Thread by @MoreHamOnt

Vienna’s city (pop-1.89 million) government owns and manages 220,000 housing units, which represent about 25 percent of the city’s housing stock. These city-owned housing units, called social housing, are meant primarily for lower-income residents.

The city also indirectly controls 200,000 units that are built and owned by limited-profit private developers but developed through a city-regulated process.

The city buys land deemed suitable for residential development and retains control over the type and nature of development. The city then solicits proposals from various private developers, which will build and retain ownership of the housing units

A jury evaluates these proposals based on 4 criteria: architectural quality, environmental performance, social sustainability, & economic parameters such as proposed rent levels/costs.After jury selects a developer, the city sells the land to the developer at an affordable price.

In addition, the city gives the developer a loan with favorable terms such as low interest rates and extended repayment periods.

Private developers who collaborate with the city government to build affordable housing must allow the city to rent half of the new apartments to lower-income residents; the developer generally leases the remaining units to moderate-income residents.

Residents are never required to move out, even if household income levels increase in the following years. ..results in substantial number of moderate-income residents living in subsidized 🏠& this mixing together of residents w/different income levels helps w/social integration.

Because the city continues to add new units that are subsidized, about 5,000 annually, and available to lower income residents, housing developments do not devolve into middle-class enclaves nor do they become stigmatized concentrations of poverty.

Vienna: the city that offers the world’s highest quality of life, according to Mercer’s Quality of Living survey for the past four years.

Source: huduser.gov/portal/pdredge…

🚨Since we are in Climate and Housing Emergency, let’s try this #HamOnt 🤷 @CameronKroetsch @NrinderWard3 @ward1wilson @JasonThorne_RPP
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