Spring Break
"Live Near Your Work" grants housing subsidies to Hopkins employees
Issue date: 10/9/08
"One of the primary focuses of [the Rouse Company Foundation] is to provide the resources to community development in distressed neighborhoods in Baltimore," Director of Rouse Company Foundation Tony Deering said. He added that the "areas south of the JHU campus and north of the Hospital certainly are [distressed]."
The grants are available to all eligible Hopkins employees, and can be used as part of a down payment or to cover the closing costs on a newly purchased home.
Employees purchasing homes in the Harwood, Barclay, Greenmount West neighborhoods as well as residential units in the East Baltimore Development Inc.'s (EBDI) housing development are eligible for the maximum grant amount of $17,000.
Homes purchased in four other neighborhoods around the Homewood campus are also eligible for grant money under the program.
These communities include Remington, Better Waverly and Abell, where homebuyers will receive grants of $10,000. Buyers in the Baltimore-Linwood neighborhood can receive $6,000. Grants of $2,500 are available for homes purchased outside these targeted neighborhoods but within a designated perimeter around the Homewood campus, the Hospital and the Bayview Medical center in East Baltimore.
This tiered grant system does correlate inversely to recent home prices in these targeted neighborhoods, with the exception of Greenmount West, which includes gentrified areas along Guilford and Calvert streets and some of the residential units nearing completion in the EBDI redevelopment. In this area, "luxury" condos and "upscale" townhouses are priced at up to $200,000.
For some current employees, it appears that $17,000 will not be enough of an incentive to move into Barclay or other areas west off lower Greenmount Avenue, where the most vibrant feature on some blocks of boarded up row houses is the intermittent flashing of the blue lights affixed above police surveillance cameras.
"I don't think I would be as willing to even look at [the Barclay/Greenmount] area, I don't know if it would be worth it not to feel safe," an employee of Hopkins Hospital, who currently rents in a trendy downtown neighborhood, said.
The grants are available to all eligible Hopkins employees, and can be used as part of a down payment or to cover the closing costs on a newly purchased home.
Employees purchasing homes in the Harwood, Barclay, Greenmount West neighborhoods as well as residential units in the East Baltimore Development Inc.'s (EBDI) housing development are eligible for the maximum grant amount of $17,000.
Homes purchased in four other neighborhoods around the Homewood campus are also eligible for grant money under the program.
These communities include Remington, Better Waverly and Abell, where homebuyers will receive grants of $10,000. Buyers in the Baltimore-Linwood neighborhood can receive $6,000. Grants of $2,500 are available for homes purchased outside these targeted neighborhoods but within a designated perimeter around the Homewood campus, the Hospital and the Bayview Medical center in East Baltimore.
This tiered grant system does correlate inversely to recent home prices in these targeted neighborhoods, with the exception of Greenmount West, which includes gentrified areas along Guilford and Calvert streets and some of the residential units nearing completion in the EBDI redevelopment. In this area, "luxury" condos and "upscale" townhouses are priced at up to $200,000.
For some current employees, it appears that $17,000 will not be enough of an incentive to move into Barclay or other areas west off lower Greenmount Avenue, where the most vibrant feature on some blocks of boarded up row houses is the intermittent flashing of the blue lights affixed above police surveillance cameras.
"I don't think I would be as willing to even look at [the Barclay/Greenmount] area, I don't know if it would be worth it not to feel safe," an employee of Hopkins Hospital, who currently rents in a trendy downtown neighborhood, said.
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