability and climate resiliency solutions to mitigate threats from tidal flooding driven by more frequent and increasingly powerful hurricanes. Aufgang designed the first two multifamily buildings constructed at Edgemere Commons.
--Baisley Pond Park, a 100% affordable, 318-unit community created through the conversion of the former JFK Hilton Hotel near Kennedy Airport.
--Sherman Creek North Cove, one of the largest mixed income rental communities in Manhattan. Sherman Creek North Cove is a 30-story, 611-unit development in the Inwood section of upper Manhattan. Extensive rezoning enabled its construction.
“Harnessing America’s awesome collective talent and resources in finance, architecture and urban planning, commercial real estate development and public and social policy, requires clarity of vision and the political will on the part of our elected officials to quickly address our housing crisis through new policies and programs,” said Aufgang.
In the past 22 years Aufgang Architects has designed more than 14,000 units of affordable housing and 20 million square feet of built space.
Aufgang Architects is a certified Minority Business Enterprise.
