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What We're Working On

Transforming the City's Manufacturing Landscape

last updated January 6, 2010

"Transforming the Manufacturing Landscape," by Pratt Center Director Adam Friedman, is now available, part of the Drum Major Institute's new book From Disaster to Diversity: What's Next for New York City's Economy? Listen to Friedman discuss the future of the city's industrial jobs in New York City on WNYC's Brian Lehrer Show.

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Managing Lean and Green - A Monthly Workshop Series for Affordable Housing Managers

Event last updated December 8, 2009

Back by popular demand - The Managing Lean and Green workshops!

The Association for Neighborhood and Housing Development, Pratt Center for Community Development and the Supportive Housing Network of New York invite you to join us in a second round of our popular monthly workshop series to learn and share information about how to make your existing housing portfolio more energy efficient, healthier, and more financially viable. Each of the 10 sessions features a presentation on a selected topic and time for participants to discuss their experiences, share information, ask questions and suggest policy and/or programmatic initiatives. We encourage affordable and supportive housing managers, developers and fiscal staff to participate.

February 3 -

The NYS Weatherization Assistance Program:  When to use it, how to access it, and how to maximize program benefits

Join us for an informative workshop on Weatherization Assistance with David Hepinstall of the Association for Economic Affordability, Inc. (AEA)

 

Event Details

February 3, 2010 - 10:00am - 12:00pm
Pratt Manhattan, 144 West 14th Street

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Religious Institution Sustainability Project

Project last updated December 8, 2009

Churches, mosques, synagogues and other houses of worship serve as anchors for their congregations and communities. But rising energy costs and expensive building maintenance are a burden greater than many can bear. Their aging buildings waste costly amounts of heating fuel because of inefficient design, poor insulation, and deferred maintenance.

The Pratt Center is collaborating with religious institutions to help them reduce their buildings’ energy consumption, set maintenance priorities, develop space utilization strategies and in the process turn them into centers of education and advocacy for sustainability in their communities. The Religious Institution Sustainability Project is currently focusing on Bedford-Stuyvesant, home to more than 100 houses of worship as well as the Retrofit Bedford Stuyvesant collaboration targeting two blocks of Herkimer Street for home weatherization.

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Pratt Center News - Fall 2009

Enews last updated December 2, 2009


In This Issue:

  • A Message from Director Adam Friedman
  • Jackson Heights Green Agenda Sprouts
  • Concrete Plant Park Brings the Bronx to its River
  • Building Opportunity for Public Housing Residents
  • A Second Chance for Houses of Worship
  • Options for Seward Park
  • Training for Green Jobs, Green Buildings
  • Meet the Pratt Center Fellows
  • Pratt Center Briefs

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Jackson Heights Green Agenda

Project last updated December 1, 2009

Jackson Heights is a thriving community that faces a distinct set of environmental challenges. The City Council district that includes Jackson Heights has just 1 acre of park space for every thousand children. Traffic to and from nearby LaGuardia airport pollutes the air and clogs the streets. And Jackson Heights has a larger share of tenants living in severely overcrowded housing than any other neighborhood in New York City.

The Jackson Heights Green Agenda is a collaboration between Queens Community House, Friends of Travers Park and the Pratt Center for Community Development, bringing together residents of Jackson Heights to plan an environmental blueprint for the neighborhood. Air quality, traffic, open space and housing conditions are among the issues participants are grappling with in through a process that is engaging hundreds of neighborhood residents and ultimately influence city spending, services and priorities.

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Public Housing in New York City: Building Communities of Opportunity

Report last updated October 27, 2009

As New York City works to promote economic opportunity for the poor, a new report by the Pratt Center for Community Development, "Public Housing in New York City: Building Communities of Opportunity," provides an in-depth look at the New York City Housing Authority (NYCHA) and the nearly 500,000 New Yorkers who live in its 286 developments. Funded by the Brooklyn Community Foundation, a charitable organization devoted exclusively to support Brooklyn’s nonprofit community, the report outlines strategies that would help create and increase opportunities for public housing residents, nearly half of whom live in poverty.

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Community Voices and the Future of the Seward Park Urban Renewal Area

Report last updated September 15, 2009

Community Voices and the Future of the Seward Park Urban Renewal Area Report

SPURA Matters is a yearlong initiative facilitated by nonprofit community organizations that wished to renew a community conversation about the redevelopment of the long-vacant Seward Park Urban Renewal Area (SPURA) site on the Lower East Side. Over several months in late 2008 and early 2009, the initiative consulted with local stakeholders to engage them in a dialogue about community needs and potential uses for the site. After decades of controversial development proposals that never went anywhere, SPURA Matters strove to get stakeholders talking about how the site could be developed in a way that benefits the surrounding community. The ultimate goal of the initiative is to help start a community-driven process to put the site back into a broadly productive use.

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Saving Independent Retail

Issue Brief last updated August 10, 2009

Independent retailers are part of the glue that holds neighborhoods together, but increasingly they are fighting for survival. Retailers are plagued by high rents, competition from chains and the internet, limited access to credit, and other stresses, but their decline is far from inevitable. Drawing from the Pratt Center's work with neighborhood groups seeking to build strong shopping districts and from creative strategies pursued by other cities, the Pratt Center Issue Brief "Saving Independent Retail" details measures the Mayor’s Office can and must take to keep independent stores thriving.

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Retrofit Bedford Stuyvesant

Project last updated April 16, 2009

A Model Block for Energy Efficiency

Brooklyn's Bedford Stuyvesant is one of the most historically rich and compelling neighborhoods in NYC. As a cultural center for Brooklyn's African American community, many of its residents are devoted to the community, reinvesting when their incomes rise, staying in the neighborhood over many generations and becoming homeowners – over 25 percent of neighborhood households own their homes. The neighborhood has a well-developed network of block, civic, faith and neighborhood associations including a unique collaboration, the Coalition for the Improvement of Bedford Stuyvesant, a partnership of 25 community-based social and economic development organizations.

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