53 Putnam Place
This unique development is a combination of environmental and a housing justice initiative. We cleaned up the site which was part of NY State Brownfield projectNow it will be transformed to low to moderate condominiums where people can own a home conveniently located where jobs, shopping and other amenities are located. Our homeownership is key to bringing income.
First Fairfield Associates and its local partner Jason Letts received its final approval from D.E.C. on April 12, 2021 for the property in downtown Saratoga Springs, New York. It is a Brownfield cleanup site, with a D.E.C. approved Remedial Work Plan. This was the culmination of a ten-year process, which First Fairfield began in 2013.
We are now in the process of obtaining site plan approvals from the City of Saratoga Springs for a 32 Unit 100% affordable condominium building. This will give low-income people and local workers the opprtuinity to own their own home in a thriving downtown close to jobs and public transportation.
INTRODUCTION AND PROJECT OVERVIEW:PUTNAM COMMONS
Putnam Commons, located at 53 Putnam Street in Saratoga Springs, NY, is a unique private-public endeavor that will transform a cleaned-up brownfield in the heart of downtown Saratoga Springs into residential condominiums –100% electric -- offering homeownership opportunities for members of the local workforce.
To achieve this goal, the developers initially guaranteed at a minimum 30% of the units in the building will be offered at a price affordable for buyers earning 80% of the average median income of the area. To drive a mixed-income project would be a unique collaboration of entities with common goals of addressing the prevailing shortage of workforce housing in the Spa City and New York State.
However, with optimistic recent updates from NYSHCR, the team is now designing a building that will be 100% affordable with a minimum of 24 units. Owner Putnam Resources, LLC has partnered with Habitat for Humanity, Rebuilding Together Saratoga County, and the City of Saratoga Springs to take advantage of state and private funding sources and other initiatives geared towards increasing the amount of workforce and affordable housing available in the state.
Grants from the Restore NY Empire State Development Fund, Housing and Community Resources, NYSERDA, as well as tax credits for the brownfield cleanup, will aid the investors in fulfilling their goal to build an affordable, for purchase, environmentally friendly building in the core of downtown Saratoga Springs.
This project has attracted numerous highly regarded professionals to the team. In addition to First Fairfield Associates, LLC, the Putnam team assembled includes The Saratoga City Center, Roohan Realty, BBL Construction Services: Albany Group V, Witt Construction, HBT Architects – A Division of MRB Group- James Tripp (lead architect), Sustainable Comfort- Jeffery Love, Fusion Systems Engineering, DPC- Mark Cambria, CEO, 260 Structural Engineering- Dale Meszler, Principal, Environmental Design Partnership, LLP- Brian Osterhout, P.E., Young/Sommer LLC, Sterling Environmental Engineering, PC, and Yepsen & Pikulski, Public Affairs.
The unique features of Putnam Commons, making Saratoga Springs the first of its kind in NYS and a model other communities, are:
The funders and founding partners are impact investors not looking for a maximum ROI.
The land is a city and state identified Brownfield where nothing had been done for years – but the owners have spent 7 years and $3 million just to cleanup this eyesore to DEC certificate-of-completion standards.
Putnam Commons will be an 100% electric building.
The building will be affordable workforce housing, not for rent, but for purchase, enabling those who would never be able to afford to live where they work in downtown Saratoga Springs to have a permanent home, build equity, and stay there because they own it.
It will include an active community civic space and commercial space where businesses who provide benefits to the local community, nonprofits and organizations will gather.
The architectural design is carefully being planned to fit in to the context of the neighborhood and provide a positive impact in the downtown gut where a dirt surface lot exists, currently with no life.
STATEMENTS FROM LOCAL & STATE SUPPORT:
“Thanks to the extraordinary talent of our team, this once environmental hazard and eyesore will be a model for attractive environmentally sustainable, all-electric, mixed economic level housing,” said Jason Letts, a principal of Putnam Resources, LLC. “We are particularly excited by how it will advance social equality through affordable home ownership.”
“We are extremely grateful to the local and state government officials who have shown unwavering support,” added Letts. “Everyone shares the same laudable goal here from Mayor Kim to Assembly Member Carrie Woerner to Governor Hochul. It is very refreshing.”
“The shortage of affordable and workforce housing is especially noticeable in a city like ours with such a vibrant economy,” said Saratoga Springs Mayor Ronald Kim. “This project checks all of the boxes. It is a green building, offers affordable home ownership and it is located right downtown close to public transportation. We feel confident about the upcoming requests for approvals.”
“This is one of the first projects of its type in upstate New York and a step towards the governor’s goal of having every upstate community increase its housing stock by 1 percent,” said Adam Feldman, Executive Director of Habitat for Humanity of Northern Saratoga, Warren, and Washington Counties, one of two non-profit partners in the Putnam Resources project. “It’s great to be part of such a cohesive and competent team.”
Putnam Resources, LLC is New York-based LLC focused on revitalizing distressed properties utilizing development strategies with a positive social purpose.
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