The Trickle-Up Theory

Could affordable-housing developers become green-building pioneers?

by Doron Taussig

MODEL HOME: The Philadelphia Community Design Collaborative's Sheridan Street Housing is an ambitious example of price-friendly greening. (CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION)

going green

For the past three years, a certain kind of article has been popping up in newspapers across the country. In it, a reporter visits with the happy new homeowner, and announces that affordable housing — that is, housing for low- and moderate-income people — has gone "green." These stories have surfaced in New York, Boston, Baltimore, San Diego and other cities. Even Philly had one, right here in these pages [Cover, "Home and Design: Inside HOME's Project," Patrick Temple-West, Feb. 22, 2007].

Frequently, the subtext is that green affordable housing is surprising. Green products have traditionally been the province of middle- and upper-class consumers. Think organic foods, or hybrid cars: You pay extra for the peace of mind, and you don't do that unless you have extra on hand. But green affordable housing is, at this point, turning into a bona fide trend. And it may change the way we think of who goes green altogether.

It's hard to say exactly when the greening of affordable housing began, because there are so many different definitions for "green." But back in 2004, a national nonprofit called the Enterprise Foundation committed $555 million to build 8,500 green homes within five years; since then, the places have been popping up right and left.

Philly wasn't at the start of this curve, but has been gaining ground. The Philadelphia Housing Authority has built 50 units in West Philly to Energy Star specifications, and has another 125 in the works in North Philly. Habitat for Humanity is refurbishing seven local homes to meet the higher Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design (LEED) standard. Last year, the nonprofit developer 1260 Housing used tax credits from the Pennsylvania Housing Finance Agency and money from Enterprise to build the 48-unit Powelton Heights development in West Philadelphia, which used low-flow water fixtures, energy-efficient appliances and Earth-friendly paint.

Perhaps most ambitious is Sheridan Street Housing, the product of a Philadelphia Community Design Collaborative initiative, in which nonprofit developers were teamed with designers to come up with innovative affordable-housing plans. In this case, Asociacion de Puertorriquenos en Marcha (APM), a North Philly community development group, was teamed with Interface Studio Architects, a start-up office with a green mission. The resulting design, which won the highest honor at American Institute of Architects Philadelphia's 2006 Design Excellence Awards, calls for 13 individual homes that will include solar panels on the roof for heating water and a "whole house switch," which will allow occupants, when leaving, to take the residence down to a "steady state" to preserve energy. The project will break ground on Sheridan Street, a few blocks north of Cecil B. Moore Avenue, near Seventh Street, next year.

At first glance, green housing, like its green brethren, does appear to be a commodity for the elite. To build green costs extra — the Sheridan Street project will be about 10 percent more expensive on account of its green features, for example, according to Rose Gray of APM. And affordable housing, often subsidized by the government, has historically been built as cheaply as possible.

But while it is more expensive to construct green housing, it's cheaper to maintain it, because energy bills are much lower. For developers who plan to own and operate their buildings, it's actually more economical to go green. Powelton Heights, for instance, is run by its developer, 1260 Housing. CEO David Hahn says the company spent an extra $250,000 on environmentally friendly materials, but "we expect to recoup it within a year," through things like lower electric and water bills.

Of course, if a developer plans to sell a property, his financial incentive to build green is removed: He'd be spending more to save someone else money. And indeed, on the private market, in order for green housing to be built, consumers have to be informed enough to specifically demand it, and pay more for their homes. But developers of affordable housing are already engaged in a philanthropic act. They want to save money for their consumers.

"Housing cost is not just the mortgage or the rent you pay," says Dana Bourland of Enterprise.

"When you build these things, you build [them] so they're affordable long-term," says APM's Gray.

(CLICK IMAGE FOR LARGER VERSION)

In other words, green housing could help low-income people keep their homes.

That green housing will one day be as much a part of the building code as safety regulations is probably inevitable; already many states, including Pennsylvania, offer incentives for going green, and some cities, such as Chicago and New York, have begun to do so (Philly has not yet, although Democratic mayoral nominee Michael Nutter has proposed such incentives). But what we may be witnessing with the advent of green affordable housing is something that seems unthinkable in today's America.

It's no guarantee, because many developers will no doubt prefer to do things cheaply, but it's possible that affordable housing will go green before the private market does — and that the people who need something the most will actually get it first.

(doron@citypaper.net)