Campaign for Responsible Development CRD denver, co

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Campaign for Responsible Development
(CRD)denver, co

• Community Benefit Case Study
• Redevelopment of the Gates Rubber Factory
• By Robin Kniech, FRESC
• November 15, 2007

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The OpportunityGates Rubber Plant Redevelopment
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A Brownfield - a piece of land with real or
perceived environmental contamination
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Environment

• Trichloroethylene or TCE contaminated the site
  and some surrounding areas but
• It was unknown how far the TCE had traveled.
• There were disagreements about what levels of TCE
  were safe based on Colorado standards vs. EPA and
  other standards.

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Developers Vision - a mixed-use
transit-oriented development (TOD)
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The Neighborhoods

• Western Neighborhoods lower income, large
  Latino population, lack of basic retail such as
  grocery, separated by tracks and highway,
  residents not organized
• Eastern Neighborhoods Middle to upper class,
  less diverse, residents not organized on
  equity/social justice issues
• North of Site, Baker - a neighborhood in
  transition with some organized residents

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Key Players

• Cherokee Denver LLC local office of a national
  brownfield developer, local president answers to
  national leaders in NC, investors include union
  pension funds
• Denver Urban Renewal Authority (DURA)
  quasi-governmental agency responsible for
  determining eligibility for tax increment
  financing subsidies that go to private
  developers, DURA gives the 1st level of approval
  for TIF subsidies
• Denver City Council - 13 member elected body
  responsible for final approval or rejection of
  TIF subsidies to private developers

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Cherokee-Denver Redevelopment Advisory Committee
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Developer Goal Prepare Site for Vertical
Development, Sell Land, Make Required Rate of
Return (Profit) to Investors

• To convert the site, from current conditions,
  Cherokee would need
• Public subsidies
• Zoning changes
• Clean-up to satisfy state standards
• City Council approval of the development plan
  after a public hearing.

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FRESC Good Jobs, Strong Communities(formerly
known as Front Range Economic Strategy Center)

• Founded in 2002 to bring community groups and
  labor unions together to pursue responsible
  development strategies that would uplift
  communities and ensure good jobs, affordable
  housing, and environmentally safe and sustainable
  neighborhoods
• Cherokees intentions to puruse TIF for the Gates
  site were made public shortly after FRESC was
  founded
• FRESC founded and staffed the coalition that
  would work on the site

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Campaign for Responsible Development (CRD)
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CRDs Initial Community Benefit Goals

• Quality Jobs
• Affordable and Accessible Housing
• Neighborhood Community Investment
• Environmental Issues

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Leverage for community involvement Re-Zoning

• Current manufacturing zone would not allow
  proposed uses. Cherokees proposed new zoning
  would allow
• Residential
• Retail
• Hotel
• Commercial development
• Increase allowable floor area ratio to increase
  density.

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Leverage for community involvement Public
Subsidies

• Tax Increment Financing
• Captures future sales and property taxes and uses
  them to raise money today to pay for public
  aspects of the development
• City view project pays for itself project
  would not exist but for TIF, so not costing
  anything
• Advocate view new development requires new
  services, and if new taxes arent available, the
  city is going to do more with less

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Denver regulations

• DURAs First Source Program
• Developers receiving subsidies through TIF must
  hire local workers. However, problems with the
  program include
• Incomplete coordination with community-based job
  training and placement agencies
• Insufficient ID of future jobs
• Lack of targeted training programs
• Insufficient time to fill openings
• Lack of system for matching workers to jobs
• No post-referral tracking or monitoring of hiring
  or job quality
• Retail wages at TIF-projects are less than
  average retail wage for the metro region.

• Living wage ordinance
• Requires 9.30 an hour for parking lot
  attendants, security guards, clerical support
  workers and child-care workers at city
  facilities.
• Applies only to projects undertaken by the city.

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Denvers regulations

• Inclusionary housing ordinance
• Requires 10 of for-sale housing units be
  affordable to households earning average of 80
  of the Area Median Income (AMI) (51,600 for a
  family of three).
• No requirement for affordable rental voluntary
  incentives exist but not used.
• For large sites (like Gates) there was a
  provision to negotiate an alternative Plan to be
  approved by Director of Housing and Neighborhood
  Services.

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Strategies for community involvement

• RESEARCH
• Document Problem
• Outline Proven Solutions

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Strategies for community involvement

• ORGANIZING Public Involvement
• Public pressure

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Strategies for community involvement

• LOBBYING
• Decision-makers Directly

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Strategies for community involvement

• NEGOTIATION
• with Developer

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STOP!!! Do not copy the following slides in
the initial handout!! Please copy as separate
handout!!!!
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Part II Narrative What happened in Denver?
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CRD Coalition Endorsers

• ? 9 to 5, National Association of Working Women
  Colorado (co-chair)
• ? Advocates for a Diverse Denver
• ? Agape Christian Church
• ? American Federation of State, County,
  Municipal Employees (AFSCME), Local 158,
• Council 76
• ? Association of Community Organizations for
  Reform Now (ACORN) Colorado
• ? Atlantis Community Corporation/Adapt
• ? Bayaud Industries
• ? Capitol Hill United Ministries
• ? Centro Bienestar San José
• ? Colorado AFL-CIO
• ? Colorado Alliance for Retired Americans
• ? Colorado Building Construction Trades Council
  (CBCTC)
• ? Colorado Catholic Conference (CCC)
• ? Colorado Environmental Coalition (CEC)
• ? Colorado Federation of Public Employees (CFPE)
• ? Colorado Fiscal Policy Institute
• ? Colorado Peoples Environmental and Economic
  Network (COPEEN)
• ? Colorado Progressive Coalition (CPC)

• ? Eco-Justice Ministries
• ? The Empowerment Program
• ? Ethical Trade Action Group (E-TAG)
• ? Hotel Employees Restaurant Employees (HERE),
  Local 14
• ? International Association of Machinists
  Aerospace Workers (IAM), Local 1886
• ? International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers
  (IBEW), Locals 68 and 111
• ? International Union of Operating Engineers
  (IUOE), Local 9
• ? International Union of Painters and Allied
  Trades (IUPAT), Local 79
• ? Jobs with Justice Colorado
• ? Labors Community Agency
• ? Laborers International Union of North America
  (LIUNA), Local 720
• ? Metropolitan Organizations for People (MOP)
• ? Micro Business Development Corporation
• ? Mountain West Regional Council of Carpenters
  (MWRCC)
• ? National Association of Letter Carriers (NALC),
  Branch 5996
• ? Pipefitters (UA), Local 208
• ? Platt Park Residents Coalition
• ? Plumbers (UA), Local 3
• ? Progress Now!

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No big-box grocery store agreement
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Taking on the Department of Public Health and
Environment (CDPHE)
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CRD focus on housing and jobs
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FRESC Research
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Cherokee-Denver subsidy

• 126 million in subsidies
• Metropolitan tax districts to cover bonds of 41
  million paid from extra property taxes by
  future owners
• Tax Increment Financing (TIF) valued at 85
  million over 25 years to cover infrastructure.

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11th-hour concessions

• The VCAB to be kept apprised of progress with
  clean-up and privy to clean-up documents
• Affordable housing set-aside including 10 of
  for-sale units (150/1500 total) and 20 of rental
  units (200/1000 total)
• Remediation and infrastructure construction
  workers to be be paid the citys prevailing wage
• Living wage to apply to parking lot attendants
  and security personnel that employed at the
  sites public facilities
• Enhanced first source hiring system that
  prioritizes zip codes surrounding the site and
  enhances tracking and reporting systems to
  monitor outcomes
• Union construction manager, the Kiewit Building
  Group, for the 126 million infrastructure work
• Denver general fund to receive portion of
  property taxes from TIF beginning in year 10.

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CRD supports the project
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(No Transcript)
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Implementation

• Revamping First Source Local Hiring so there is a
  functional system for notifying and referring
  residents to openings
• Monitoring environmental clean-up
• Monitoring construction contracting