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Utica Housing Study Results


CNY homepage.com, Lauren Brill  | Original Article

June 17, 2022


UTICA, N.Y. (WUTR/WFXV/WPNY) – Community developer CZB LLC has presented the findings of their housing study for the City of Utica, the results include the population in Utica is growing but the number of households have been decreasing.

“Part of that is because families are getting larger in utica because of a large immigrant population which is a good thing but what that means for the housing market though is you actually have fewer consumers of housing as houses get larger,” said Peter Lombardi, CZB Director of Revitalization Planning.

The study found one issue for the city to address when it comes to housing needs, almost a third of the households in Utica are spending too much on rent, and making a fairly low income. While there are high levels of need, there are low levels of demand to live in Utica.

“You have almost 3,400 fewer households in the city making $50,000 dollars or more than if those households were evenly distributed across Oneida county so those are households that live in this county, and that’s 3400 that could be living in Utica, but are not,” said Lombardi.

This study identified strategic opportunities for the city, one proposal is to redevelop the St. Elizabeth’s Hospital campus on Genesee street into single family housing.

“That site is a strong candidate for a new single family housing subdivision could have up to 40 single family homes that really fit into the fabric of that neighborhood around Roscoe Conklin Park,” said Lombardi.

So what happens next? Community Development Specialist Derek Crossman says the city will use the findings, recommendations and strategies to to guide them going forward.

“As we think about all the different funding sources the city has access to whether we’re going out to bond or we’re using federal funding how do we get a community development block grant and a home program,” said Derek Crossman, Community Development Specialist.

The full PDF draft of the housing study, and a google form for public feedback is available at UticaHousingStudy.org