Letter to the Editor – Mixed Housing right solution

The Telegraph Journal published this letter to the editor today:

Mixed housing is best solution

Congratulations to the Telegraph-Journal on its editorial (Oct. 17) endorsing "building affordable housing on a mixed-income, mixed neighbourhood basis."

South End Sustainable Communities (SESC) has been a vocal advocate of mixed housing developments. The 2008 Tannery Court proposal for a 50-unit, mono-culture project at 185 Carmarthen Street was the catalyst for the SESC position.

Tannery's housing for non-elderly, low-income singles is to be located in a community already struggling with the effects of the highest poverty rate in Saint John - 47 per cent poverty in the uptown peninsula and 56 per cent poverty in the immediate six-block neighbourhood of Tannery Court.

Ostensibly a not-for-profit project of Co-Op Atlantic, the Tannery Court developments are designed, constructed and managed by Avide Development Inc.

South End Sustainable Communities believes such projects contribute to the root causes of poverty rather than addressing them adequately.

GREG COOK

The editorial mentioned in the letter is published here: Get strategic about poverty.