Latest post in a series on Affordable Housing
“43% of Bethlehem households are cost-burdened. That’s a staggering percentage.”
Tina Roseberry
ref: Crampsie Smith Affordable Housing Task Force advances
ref: Affordable Housing has momentum
What data about Bethlehem reside in your data banks?
What statistics do you know that help us understand the kind of city that we are?
Let’s see . . . population c. 75,000 . . . POC c. 40% . . . budget c. $87m . . . hmm, I’m not getting much further than that.
Well, Gadfly found the numbers laid out by the City at the affordable housing discussion by the Community Development Committee on Tuesday really quite revealing, kind of riveting actually.
If he understands correctly, for instance, 887 apartment units were approved by the planning commission through the land development process between 2014 and 2020, and none were classed “affordable.”
Listen to the City’s Tina Roseberry expand on the following slides.
- about 1/4 of our residents earn less than $25,000/yr.
- about 11% live at or below poverty
- 43% of households are “cost burdened” (rent/mortgage + utilities exceeds 30% of income): a “staggering” number
- housing cost has gone up 4% in 5 years
- rents have increased 18% in 5 years
These are some nasty numbers.
