CHAPTER II CO-OP CITY: COOPERATIVE HOUSING IN THE NEW YORK REGION (Affordable, Not-for-Profit and Non-Speculative) COOPERATION Cooperation means concert for the diffusion of wealth. It leaves nobody out who helps to produce it. It touches no man's fortune, it seeks no plunder. It causes no disturbance to society. It contemplates no violence. It subverts no order. It accepts no gift nor asks any favor. It keeps no terms with the idle and it will break no faith with the industrious. It means self-help, self-dependence and such share of the common competence as labor shall earn or thought can win. George Jacob Holyoake London, England - 1883 Source: United Housing Foundation, The Story of the IGWLU Co-Op Houses, NY, NY 1963 p34 Co-Op City was the largest in a succession of affordable, not-for-profit and non-speculative cooperative housing communities established in New York City between 1927 and 1965. This cooperative housing "movement" originally grew out of socialism, as one of the "...conscious crystallizations of socialist theory...". [Catherine Bauer, Modern Housing, Richard C. Wade, Advisory Editor Arno Press, New York: 1974 92] The historical link between cooperative communities and socialist theory dates back to the mid-19th century: "Co-operative housing and the eventual establishment of self-sufficient productive communities was part of the original program of the Rochdale Pioneers in 1844, who were still greatly influenced by Owen and Fourier." [Bauer 93] In that year, in the small community of Rochdale, England, "... a group of 28 poor artisans opened the first consumer's cooperative, a little store on Toad Lane that sold flour, butter, sugar and meal." [United Housing Foundation Advertisement "The Phenomenon of non-profit cooperative housing" The United Housing Foundation 1968 p5] The following principles were established by the Rochdale Co-op Society in England and served as a guide for the cooperative housing movement in the United States which produced Co-Op City: (1) Open ownership - no restrictions as to race, color, or creed. (2) One member-one vote. The housing cooperative is owned by its members, the tenant-owners, who elect the board of directors. (3) Neutral in politics and religion. (4) Return of equity (investment) when member leaves with no profit and no right to sell his share on the open market. (5) Constant education and information. Organization must keep members informed so that they may act intelligently in the affairs of the co-op. Project Crossroads, Oral history: An Overview of Non-speculative cooperative housing in New York City unpublished Preliminary manuscript Susan Perlstein, Director, Brookdale Center on Aging NY NY March 1986, 5. In the United States, the cooperative approach to the marketplace had gained favor in the late 19th century among the farming community. By 1907, approximately 25,000 cooperative units had been built, on a comparatively small scale, by different cooperative societies in the United States. [Bauer 93] Some were "self-help" cooperatives, in which the members performed much of the actual construction labor. One of the most successful of this type was the Penn-Craft cooperative in the Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania area, sponsored by the American Friends Service Committee. Under the guidance of "two skilled workers", 50 miners built six-room homes to replace the one-room shacks they had lived in. The cost (in cash) to each was approximately $2,000. [William H. Chartner Cooperative Housing Editorial Research Reports Vol II 1949 #8 9/2 p 571] In the New York metropolitan area, large-scale affordable housing was built cooperatively as "non-speculative" or "not-for-profit" ventures for the first time during the 1920's. This method was an alternative to "commercial" cooperatives, whereby a property owner sells an apartment building to existing tenants for a profit. "Non-speculative or "not for profit co-op housing means collective ownership with each member having a share in the housing development (rather than owning his apartment), as well as the responsibility for its administration through the election of a board of directors." [Project Crossroads 5] An equity investment is made in proportion to the size of the apartment. Each cooperator is provided with a non-propriety term lease for the designated dwelling unit. Members share operating and maintenance costs equally. Any "profit" is rebated to the cooperators. Previous efforts to meet the need for affordable housing in urban areas had relied on private philanthropy (known in New York, for example, as "6 percent philanthropy"). Individual investors, who would be content to reap a modest profit on their investment in order to contribute to the general welfare, would build housing and collect reduced rents. The economic justification for this approach "...was that excessive profits demanded by owners of rental housing were responsible for the high costs." [Roger Starr Hill and Wang, NY 1977 America's Housing Challenge (What It Is and How to Meet It) p23] The concept was that, by eliminating "excessive profit", dwellings could be built and maintained while allowing for affordable rents. However, the cost of new housing kept rising as a result of progressively more stringent health and safety requirements of new municipal housing codes, which had the impact of discouraging private philanthropists from investing in affordable housing. Another market condition unfavorable to philanthropists was the need to fund contingency costs: the 6% profit margin did not allow a budget for the inevitable "contingencies", which often caused these limited-profit projects to run at no profit (the equivalent of a loss). Rents had to be kept relatively low to fulfill the mission of housing the less well off residents of the city; consequently raising rents to pay for unforeseen expenses was not an option to these landlords. Fluctuating mortgage rates, land and construction costs, and real estate taxes created additional difficulties for private, limited-profit philanthropists. New York City answered the latter problem by applying "tax abatement" which reduced or eliminated real-property taxes for a designated term. The tax abatements granted by the City of New York, in the 1920's, have been criticized as "...a handout to builders to make up their profits while keeping their prices competitive...". [Housing in NYC A Chronology Hall Winlou Elsie Woods p. 257] Six percent philanthropy failed to produce sufficient affordable housing for the less well-off urban dwellers. "The profit of the housing owner was not, it turned out, the crucial factor in housing cost; profit was far less important than the cost of the components of a housing unit that was built and maintained in accordance with the legal standards that had gradually been developed." [Roger Starr 26] It had become "...obvious that no matter what the form of ownership might be, the kind of housing that legislators demanded for the cities would require subsidization to bring it within the economic reach of the ordinary working-class family." [Starr Hill 26] Government subsidies became available, in New York State, under legislation passed in 1926, 1927, and 1928. New York State's Governor, Al Smith, supported these laws, which provided for tax advantages for privately capitalized, limited-dividend companies. One effect of granting these subsidies was that non-speculative, not-for-profit cooperative housing ventures became more competitive. A 1939 amendment to the New York State Constitution, which allowed for "public loans and tax concessions" for both low and middle-income housing projects, further expanded the market supports for cooperative housing. [Jean A. Flexner, Cooperative Housing in the United States, Construction Review, June 1958, page 6, U.S. Department of Labor and U.S. Department of Commerce, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C.] Additional limited-dividend laws, which included supports for affordable, not-for-profit cooperative ventures, were passed in New York State in 1940, 1948 and 1949. Limited-dividend housing companies utilizing both private capital and state and municipal loans were authorized in 1955. New York State support for housing cooperatives continued through the Rockefeller years, directly assisting the construction of Co-Op City in the late 1960's. The leading advocate of affordable, not-for-profit, cooperative housing in the New York area was Abraham E. Kazan (1889-1971), sometimes referred to as the "George Washington" of the cooperative housing movement in the United States. Co-Op City was his last, and largest, project. Kazan was an immigrant who had come to the United States from Russia as a young boy in 1904. He has been described as "...a quiet gentle man, with a sparkle in his eye, who loves classical music and gardening." [Realty 5/4/65 by Irwin Baron "Kazan Has Promoted Construction of 33,000 Middle Income Apartments."] Kazan was an office staff worker for the International Ladies Garment Workers Union from 1910 to 1920. As an anarchist and advocate of cooperativism, Kazan had helped organize consumer cooperatives for sugar and potatoes during the severe shortages throughout World War I. In the early 1920's he went to work for the Amalgamated Clothing Workers Union where he helped organize a credit union (1923). He became interested in the potential of cooperative communities for workers who lived in very poor housing. In the mid-1920's, he and others "persuaded his union to sponsor the construction of housing for working people on an inexpensive cooperative basis". [Interview with Abe Blustein 2/8/84, United Housing Foundation consultant Project Crossroads p8] The trade union leader who Kazan persuaded was Sidney Hillman (1887-1946), the president of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers union (1925). Hillman was amenable to the idea of a cooperative housing community providing affordable housing for workers from diversified occupations. [Interview with Abe Bluestein 2/8/84 p14] Hillman, born in Lithuania, had "joined the underground revolutionary movement in Russia in 1905. He left Russia because of Tsarist oppressions ..." and immigrated to England and then to the United States in 1907. [Saul, Shura The Right to be Different National Jewish Welfare Board USA 1967 p100] Hillman worked in the garment industry and became a union leader after joining the 1910 clothing workers' strike in Chicago. In 1914, he became the union's president, a position he held until his death. "The labor movement in New York City was probably more responsible than any other group for bringing in middle-income co-op housing." [Interview with Al Smoke, United Housing Foundation consultant Project Crossroads 72] In addition to Kazan and Hillman, other labor union leaders actively involved in providing middle-income, not-for-profit cooperative housing included Jacob Potofsky (future president of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers Union and of the United Housing Foundation), Ralph Lippman (executive manager of Cooperative Village), Al Smoke (secretary and treasurer of the Hat, Cap and Millinery Workers International Union), David Dubinsky (president of the International Ladies Garment Workers Union), Alex Rose (President of Hat, Cap and Millinery Workers International Union and future leader of the Liberal Party in New York State) and Michael Shalam (assistant manager of the Amalgamated Houses). The labor unions, the Workman's Circle (A landsmanschafen or fellowship organization, limited to immigrants from a town in the "old country") and the newspaper, "The Jewish Daily Forward", were all supporters of the "progressive movement" to improve the quality of life of workers in the United States. The newspaper was closely aligned with the unions, which, at the time had a large proportion of Jewish members, especially Jewish immigrants. (Another ethnic group with a large union membership were Italian-Americans.) The Daily Forward advanced necessary funds to the cooperative housing efforts and "...helped out with capital funds before they had a mortgage." [Interview with Al Smoke p 72] These groups helped with temporary construction loans and provided down-payment assistance to some individual cooperators. The parent organization of the Amalgamated Clothing Workers Union supported the local, and temporary loans were floated by "...the Amalgamated Clothing Worker's Credit Union, the Amalgamated banks of New York and Chicago, and the Amalgamated Center." [Chartner 571] The first large (319 apartments, 1,256 rooms), union-sponsored, housing cooperative was built in the upper west Bronx in 1927. In 1990, it remained as the oldest surviving cooperative in the country. Amalgamated rents were $11 per room and residents earned rebates from participation in cooperative purchases (e.g., for milk delivery, gas and electricity, etc.). [Chartner 571] This low-income cooperative was built with economic assistance provided by the State of New York Limited Dividend Housing Law (1926). (This legislation had become law due to the support of New York's governor, Al Smith.) The Amalgamated was the first housing development to be built under this legislation, which provided partial tax abatements to housing projects that limited profits to 6% of the capital investment. Through 1948, there were 5,822 apartments in 11 projects constructed under this program. The majority of the economic savings would result from the full abatement of taxes on new structures and improvements (for up to 50 years, but usually based on the length of time necessary to amortize the original investment). Taxes were paid on the assessed value of the land prior to development, assuring that the community would not lose any pre-existing source of revenue. Largely due to the efforts of the national office of the Amalgamated, a two-thirds mortgage was purchased by a private insurance company, Metropolitan Life, which did not build cooperative housing. Metropolitan Life would go on to build other affordable rental housing in Manhattan (Stuyvesant Town, the first Redevelopment Company under the 1942 New York State Legislation) and in the west Bronx (Parkchester, developed in the 1940's). Known as the "Amalgamated Houses", this was the pioneering effort in building communities through cooperative housing. The "remote" location was not considered problematic, as Kazan postulated that people seeking fresh air and open space would travel to work to live in decent housing they could afford. "The place was pretty much of an isolated community. There wasn't much around it except Van Courtlandt Park, which encroached right up to it." [Interview with Harold Ostroff Project Crossroads 21] The Amalgamated Houses were located at the penultimate stop of the Jerome Avenue subway. The housing development was designed by architect George Springsteen. One of the young architects on his staff was Herman Jessor (who became the architect of Co-Op City some forty years later). The buildings were four story walk ups, encircling a common courtyard with gardens and fountains. According to Harold Ostroff, the reason there were not any elevators was that these would have caused electrical interference for a nearby RCA factory. The buildings would have been six stories high had elevators been practical. [Interview with Harold Ostroff, Project Crossroads 20] All the apartments were along the outside, with views to the street and to the courtyard, each with cross ventilation. The apartment layout were important to the Amalgamated’s organizers: they did not want "railroad flat" style apartments and they wanted eat-in kitchens. The community was conceived as a "workers paradise" where "more than 50% of the land shall be open and free ...". [Interview with Abe Bluestein 2/8/84, United Housing Foundation consultant Project Crossroads. 17] A haven for human values was sought in cooperation: people would live together in an environment conducive to family and community living, pooling resources and efforts, unencumbered by the hectic pace and the dehumanizing orientation of industrial society. Many "cooperators" were immigrants who were "repelled by industrial capitalism with its slums and sweatshops and degradation of the human spirit". [Averich, 115] They desired decent housing at a reasonable price in a community of neighbors. In addition to affordability, those who joined the Amalgamated hoped that living in such a cooperative community would provide a healthy physical and intellectual environment for themselves and their families, safe from the turmoil and filth of the city. "The Amalgamated was the extension of a dream": [Kaminsky, Mildred, Project Crossroads interview with Abe Bluestein February 8, 1984, p.9] "Basically they had nothing except a dream and a commitment to financial responsibility, a desire to improve their life, to improve their living standards, and an understanding that by acting together they could get what they wanted individually but otherwise might not be able to afford." [Interview with Harold Ostroff Project Crossroads 25] As soon as the buildings were occupied, social and cultural activities began to develop: self-management, service and educational committees were formed. Some of the early disputes among members related to the desire of religious Jews to have space for their services. An eyewitness reports, "Now, the majority of people who were here were anti-religious and denied them the right to have space in the cooperative." [Interview with Bluestein Project Crossroads 18] Both Kazan and the "education director" for the cooperative (Herman Liebman) took the position that everyone in the community had equal rights: if community members who were anarchists or socialists could have space, so would community members who were religious Jews. Kazan's "preferred solution" did not prevail, and hence these cooperative ventures accorded equal rights and privileges to all members and groups of members. Kazan's "preferred solution", however, was to " ... end to all partisan and sectarian activities in the cooperative ... " to maintain the cohesiveness of the cooperative. [Interview with Abe Blustein 18] The cooperative dimensions of the community extended to consumer cooperatives, eventually to include a drug store, a supermarket, a nursery and an optical service. Among the residents were labor union leaders, novelists, journalists, editors and Yiddish poets. There were cultural and educational activities, provided through the active Jewish community center and the Workmen's Circle Community house. During 1930-31, the second project sponsored by the Amalgamated Clothing Workers Union was completed on Grand Street (on the Lower East Side of Manhattan, one of the oldest sections in the city). Grand Street "was at one time the Mecca of the department stores and other commercial enterprises." [United Housing Foundation, The Seward Park Story, the United Housing Foundation New York 1958 p2] The slum housing in that area of New York City was described by Kazan "... as a breeding ground of disease and other social problems .... for generations the words 'Lower East Side' have been synonymous with 'miserable slum'." [A. Kazan ILGWU Cooperative Village A Dream Come True, United Housing Foundation NYC 1959 p1] The new cooperative was named the Amalgamated Dwellings, Inc., and included 236 units with 930 rooms. There followed "a succession of cooperative ventures sponsored by labor unions, neighborhood organizations, fraternal societies and other such groups." ["You've Come a Long Way Baby From England to Baychester", City News 1/2/69 page 3] Not-for-Profit Cooperative Housing Projects sponsored by the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America Name: Location: Yea(s) # of Acres # of Apartments Type Amalgamated Housing Corporation 98 Van Courtlandt Park South, Bronx 1927 1936 1952 10.8 1,380 Limited Dividend Amalgamated Dwellings, Inc. 504 Grand Street, Manhattan 1930 1.5 236 Limited Dividend Hillman Housing Corporation 500-530-550 Grand Street 1949-1951 5.7 807 Redevelopment Company This desire to create a "workers paradise" manifested throughout the region, even in rural areas that today comprise suburbia. For example, both summer and winter communities sprang up in the counties outlying New York City during the 1920's and 1930's. Many of these were populated by immigrants seeking "community", often wintering in the "coops" and summering in a "bungalow colony" or "workers cooperative". In Westchester County, New York, such communities include the Mohegan Colony (founded in 1922) the Goldens Bridge Colony (founded in 1927) and the Followers of the Trail, a "summer camp" of Jewish working class radicals located in Peekskill, New York (founded in the early 1920’s). (See Jews in Westchester 1994) As union sponsored projects, these cooperative housing developments attracted people who "envisioned a community where they would be close to people that had similar ideas, a similar cultural background and similar desires and aspirations for their children...An overwhelming majority of the people came from what you call the left of center politically, socialists, anarchists, communists -- the whole "isms" of the Left -- who came with an ideology politically. There were very strong union concerns. They were immigrants, most of whom came from what we call Eastern Europe -- Poland, Russia, that area -- where they had lived together. There, imposed in ghettos of one kind or another, they could built [sic] an environment -- a community or society within that ghetto. Here they most certainly had it in certain section of the City [such as] the Lower East Side. Then they moved up to Harlem and then to Brooklyn. But they moved as a group." [Interview with Harold Ostroff 27] The impetus for people to join together in cooperative housing was both ideological and practical. It "came out of a theoretical acceptance of this kind of life. One must remember that not everyone wanted to, even if they had the means, invest $1500 or $2000 in an apartment. I don't think it's wrong to say that most people, when they began to think of their own housing, had what became known as the American Dream -- a little house of their own. At that particular time in history they seemed to gravitate here, first maybe because it was more affordable, second, because I don't think they wanted to be separated. They wanted to be together, to form a community, to be able to extend their cultural life in a community where there would be people who would be amenable to them." [Interview with Harold Ostroff 27] Among those who settled in the cooperative houses built by the Amalgamated is a group that can be identified with that segment of the Jewish population in New York City whose orientation was secular, Yiddish speaking and left-wing. "I would say a good portion of them were what you'd call secular Jews." [Interview with Harold Ostroff 27] In the "old country", the contemporaries of these cooperators, literally their playmates and classmates, were the leaders of and participants in a revolution that "shook the world". In America a decade later, these immigrants were part of a mass "movement" of progressive Americans, extending even beyond the labor "movement" which was sweeping the country in the 1920's and 1930's. As such, they were an integral part of what is now known as "the Old Left", following the dream of transcendent freedom through participation in the greater whole. In their youth they had learned about the Democratic Socialists (ala Eduard Bernstein) and the Webbs. They grew up believing in the Marxist class struggle and in the equality of men and women. They attended left-wing study groups, such as the Rand School and the Workers School. They struggled, on a very personal level, with the great question of the day which faced every Jewish immigrant to America: whether becoming an American meant to "integrate," "assimilate," "acculturate," or whether it was possible to "Americanize" and yet maintain their identity as Jewish members of American society. For many Jewish immigrants, adjustment to industrializing, urban America had presented a complicated challenge. During the first third of the century, for example, two polar tendencies were observed "...uneasily within the Jewish labor community". On the one hand, there were those who desired complete assimilation with people of all nations through a "brotherhood of workers" and opposed the "chauvinism of nationality". On the other were those who "seasoned" their socialism with a tinge of ethnic community identity. [Arthur Goren New York Jews and the Quest for Community, The Kehillah Experiment, 1908-1922, 192] When, in the 1920's, leaders of the greater Jewish community in New York City sought unification of the entire Jewish population of the city through the creation of a broad-based Jewish community, known as "the kehillah"", this ethnocentric goal proved to be at cross purposes with "...those intellectuals who were imbued with socialist cosmopolitanism, [who] had advanced an alternative to ethnic community. Working-class solidarity and the visions of a new society, socialist and nonethnic, preempted the place of the kehillah ." [Arthur Goren 187] The central feature of labor sponsored cooperative housing was a sense of community without demanding ethnic exclusivity. They were "...organizations or just interested persons who join in a common effort to meet common needs." [10/2/69, Co-Op City Times, p2 "Community Life Grows"] While the majority of the "cooperators" who joined Amalgamated-sponsored cooperative housing communities were of Jewish descent (which gave these cooperatives a strong ethnic character), their desire for community stemmed as well from their common experience as immigrants to an industrializing, urban society. In some cooperative communities established by immigrant Jews, business continued to be conducted in Yiddish for many years. (e.g., Goldens Bridge Colony) Cooperative communities required "...good management, dedicated board members, a volunteer spirit..." and active participation. ["Co-op City Very Important Among Other Cooperatives" City News 2/6/69] Individual members were expected to be involved, volunteer time, and work to make the community a satisfying and healthy environment. A complete investment was required on the part of each of the members of the community; each family had "...a share in their community, and a voice in it." ["Co-op City Very Important Among Other Cooperatives"] In theory, cooperative activities were "... developed and directed solely by cooperators ..." in accordance with "... the cooperative principles of democracy - dignity - equality - growth." [10/2/69, Co-Op City Times "Community Life Grows" 2] "Cooperators" engaged in direct democracy, as volunteers on and elected representatives to the advisory committees, executive boards, and community councils which governed life in the cooperative. For immigrants (and members of immigrant families), joining and participating in a cooperative housing community was an experience of self-empowerment: an attempt to alter the pattern of their experiences in the new world. Through community participation, residents attempted to take charge of their lives by controlling change. Collectively, they were responsible for both planning and problem solving. Planning for the future, especially for the children who would be the next generation of residents, was among their responsibilities. These tasks required constant discussion and decision-making regarding organizational issues, financing, and conflicting points of view. Community literacy was a responsibility of each resident. The settlement of disagreements among members of the community required acknowledgment that, although the whole (community) was "greater than the sum of its parts", the individuals who comprised the community were important in their own right. Additional cooperative housing ventures were not undertaken until the post-World War II the housing shortage, when the economic benefits of cooperative housing attracted public attention. The potential for cost savings through cooperative housing for veterans and their families (who were among the neediest) attracted the interest of officials of the federal government and many individual states. "The great nation-wide wave of interest in co-operative community development, initially sparked by the CIO (Congress of Industrial Organizations) and swelled by unified veteran and labor support, provided spontaneous popular evidence of the needs and possibilities of the times...". [The Future of our Cities and Urban Redevelopment Coleman Woodbury (Ed) 1953 (reprint 1966) University of Chicago Press, Chicago 16] In 1947, New York's Governor Thomas E, Dewey called attention to the potential for reducing housing construction costs through "mutual" housing projects for veterans in his annual address to the legislature. In most mutual housing arrangements, as distinguished from cooperative housing communities, occupants did not own their dwellings. Rather, they were entitled to permanent tenancy (as long as the rent was paid), to participate in a democratic fashion in the control of community property and to relocate to vacant apartments (in the same complex) when family needs changed. The combination of cost savings, community control, and a desirable quality of life made such housing communities attractive. Dewey identified such projects as a cure for the "sick" housing industry: "It is hoped that, in the building of homes owned by veterans, labor will function at greater effectiveness, our municipalities will take steps to remove unnecessary and costly building restrictions, and producers of building materials, supplies and equipment will eliminate unnecessary cost increases. As a result, our veterans' mutual projects can be true homebuilding laboratories that will lesson costs." [Dewey 1/7/48 as quoted in William H. Chartner Cooperative Housing Editorial Research Reports Vol II 1949 #8 9/2 572] Also in 1947, Abraham Kazan was joined by Harold Ostroff (a future president of the United Housing Foundation), whose first responsibilities were those of an office clerk. Ostroff had grown up in the Amalgamated houses (from age 6) and was a past president of Workman's Circle. During World War II, he served as an airplane mechanic. After the war he studied drafting and construction. Under Kazan’s guidance, he was soon supervising the opening of new cooperatives and "the construction and management of new buildings." [Interview with Harold Ostroff 20] Ostroff rose to the office of vice-president of the United Housing Foundation and was the chief spokesman and advocate for Co-Op City throughout the planning and construction phases. (Ostroff left the United Housing Foundation in 1976 to become the manager of the Jewish Daily Forward and joined the board of directors of the Yiddish International Veterans Organization in 1984). The combination of a supportive political environment and market opportunities favorable to cooperative investment enabled the Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America to break ground in 1947 for the Hillman Houses, located on the east side of Manhattan in the immediate vicinity of the Amalgamated Dwellings, Inc. This 800- apartment, monthly $15 per room cooperative was named after the organization's late president, Sidney Hillman. A "workers' paradise", the Hillman Houses were designed around quality-of-life amenities, including courts, gardens and walkways, which occupied 75% of the 5.7 acres. Milk deliveries, gas and electricity were contracted for on a cooperative basis. Tenants qualified for rebates on purchases of these and other service. When profits were earned, tenants became eligible for rebates on rent paid (sometimes rebates equaled the rent for one apartment for one month). The close proximity of the two cooperative housing communities enhanced the quality of life of the entire neighborhood. The Hillman Houses were completed in 1951. That same year, "under the direction of Abraham E. Kazan, popular interest in cooperative apartment living began to broaden ... the movement had gained such momentum that the several groups involved decided to establish a permanent organization to sponsor cooperative development." ["You've Come a Long Way Baby From England to Baychester" City News 1/2/69 3] The Amalgamated Clothing Workers Union and the International Ladies Garment Workers Union, and the Amalgamated housing cooperatives joined with civic associations and other non-profit organizations to form a non-profit federation called The United Housing Foundation. Kazan was instrumental in establishing the United Housing Foundation as a central agency for developing cooperative housing. The coalition was to "become a leader in developing moderately priced cooperative housing". [The New York Times, Monday, November 25, 1968 William E. Farrell "Vast Co-op City Is Dedicated in Bronx" 43] The United Housing Foundation's "primary motivation was limited equity cooperative ownership for moderate income workers...". ["Non-Profit Housing Comes of Age" Remarks of Clara Fox at Institute of Professional and Executive Development at Washington Hilton Hotel Wash, DC October 25-26, 1990.] Throughout the 1950's, the organization was "spearheaded by Amalgamated Clothing Workers Union and International Ladies Garment Worker's Union". ["Non-Profit Housing Comes of Age" Remarks of Clara Fox.] The composition of the Board of Directors in 1960 illustrates the broad-based union and organizational support of the United Housing Foundation. Along with national organizations, such as the League for Co-operatives, the United Housing Foundation viewed cooperatives as a democratizing tool, a means by which the collectivist values of the cooperative movement could be spread to the general population: "the United Housing Foundation foresees development of cooperative programs in cities other than New York and Chicago." ["Co-op City Very Important Among Other Cooperatives" City News 2/6/69] United Housing Foundation BOARD OF DIRECTORS 1960 Amalgamated Clothing Workers of America Jacob Sheinkman, Counsel Amalgamated Housing Corporation A.E.Kazan, President Building Service Employees International Union David Sullivan, President Local 32B Citizens Housing and Planning Council Louis Lasker, Board of Directors Cooperative League Accounting Bureau Werner E. Regli, former Director Edward A. Filene Good Will Fund Inc. Percy S. Brown, President Electchester Harry Van Ardsdale Jr., Treasurer Hillman Housing Corp. Robert Szold, President ILGWU Charles Zimmerman, Vice President James Felt & Company Irwin Baron, President N.Y.C. Central Labor Council AFL-CIO Morris Iushewitz, Secretary NAACP Henrey Lee Moon, Dir. of Public Relations NYC Housing Authority Maxwell H. Tretter, former Executive Dir. Workmen's Circle William Stern, Youth Director The first large-scale development built by the United Housing Foundation was the East River Housing on Grand Street "... in an area which was then a horrible slum." [A. Kazan ILGWU Cooperative Village A Dream Come True, United Housing Foundation NYC 1959 p1] This was the same neighborhood that contained the Amalgamated Dwellings and the Hillman Houses. The land was acquired from New York City under the Title I provisions of the Housing Act of 1949, which allowed the federal and municipal governments to share the costs of community redevelopment: the city paid $1,827,765; the federal government, $3,655,765; and the United Housing Foundation, $1,049,240. In addition, the city awarded tax exempt status for all of the improvements on the land for 25 years. The cost of the development was almost $20 million: one-fourth was borne by members' equity ($625 per room), with the balance provided by a 20-year (6.5%) mortgage insured by the Federal Housing Administration. The design of the East River Houses (also known as the "ILGWU Cooperative Village") continued to expand the United Housing Foundation’s original "Workers' Paradise" approach. Approximately 75% of the 12.9 acre site contained parking facilities, gardens, and playgrounds. The remainder housed the physical plant of the community: a shopping center, a heating plant and four apartment buildings. The United Housing Foundation continued to "pioneer" in the design of affordable housing: the 20- and 21-story towers were, at the time, "the tallest reinforced concrete apartment structures in the United States", containing 1,672 apartments (7,307 rooms). [A. Kazan ILGWU Cooperative Village A Dream Come True 3] The apartments ranged in size from 21/2 to 51/2 rooms; many had balconies or terraces, some had two bathrooms. The community was completed in 1956. Seward Park, also a Title I project, followed immediately in 1957. This was the fourth cooperative community built in "... the southeast section of lower Manhattan." [United Housing Foundation, The Seward Park Story New York 1958 p1] The area comprised about 32 acres, stretching "from the East River bend known as Corlears Hook to Essex Street on the west, Delancy Street on the north and East Broadway and Cherry Street in the south." [The Seward Park Story p1] This large scale development encountered substantial local community resistance. When the site was acquired, there were 1,471 families (4,304 people) living in 138 slum dwellings. These residents would be forced to relocate. Under federal law, the United Housing Foundation was required to develop "relocation programs" to find suitable dwellings for these families. During the three years between the announcement of the project and the title transfer to the United Housing Foundation, "... sentiment against the project developed among families living on the site." [The Seward Park Story 5] The United Housing Foundation argued that replacing slums was beneficial for the public good. From the perspective of the United Housing Foundation, "little if any support was extended to the cooperative in its efforts to improve living conditions in this slum section by political groups, social agencies or religious institutions." [The Seward Park Story 5] Although the neighborhood qualified for Federal funding as a slum, community residents resisted the change. The United Housing Foundation followed a fairly consistent approach to public relations: they denied any wrongdoing. This stance did not endear them to local community advocates the United Housing Foundation’s poor relationships with neighborhood groups supplanted by their projects became an Achilles heel in the process. The United Housing Foundation justified its actions in the Seward Park community by publicly stating that "at no time did any of these groups take the definite position that the neighborhood had to be rebuilt."  [The Seward Park Story 5] Local business owners also resisted change, and "would have preferred the neighborhood to remain as it was as long as the business activities they conducted remained undisturbed. They too added their sentiments in opposing the construction of the cooperative." [The Seward Park Story 5] Despite local opposition, the federal "Housing and Home Finance Agency and the City of New York Slum Clearance Committee, the two public agencies involved in the promotion of the project, prescribed definite plans to be followed in relocating site tenants."  [The Seward Park Story 5] The United Housing Foundation described the relocation efforts as follows: "From the very beginning the sponsor recognized that the relocation program required physical and emotional adjustments and that each family’s problems must be handled individually with sympathetic and courteous understanding." [The Seward Park Story 3] A survey of the existing area residents, conducted by the United Housing Foundation, concluded that "the neighborhood was comprised largely of a mixture of racial minority groups." [The Seward Park Story 3] As interpreted by the United Housing Foundation, the survey offered a picture of what was termed a "transitory neighborhood": "18.6 per cent of the families lived on the site for one year or less ... 53.6 per cent were residents for less than five years." [The Seward Park Story 3] Elderly residents were prominent among this latter group and "a good many were maintained by the Welfare Department of the City of New York." [The Seward Park Story 4] Although there was a "preference given to site tenants in the proposed new development ... the largest number of families did not take advantage of the opportunity" and were relocated elsewhere. Forty-six families, for example, were flown back to Puerto Rico, according to the United Housing Foundation, "They were a happy group when they left the airport." [The Seward Park Story 3] Public criticism of the Seward Park cooperative centered on two issues: "That the tenants occupying the building are well to do and should not be given assistance through the Housing Home and Finance Agency of the federal government or by the city government." "That when an organization like a labor union helps promote such housing it does so for its own members, and therefore assistance given by public agencies is not warranted." [The Seward Park Story 3] The latter criticism was not borne out by the facts. The United Housing Foundation received financial and other assistance from several unions and at least one landmanschafen in the development of the Seward Park cooperative: the United Hatters, Cap & Millinery Workers International Union, Local #3, International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers, District Council No. 9, Brotherhood of Painters, Decorators & Paperhangers of America and the Workman’s Circle. The United Housing Foundation reported that, "of the 1,728 families in the cooperative only 174 are members of these organizations." [The Seward Park Story 3] Nevertheless, the use of public subsidies to support United Housing Foundation communities during the 1950's and 1960's required repeated public justification. (For example, despite the fact that the United Housing Foundation had built many subsidized cooperatives, the issue of government support was raised during the public review of Co-Op City to justify greater public participation in the design of the community.) The former criticism, that slum dwellings were replaced with middle-income cooperatives which current residents not afford, was a repeated criticism of United Housing Foundation cooperatives. This was the case despite the fact that those who moved to Seward Park were middle-income, but not "well off". Of the 2,216 wage earners (almost one third of the 1,728 families had more than one wage earner) 2,110 (or 95%) earned $7,500 or less. [Source: extrapolated from chart of Family Income, United Housing Foundation, The Seward Park Story New York 1958 p7] White collar workers, professionals and salesmen composed 39% of the wage earners, while 48% were small business owners and skilled or semi-skilled workers. The vast majority (75%) of the families had relocated from other areas on the Lower East Side of Manhattan. Although there was no record of the racial or ethnic origin of the approximately 6,700 people who moved to Seward Park, the United Housing Foundation reported that, "collectively, they represent every race, color and creed." [The Seward Park Story 3] The next large cooperative housing completed by the United Housing Foundation, Penn Station South, required the relocation of the "2,646 families and over 900 single transients living in rooming houses on the site". [Source: United Housing Foundation, The Story of the IGWLU Co-Op Houses, NY, NY 1963 p6] Designed by Herman Jessor, this community (also known as the Mutual Redevelopment Houses or as the ILGWU Cooperative Houses) was a Title I project located along Eighth Avenue in Manhattan. The 361 buildings on the site (including 183 residences, 132 furnished and unfurnished rooming houses and 46 commercial buildings) were replaced with 2,820 middle-income cooperative apartments for 6,000 residents. When the cooperative opened, average carrying charges were $24 per room, which was "made possible by the partial tax abatement granted by the City of New York". [The Story of the IGWLU Co-Op Houses 6] Union and non-union families joined the Penn South community: "besides the 714 members of the ILGWU [were] plumbers, taxi drivers, city employees, federal civil service workers, painters, printers, salesmen, furriers, accountants, dentists and people with many other occupations." [The Story of the IGWLU Co-Op Houses 32] Collectively, their investment in the community amounted to $7.3 million. Occupancy began on May 14, 1962. Dedication ceremonies, held five days later, were attended by Mayor Wagner, Governor Rockefeller and President John F. Kennedy. "This marked the first time that a President of the United States participated in ceremonies dedicating a private housing development. [The Story of the IGWLU Co-Op Houses 33] Riding the crest of success, the United Housing Foundation and the unions advocated a program of cooperative housing communities to rid the city of its "hundreds of acres of slums": "With the continued assistance of the City and Federal governments, consumer sponsored-labor supported cooperatives are anxious to replace these slums with decent housing developments for moderate income families." [A. Kazan ILGWU Cooperative Village A Dream Come True, United Housing Foundation NYC 1959 p1] The approach to development followed by the United Housing Foundation was "to buy relatively inexpensive land and put up uniform, large buildings at high density in a standard cookie-cutter pattern for maximum costs benefits. Beyond the provision of some basic shopping facilities and the space allotted for necessary public services that the city must follow along and provide, everything else [was] expected to fall into place." [Ada Louise Huxtable "A Singularly New York Product" The New York Times Monday, November 25, 1968 43] This strategy helped to keep costs low and was repeated in each of the United Housing Foundation projects, including Co-Op City. However, a weakness in this approach became increasingly evident as ever larger cooperative housing communities were envisioned: the assumption that the city would "follow along" with services and "amenities" proved to be false. For example, the lagging provision of city services had a dampening affect on the quality of life of the cooperators of Co-Op City throughout the 1970’s. Furthermore, the United Housing Foundation had to assume construction responsibility for schools to avoid an intolerable delay and the subway line extension proposed to serve the community was never built. The United Housing Foundation built several successful middle-income cooperative housing projects between 1952 and 1969 "...to promote and establish better housing through the cooperative efforts of its members". ["Freedomland's loss Co-op City's Gain" City News 1/2/69 p31] By 1968, these United Housing Foundation cooperatives (representing a total outlay of about a half billion dollars) accounted for about "...half of the New York State's investment in low-interest mortgage financing for housing low- and middle-income families." [Ada Louise Huxtable "A Singularly New York Product" The New York Times Monday, November 25, 1968 43] United Housing Foundation Sponsored Cooperative Housing Projects 1951 - 1965 Name: Location: Year(s) of completion Acres Aptm'ts Type Mutual Housing Association, Inc. 3850 Sedgwick Ave, Bronx 1955 0.77 123 Conventional Financing East River Housing Corporation /"ILGWU Cooperative Village" 570 Grand Street, Manhattan 1955-56 13