Cypress Hills

HPD's Green Owners' Forum in Cypress Hills

Event on April 29, 2010

The City of New York Department of Housing Preservation & Development, in partnership with Cypress Hills Local Development Corporation, cordially invite you to a

Green Owners’ Forum

An opportunity for property owners to get information on issues such as green financing opportunities, property tax exemptions, water & energy conservation, recycling, weatherization, utility incentives, and much more.

Event Details

Thursday, April 29, 2010 - 6:30pm to 8:30pm

Intermediate School 302

Cypress Hills: New Housing for a Rooted Community

Project last updated April 27, 2008

In northeast Brooklyn, Cypress Hills Local Development Corporation (CHLDC) has built or rehabilitated nearly 100 homes and apartments in the last five years alone. Now CHLDC is a victim of its own success: it is running out of development sites. Teaming up with Pratt Institute's graduate programs in planning and preservation, the Pratt Center is helping Cypress Hills LDC find ways to build a significant amount of new housing while preserving the area's affordability and established communities. Board, staff and constituents of CHLDC recognize that the neighborhood's blocks of historic rowhouses have architectural and aesthetic value, but they also see the increasingly urgent need to house recent immigrants and low-income families who are quickly being priced out of the neighborhood.

East Brooklyn Housing

Past Project last updated April 6, 2009

East Brooklyn's neighborhoods now face both a serious need for affordable housing, and a significant number of foreclosures. Like the rest of the New York City, East Brooklyn experienced a dramatic increase in housing prices from 2000 to 2007 -- both rental and sales -- while incomes steadily declined. In the neighborhoods of Ocean Hill, Brownsville, Broadway Junction, Cypress Hills, City Line, East New York, New Lots, Spring Creek and Starrett City, almost half the population pays more than 30% of its income on housing, and around one third of residents live in poverty.

Verde Summit Gives Voice to Cypress Hills and East New York Residents

News last updated February 7, 2012

On October 21st and 22nd, 2011, over 200 Cypress Hills and East New York community members came together to re-envision the way their neighborhoods look, feel and work at the Cypress Hills Local Development Corporation (CHLDC)’s Verde Summit, an inclusive, bi-lingual community planning event held at the Cypress Hills Community School. Pratt Center worked closely with CHLDC to plan the summit, with sponsorship from the Brooklyn Community Foundation. The Summit incorporated themes that were revealed by more than 600 responses to a Community Satisfaction Survey, designed by Pratt Center and conducted by CHLDC during the spring and summer of 2011, which assessed resident concerns about living, working, eating and learning in their neighborhoods.

The Art, Culture and Sustainability Project

News last updated January 26, 2012

In the spring of 2011, Pratt Center for Community Development launched a two-year program designed to connect the arts and artists with our multi-layered work, helping New York City communities to become more environmentally sustainable. Supported by a grant from the Rockefeller Foundation’s Cultural Innovation Fund, the Center has partnered with academic and community organizations to produce innovative culture, arts, media and organizing strategies that seek to engage neighborhood residents and artists to promote sustainable, environmental action. This project is a part of Pratt Center’s broader goal to develop replicable models that will aid urban communities’ efforts to become environmentally sustainable -- intensive work we are doing in partnership with nine different community organizations in all five boroughs of NYC.

Sustainability Seeds are planted in Brooklyn

News last updated August 9, 2011

On August 10, The Brooklyn Community Foundation (BCF) officially launched “Brooklyn Greens,” a three-year $750,000 commitment to help three low-income communities in Brooklyn to become models for environmentally responsible, sustainable living.

Energy Efficiency Comes to New York Neighborhoods

News last updated November 24, 2010

City Council Speaker helps Pratt Center and partners launch citywide green home upgrade program

City Council Speaker Christine Quinn joined the Pratt Center, Bedford Stuyvesant Restoration Corporation and other partners on November 16 in the front yard of Theresa Braithwaite's Hancock Street house to inaugurate Retrofit NYC Block by Block, a new initiative to get New Yorkers to reduce their energy use through smart investments in their homes. Energy retrofits — home improvements that reduce the use of heating fuel, electricity, and water — can significantly reduce energy bills, make homes healthier and more comfortable, and reduce greenhouse gas and other emissions.

The New York City Council is sponsoring a one-year program that calls on community development groups in Staten Island, Brooklyn, the Bronx, and Queens to enlist property owners in their neighborhoods to undertake retrofits, with the help of incentive programs from the New York State Energy Research and Development Authority (NYSERDA), utility company programs, and federal grants and tax credits.

"When we saw the opportunity to fund $400,000 to help hundreds of homes throughout the City, particularly for underserved neighborhoods in the outer boroughs, we jumped at it," Speaker Quinn said. "This is a great initiative that I’m proud to support and I want to thank Pratt Center for Community Development and all the neighborhood partners for making our City green — one home at a time.”