It’s helping the environment and keeping hard-earned dollars in people’s pockets, a place you want to live, work, and raise your family and it doesn’t get much better. It is the most critical need in our city and Tasker Village is the perfect example. “We need development at all levels and all scales, but the critical one is affordable housing. “Developing and maintaining neighborhoods is critically important to the growth of Philadelphia,” Nutter said at last week’s event. “I really don’t think there’s anything better than that.” His former mission isn’t far off from what Diversified Communities is trying to do.ĭiversified “aligns perfectly with my life’s mission as a kid who grew up in poverty, got out, and now has the opportunity to affect policies and programs to help others do the same,” he said. Their foci were shared prosperity, focusing on early childhood education, workforce development, housing stability and “making sure that people in poverty are taking advantage of the help that is available to them,” Bullock added. “We kind of got back to the roots of being a poverty-fighting agency.” If you’re going to be in it for the long haul you have to do it correctly,” Bullock, whose recent boss was Nutter in the Office of Community Services, which became the Office of Community Empowerment and Opportunities, said. “You’re not going to close that gap overnight. Philly, on the other hand, has a nearly 28-percent poverty rate, and it’s worse in some neighborhoods. Census report listed 16 percent of Americans as living in poverty. Philadelphia may be experiencing some smart development, but it’s also a deeply poor city. My job is to make sure that the Point Breeze community moves forward – let’s keep up the good work.” “This is a new level of affordable housing here in the Point Breeze community, it’s to grow up and live in the neighborhood regardless of your pocketbook or checkbook. Childs School, 1599 Wharton St., a few blocks away, said. “I’m a strong advocate for smart development,” the graduate of George W. In Johnson’s remarks, he commended Diversified as well as the other elected officials on hand for leading the charge on behalf of Point Breeze residents to have more choices surrounding where they call home. “To build something that the residents want, that was very important to us.” “When we were doing the Tasker Village project, we had a number of things that we had to sacrifice because of budget, but the one thing that we refused to sacrifice was the dignity of residents,” he said. It’s a very dignified way for low-income residents to live, work and raise a family, something Bullock says was essential to the process. The units are beautiful and last week’s attendees were encouraged to inspect a couple model units. “You can’t ride down the street without some new building going up, and people are worried they’ll be priced out and a nice complex like Tasker Village may have become high-end condos,” the Strawberry Mansion resident told the crowd on the sunny Thursday morning. Bullock Jr.’s opening remarks, he pointed out that Point Breeze is a rapidly gentrifying neighborhood, which makes affordable housing a priority for the non-profit. In Diversified Community Services executive director Otis L. According to Diversified’s website, “the preservation project includes six 1BR apartments from 584-772 square feet, eight 2BR apartments ranging from 772-837 square feet, and 14 3BR apartments ranging from 970-1,025 square feet.” Tasker Village is 27,243 square feet and has 28 units in five buildings with an open-air garden and parking spaces.

Tasker village apartments