Displayed on the edge of the Benjamin Franklin Parkway, barricades and signs stating “No cop zone” and “Housing Now” made it impossible for passersby to ignore the struggles of unhoused people embroiled in a contentious dispute over the city’s approach to housing. An encampment with around 150 tents set up in a park in the center of Philadelphia lasted up to four months, locked in a battle with the city over housing policy. In tumultuous 2020.
In October of that year, under mounting pressure, an agreement was reached between the activists, the Philadelphia Housing Authority, and the city to acquire properties to house people living in the tents. Along with this promise came a few minor arrangements like the building of tiny house villages. But this agreement did not happen in a vacuum, and to understand why four years later many of the properties from this deal—as of February 2024—have not been acquired, some Philadelphia housing policy must be revisited. In doing so, the stark reality of housing policy arises, leaving space for only a few well thought out solutions. Indeed, the feasibility of a community land trust at all—the entity set to acquire these properties to house members of the encampment—is called into question, because of multiple organizational and political–economic constraints.
The Philadelphia Community Land Trust’s (PCLT) stated mission is to “remove property from the market in order to secure it as a long–term, stable housing stock, insulate neighborhoods from gentrification and meet the income levels of the bottom quarter of Philadelphia living under the poverty line.” This cause is commendable and rightfully made headlines following the activists’ win. However, the PCLT has run into a few stumbling blocks, not least of which is the death of their leader, Jennifer Bennetch, in 2022. Bennetch was a key figure who spear–headed the protests and engaged in negotiations for the agreement.
Along with this, it was reported by an ousted board member, Ruth Birchett, that the PCLT operations were far from where they needed to be. She stated in a Billy Penn article, “You [The PCLT] can’t demonstrate to the city of Philadelphia why you’re a good candidate for conveying the property to you.” Both Birchett and another board member, Dan Moffat, stated that the city wanted the PCLT to insure the homes, which would require fundraising.
The sentiment that government agencies can be better equipped to create affordable housing is echoed by John Kromer, the director of Philadelphia’s Office of Housing and Community Development during the 1990s and current Fels Institute of Government instructor at Penn. Kromer says, “Public agencies are doing a good job in producing affordable housing for residents like the ones that this group was concerned about. And it makes more sense for us to continue doing that, rather than to try to put together a group that has been fragmented as a result of the loss of the leader, and also its status as an activist organization, rather than as a development organization.”
While Kromer is sympathetic to the idea of a community land trust in theory, he notes that the most successful land trusts focused on affordable housing are well connected to either government organizations or the private sector, who provide funding and are able to help “maintain properties, make sure they're insured, deal with emergencies and repairs, and city code problems.” As Moffat notes, the PCLT has struggled with the insuring of the properties. Street reached out to the PCLT for comment several times and have not heard back by time of publication.
This is not to say that the PCLT is the only one to blame for the stagnation of the deal; the city has an important role to play as well. For one, the nonprofit entity the city uses to pull properties from and give to organizations is inefficient. Known as the Philadelphia Land Bank, the nonprofit is part of the Philadelphia Housing Development Corporation. Kromer notes that the “the process takes forever” and is fraught with delays. But these are only symptoms of an underlying problem: political support.
Kromer conveys just how important it was to have support from the mayor at the top, without which the Philadelphia Land Bank would struggle deeply. If the Philadelphia Land Bank were to have had support from the beginning, it would have been more successful. He cites a lack of support from a string of mayors since it was conceived. Recently, Mayor Parker has committed to a review of the Philadelphia Land Bank, which will help the city to “better understand the challenges of developing vacant, city–owned properties.” It remains to be seen if this will improve the slow bureaucratic process.
A related issue, known as councilmanic prerogative, is possibly the single most important factor in undergirding the importance of political support. An overwhelming amount of choices of how land is to be used are made by the 10 City Council members, who represent different districts. Council members have control over nearly all real estate decisions in their district that are presented to city council each year, and they have the ability to delay approval of transactions indefinitely through the process.
The phenomenon of councilmanic prerogative elucidates why the Philadelphia Land Bank might be inefficient. Kromer points out that it might seem “unheard of” for a councilman to waive approval of real estate transactions to an independent agency. Kromer explains, “I think their rationale was, we were elected by the people…why would we want to defer to some independent agency with respect to transacting properties in the district that we were elected to serve?” Kromer also made it clear that this was not his personal opinion, but rather what he thinks might have been the stance of the councilpersons.
The result of councilmanic prerogative is that groups applying in good faith for properties through the land bank, even with support from a councilperson, might at a later date be halted for any number of reasons. “If at a later stage, a block leader is unhappy and complains to the council person, or if there's another group that wanted that property, or if there's a developer that claims that he or she filed an application three years ago … the whole process can grind to a halt,” says Kromer.
Due to the sheer size of Philadelphia, the misunderstandings or disagreements can accrue to a staggering level. This is possibly why the transaction for the PCLT has taken so long, besides the other issues mentioned above. In all, the slow moving bureaucratic process and lack of political support for the Philadelphia Land Bank leads one to think the situation might be hopeless or at a standstill. Kromer cautions that this is too hasty a conclusion to make.
Another piece in this puzzle is the Philadelphia Housing Authority (PHA), which is one of the institutions with which the original deal was struck. The PHA is an independent body that does not answer to city officials, but does partner with the city and state. Kromer explains that it is funded by the Department of Housing and Urban Development, a federal agency.
Due to the cut in federal funding, Kromer indicates that the housing authorities have had to “leverage more private sector resources and become less dependent on government funding.” The PHA owns property, some of which lies vacant, and “because they're entrepreneurial, and want to make the best use of their opportunities, I expect they're reluctant to talk with anyone about conveying any of that property … the Housing Authority did not make a practice of entering into agreements like this on an ongoing basis,” Kromer says.
In the context of the deal with the activists, it seems like the PHA was under some pressure to make the deadline. Kromer speculates that the decision was made before a deadline to begin development on the Sharswood area in North Philadelphia. This was an area where Bennetch had set up a smaller encampment in protest. As of February, reporting on the deal explained that the PHA was slowly going to begin to transfer eight properties to the PCLT in the month of March, which is out of 25 total properties. A request for follow up on the agreement with the PHA and the status of these properties was not answered by time of publication.
Kromer makes a case for an alternative way of approaching the housing crisis, and one that is rooted in taking the situation as it is, and working within the constraints of the current political situation. He advocates for people identifying small vacant properties in Philadelphia that are unwanted, because either “the neighborhood real estate market is still too weak to support new construction, or because the land is poorly located.”
After identification, these properties could be submitted to the district councilperson, the idea being that the properties could be developed “based on a commitment to improve them in a manner consistent with city codes.” Kromer indicates that there is a strong rationale behind this, because from the point of view of a councilperson, they have nothing to lose in signing off on development of properties that no one wants. This solution, Kromer notes, was tested during the Nutter administration, but was not pursued due to a change of leadership within the Philadelphia Redevelopment Authority. However, he still believes that it is a promising idea.
Last month, the tiny homes agreement from the protest was canceled, which leaves one wondering about how much was really accomplished in the momentous deal of 2020. The PCLT’s stagnation and the cancellation of the tiny homes villages might be a sign of the impracticality of such projects, or perhaps an outcome of political decisions. However, the courageous endeavor led by the Bennetch and PCLT to find solutions to the city’s housing crisis should not be overlooked. Instead, the barriers and bureaucracy they faced provide valuable lessons in navigating a city where many continue to grapple with housing insecurity.
