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City of Chicago Housing Initiative Selected As Winner of ULI's 2016 Robert C. Larson Housing Policy Leadership Award
October 27, 2016
ULI PRESS RELEASE DALLAS (October 27, 2016) – The City of Chicago’s Troubled Building Initiative was selected by the Urban Land Institute (ULI) Terwilliger Center for Housing as the winner of the 2016 Robert C. Larson Housing Policy Leadership Award, an annual recognition of the innovative ways the public sector is addressing the country’s affordable housing crisis.
The Chicago initiative, honored last night during a ceremony at the ULI Fall Meeting in Dallas, was chosen by a jury of national housing industry leaders. The housing initiative was selected from a group of finalist policies and initiatives, including the Arlington County, Virginia, Affordable Housing Master Plan; the state of Iowa’s Iowa Green Streets Criteria; and New York City’s Bifurcated Structures for 80/20 or Mixed-Income Financing.
Through its Troubled Buildings Initiative, Chicago has acted aggressively to acquire and improve run-down buildings that pose a threat to communities—and instead rehabilitate vacant and abandoned structures to provide critically needed low-cost housing. Multiple city agencies work with well-established community-based groups to move buildings from code enforcement to improved physical condition and management rather than to abandonment and demolition. These efforts have preserved more than 16,000 rental and for-sale units across the city.
Pictured above is Bryan Esenberg, Assistant Commissioner, City of Chicago, Department of Planning & Development, who accepted the award on behalf of the City on Wednesday, October 26th at the ULI Fall Meeting in Dallas, TX.