Bethlehem Council Meeting 8/3/2021
Housing, Public Funds to Private Pockets, Unhoused Populations, Covid-19
What: Bethlehem Council Meeting
Date: August 3rd, 2021 at 7:00pm
With the ten day long MusikFest taking over much of downtown Bethlehem, it was shocking to hear no mention of the rising Delta variant of Covid-19. Mayor Donche’s report congratulated the city for its efforts in bringing the festival back, but conspicuously absent are any precautions to avoid a potential outbreak, besides a cursory “stay safe.” In a typical year, over one-million people flock to the city for one of the largest free music festivals in the country. With cases on the rise in both Lehigh and Northampton Counties, MusikFest could become a vector for community spread of the virus.
Instead council focused on passing a zoning ordinance amendment, to allow for changes to proposed parking at the Martin Tower development site. While discussing the change to the ordinance, Councilwoman Grace Crampsie Smith pointed out that Becky Bradley, from the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission, called the plan “not in alignment with the Future Lehigh Valley Plan.”
The Future Lehigh Valley Plan (FutureLV) is an initiative of the Lehigh Valley Planning Commission, which “addresses current and ongoing regional planning issues while fostering cooperation between governments, private sector and non-profit organizations and the general public.” In the July 20th meeting, Bradley had questioned the need for more parking, rather than promoting multimodal transportation.
Councilman J. William Reynolds spoke somewhat unrelatedly about how the city is integrating the Climate Plan with it's development process. However, nothing was pointed to in regards to the Martin Tower project, which would classify it as a “sustainable” development. He did however speak to a “best use” conversation. How the property had fallen into disrepair, generating less and less tax revenue, and becoming both a blight and an environmental hazard.
Meanwhile, Councilman Bryan Callahan characterized complaints about inadequate parking for the surrounding area as, “untrue,” and called the parking on both sides, “basically the same.” He also dismissed concerns for new transportation technology, noting that any new transportation methods will still need parking.
Councilwoman Crampsie Smith was the lone no-vote, as the change passed 4-1. The final vote regarding the amendment will be held at the next council meeting on August 17th.
Council moved on to discuss LERTA or the Local Economic Revitalization Tax Assistance program. The Dochez administration proposed program would require projects with 10 or more housing units, which apply for LERTA benefits to either provide 10% of the units as affordable housing, or the developers will be charged a $25,000-per-unit fee, the city would then put into affordable housing programs.
There were concerns raised during the July 20th meeting that the metrics used to arrive at “affordable” used the mean income, rather than focusing on low-income, as well as concerns that the $25,000 fee would not be adequate to address affordable housing needs in the area.
Alicia Miller Karner, Director of Community and Economic Development, explained that the city used the affordability gap method, devised by the U.S. Dept. Of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). The HUD formula uses the value of the average market rate apartment, minus the average affordable rent, multiplied by the period of affordability. She argued that raising the fee would deter investment, and that that would cause housing prices to increase.
However, Anna Smith’s calculations at the July 20th meeting put the affordability gap fee at a much higher $90,000. Moreover, Karner failed to mention that much of the housing development Bethlehem has seen, such as the condos at the armory, have placed high rent units in low-income neighborhoods. The proposed development on the south side appears to do much the same. So while the number may be based on abstract formulas, what matters is how much the proposal helps to rehome low-income tenants who are displaced. Is $25,000 per unit going to be enough to rehome a family? Is that even the right question to ask? Shouldn't we instead be asking why are we asking people to be rehomed? Trying to set a dollar amount to that has always been the wrong approach. If that were not already morally apparent, the threat of the end of the eviction moratorium makes it very clear.
This ultimately leads to a strange connection with the former Martin Tower site. There are an unsettling number of unhoused people living in the vicinity of the tower, in an encampment the city largely ignores. Will that continue to be the case when development on the site starts? Will they be pushed into another camp, somewhere else, as seems to be the perpetual destiny of homeless camps? As Bethlehem is considered a potential World Heritage Site, shouldn’t this problem only be more pressing?