About 200 people attended the Oneonta Common Council meeting Tuesday, April 1, that was held at Hartwick College’s Anderson Center auditorium to accommodate the crowd, many of whom attended for one of the first items on the agenda — a presentation by Rehabilitation Support Services Inc.’s proposal to develop a prime downtown property.
A council vote is scheduled for May 6 on whether to sell the city-owned property at 27 Market St. to RSS — which provides community-based mental health and substance abuse services, including housing and employment assistance — to build a $25 million multi-story structure with residential and commercial space, with some housing units dedicated to RSS clients.
RSS has developed other properties throughout the state and has been a presence in Oneonta for decades, offering its programs and running the Oneonta Bagel Co. on Main Street.
The proposal has been a point of local contention for more than a year. Advocates for a plan to build a mixed-use building that includes low-income housing were met with opposition from a group of landlords and business owners who organized a campaign against the plan, wanting to either keep the current use as a parking lot or develop the site into a purely commercial use.
The property, site of the former Oneonta Sales Co. building, had been on the market for several years before the city bought the property in 2020. The building was demolished in September 2023.
At Tuesday’s meeting, RSS director of strategic partnerships Christine Nealon, who has been the spokesperson for RSS throughout the process, reiterated the development proposal of a mixed-use building with 47 apartments for individuals and families earning 30-70% of the area median income, 30 parking spaces including an indoor garage, first-floor commercial space and 24/7 property management and support services.
The proposal aims to boost Oneonta’s revitalization, attracting young professionals and supporting local businesses, she said.
“It’s about building a community, and not so much about just putting people in apartments,” she said. “It will include parking and a commercial space that will attract more business to downtown, not less.”
The project would be funded through the state’s 9% Low Income Housing Tax Credit, which “incentivizes affordable housing by allowing private investment dollars into affordable housing development, which reduces the construction costs to the developer and caps rents at 30% of the household income,” Nealon said.
“Once site control is obtained, then pre-development activities pick up and then we start making more specific plans, more detailed architectural plans,” she said. “We work with engineers, we work with hiring the professional property management firm, all of those things. We hire our attorneys. We get everything in place, and then we make an application to New York State Homes and Community Renewal.”
RSS has been awarded 9% tax credit projects, most recently in Ithaca, on the first try, she said.
“People don’t just get awarded these projects unless you have a demonstrated success rate in developing properties,” she said. “The resulting structure, where RSS retains its control, is a business, not a nonprofit, and it ensures that housing is stable and affordable with rent protections in place for the term of the tax credit contract. Sometimes that has been 30 years, but typically 40 years.”
A payment-in-lieu-of-taxes agreement was proposed to balance financial feasibility and ensure the city received revenue from the property, which would remain tax-exempt.
As part of Nealon’s presentation, several speakers shared their experiences living, working and going to school in Oneonta who said they hoped the project comes to fruition.
Council members raised concerns about parking, site management, waiting lists and vacancies with the Oneonta Housing Authority and the PILOT, as well as Otsego County’s need for affordable housing.
“We’ve had a professional market analysis done,” Nealon said, “and that has given us very clear numbers of the housing stock that is available to workforce. It establishes a pretty drastic need right in the area. Not having those numbers at the tip of my fingers, but we wouldn’t have endeavored further than Week 1 of getting that housing study, if we were not shown that there was need here, beyond what already exists.”
Public comments in support and against
There were mixed comments from attendees during the public comment portion of the meeting, which toward the end got heated enough that Mayor Mark Drnek had to gavel down a couple of speakers.
Marge O’Mara, 4 Ravine Parkway North, said the council should wait until the impacts of the 115-spot parking lot and the new transit hub under construction across the street are known.
Bryan Shaughnessy, who owns downtown properties, also has submitted an offer to purchase the site to keep it as a parking lot.
“I want to remind the council that the city purchased 27 Market St. five years ago with the goal of building a transit hub and renovating the adjacent parking garage,” he said. “However, in 2023 when those plans changed and the parking garage was demolished, 27 Market St. became something else. It became a critical downtown parking lot. It now serves as a partial replacement for the parking garage we lost, and it supports downtown businesses, employees, residents and visitors. The reckless push to sell this lot to RSS undermines the city’s obligation to safeguard essential public assets.”
Others spoke out in support of RSS’s proposal.
Josephine Becker, a Hartwick student from Elmira and a member of Reclaim Oneonta, talked about the impact affordable housing would have on retaining Oneonta’s college students after graduation.
“In some situations, young adults are moving across the country to states where housing is significantly cheaper, continuing the long trend of New York’s population decline. The cost of houses and the cost of renting apartments is simply too high,” she said. “Creating more housing projects such as 27 Market St. is an effective solution that we desperately need. This is also assuming that this will drive down the average cost of rent, because not just the wealthy should be able to live here.”
The council plans to hear alternative proposals for development of 27 Market St. at its next meeting April 15.