SAN FRANCISCO RECEIVES $600,000 TO SPUR NEXT GENERATION OF HOUSING, NEIGHBORHOOD TRANSFORMATION
17 entities nationwide receive grants to promote grassroots efforts to revitalize housing, communities

WASHINGTON - The U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) announced today that two San Francisco housing development organizations will each receive $300,000 to promote grassroots efforts to revitalize the public housing and transform the Sunnydale/Visitacion and South Potrero neighborhoods.

The Bridge Housing Corporation and the Sunnydale Development Co, LLC are two of 17 entities from across the U.S. receiving a Choice Neighborhoods Planning Grant today. The funding provides these communities the resources they need to craft comprehensive, community-driven plans to revitalize public or other HUD-assisted housing and transform distressed neighborhoods.

"This funding will enable San Francisco to further its discussions with local partners to plan strategies that will build a stronger, more sustainable community and address distressed housing, struggling schools, crime," said HUD Deputy Regional Administrator Wayne Sauseda. "HUD's Choice Neighborhoods Initiative represents the next generation in a movement toward revitalizing entire neighborhoods to improve the quality of the lives of the residents who live there."

HUD's Choice Neighborhoods Initiative promotes a comprehensive approach to transforming distressed areas of concentrated poverty into viable and sustainable mixed-income neighborhoods. Building on the successes of HUD's HOPE VI Program, Choice Neighborhoods links housing improvements with necessary services for the people who live there - including schools, public transit and employment opportunities.

The awardees announced today were selected from among 72 applications. Successful applicants demonstrated their intent to plan for the transformation of neighborhoods by revitalizing severely distressed public and/or assisted housing while leveraging investments to create high-quality public schools, outstanding education and early learning programs, public assets, public transportation, and improved access to jobs and well-functioning services. HUD focused on directing resources to address three core goals:

• Housing: Transform distressed public and assisted housing into energy efficient, mixed-income housing that is physically and financially viable over the long-term;
  
  
• People: Support positive outcomes for families who live in the target development(s) and the surrounding neighborhood, particularly outcomes related to residents' health, safety, employment, mobility, and education; and
  
  
• Neighborhood: Transform neighborhoods of poverty into viable, mixed-income neighborhoods with access to well-functioning services, high quality public schools and education programs, high quality early learning programs and services, public assets, public transportation, and improved access to jobs.

The grantees will use the funding to work with local stakeholders - public and/or assisted housing residents, community members, businesses, institutions and local government officials - to undertake a successful neighborhood transformation to create a "choice neighborhood." The awardees will use the funding to create a comprehensive Transformation Plan, or road map, to transforming distressed public and/or assisted housing within a distressed community.

Choice Neighborhoods is one of the signature programs of the White House Neighborhood Revitalization Initiative, which supports innovative, holistic strategies that bring public and private partners together to help break the cycle of intergenerational poverty. Choice Neighborhoods encourages collaboration between HUD and the Departments of Education, Justice, Treasury and Health and Human Services to support local solutions for sustainable, mixed-income neighborhoods with the affordable housing, safe streets and good schools all families need.

Congress approved the Choice Neighborhoods Initiative with the passage of HUD's FY2010 budget. Funding is provided through two separate programs - Implementation Grants and Planning Grants. With this announcement, HUD has awarded a total of $12.55 million in Planning Grants to 46 cities or counties.

Choice Neighborhoods Implementation grants are awarded to entities that have completed a comprehensive local planning process and are ready to move forward with their Transformation Plan to redevelop their target housing and neighborhoods. In August, HUD announced the nine finalists that will compete for approximately $110 million in 2012 Choice Neighborhoods Implementation grants to transform public and other HUD-assisted housing in targeted neighborhoods. Teams recently completed site visits as part of the application review process to determine which of the finalists will receive Implementation grants.

Last year, HUD awarded its first CN Implementation grants for Chicago, Boston, New Orleans, San Francisco and Seattle, a combined $122.27 million investment to bring comprehensive neighborhood revitalization to blighted areas in these cities. San Francisco was awarded one of the CN Implementation grants for $30 million for the Alice Griffith Housing Development.   

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HUD's mission is to create strong, sustainable, inclusive communities and quality affordable homes for all. HUD is working to strengthen the housing market to bolster the economy and protect consumers; meet the need for quality affordable rental homes: utilize housing asa platform for improving quality of life; build inclusive and sustainable communities free from discrimination; and transform the way HUD does business. More information about HUD and its programs is available on the Internet at www.hud.gov and espanol.hud.gov. You can also follow HUD on twitter @HUDnews, on facebook at www.facebook.com/HUD, or sign up for news alerts on HUD's News Listserv.

FY2012 CHOICE NEIGHBORHOODS PLANNING GRANT AWARD INFORMATION

San Francisco, CA

Choice Neighborhoods Lead Grantee: BRIDGE Housing Corporation
Choice Neighborhoods Co-Grantees: City and County of San Francisco through the Mayor's Office of Housing and the San Francisco Housing Authority (SFHA)
Target Public Housing Projects: Potrero Terrace and Potrero Annex
Target Neighborhood: South Potrero
Choice Neighborhoods Grant Amount: $300,000

Key Partners:
KDG Enterprises (Planning Coordinator), San Francisco Office of Economic and Workforce Development (OEWD), City College, San Francisco Human Services Agency, San Francisco Conservation Corp, San Francisco Department of Public Health (DPH), Potrero Neighborhood House, San Francisco SAFE (Safety Awareness for Everyone), San Francisco Police Department, Community Response Network (CRN), San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency (MTA), San Francisco Planning Department, Innovative IT, Technology Network of the Bay Area, San Francisco Unified School District (SFUSD), San Francisco's First Five, SFSU Head Start and Early Head Start, Starr King Elementary School, Daniel Webster Elementary School, Potrero Hill Library, Potrero Parks and Recreational Center, San Francisco Food Bank, Potrero Neighborhood House, Potrero Family Resource Center, and Potrero Caleb Clark Health Center.

Project Summary:
The South Potrero Neighborhood Transformation Plan will focus on revitalizing the San Francisco community known as South Potrero, a 2.5 square mile area situated on the south slope of Potrero Hill. Potrero Hill's two slopes contrast sharply. While the north slope gentrified in the early 2000s and has a median household income of $131,000 and poverty rate of 5.4 percent, the south slope is an area of concentrated poverty dominated by Potrero Terrace and Annex, two severely distressed and sprawling public housing developments where the average family income is less than $14,000 per year and the high school graduation rate is 16 percent.

Since 2008 BRIDGE Housing Corporation, the City and County of San Francisco, the San Francisco Housing Authority, and the residents of the South Potrero Neighborhood have been working to create a common vision for improving South Potrero. Their vision includes completing a master plan focused on the transformation of Potrero Terrace and Annex's physical environment as well as a Community Building Program aimed at strengthening the capacity of residents and the neighborhood. Under the banner Rebuild Potrero, these activities have involved over 1,000 diverse stakeholders. BRIDGE, SFHA, the City and KDG will build upon this significant base and complete a Transformation Plan that will profoundly transform South Potrero.

Beginning with housing, the team will develop plans to build a fully revitalized and sustainable community of approximately 1,600 mixed-income units. To ensure that the South Potrero Neighborhood Transformation Plan brings comprehensive benefits to people, the team will develop a deeper understanding of the barriers to residents' success in health, safety, employment, and education and plan ways to eliminate barriers and create real opportunity. And for the neighborhood as a whole, the team will continue and expand strategies to create an integrated and socially cohesive, mixed-income, service rich, safe and technologically connected community.

FY2012 CHOICE NEIGHBORHOODS PLANNING GRANT AWARD INFORMATION

San Francisco, CA

Choice Neighborhoods Lead Grantee: Sunnydale Development Co., LLC
Choice Neighborhoods Co-Grantees: San Francisco Public Housing Authority and the City and County of San Francisco through the Mayor's Office of Housing
Target Public Housing Project: Sunnydale-Velasco
Target Neighborhood: Sunnydale/Visitacion Valley
Choice Neighborhoods Grant Amount: $300,000

Key Partners:
San Francisco Department of Children, Youth and Families, First Five, San Francisco Unified School District, YMCA, San Francisco Boys and Girls Club, San Francisco Office of Economic and Workforce Development, UC Berkeley, San Francisco Department of Public Health, UCSF Schools of Public Health, San Francisco Department of Recreation and Parks, San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency, San Francisco Police Department, San Francisco SAFE (Safety Awareness for Everyone), Bayview Foundation, and TURF (Together United Recommitted Forever).

Project Summary:
Residents of Sunnydale - 785-units of severely-distressed public housing - and its surrounding neighborhood, Visitacion Valley, face serious challenges on several fronts. Sunnydale suffers from approximately 75 percent unemployment, while the poverty rate for the entire neighborhood is 29 percent. Chronically high crime rates create behavioral, social and economic distress. Public transit and workforce connections are insufficient. Educational attainment at Sunnydale is often below high school level and the rate of adults and youth using emergency rooms for preventive and chronic ailments are up to three times higher than city-wide rates. 

However, Sunnydale Development Co., LLC, the San Francisco Public Housing Authority, the City and County of San Francisco, and other partners will use the Choice Neighborhoods Planning Grant to create a Transformation Plan for the neighborhood that will address and reverse the community's long-standing distress. The vision will be new, high-quality, sustainable housing; new community-serving amenities for the neighborhood; and focused services and educational opportunities for residents, including a focus on STEM (science, technology, engineering and math) for college preparation, workforce development, and economic mobility. The Planning Grant will enable the team to define the most effective ways to deliver opportunities, break the cycle of poverty and transform Sunnydale/Visitacion Valley into a thriving, viable mixed-income neighborhood. The planning activities will include refining the financing plan; completing an in-depth needs assessment; increased pre-natal health care utilization; improved health care, healthy food, and transportation access; recreational programs; and improved public safety.