Queen Latifah is giving back to her community in a major way.
The actress went back to her hometown of Newark, New Jersey to break ground for a new affordable housing development called Rise Living.
The plan for this project has been in the works for over a decade and it is slated to have 76 units including 20 three-family townhouses for $1,800 per month rent. It will also have 16 units that will focus solely on income by the Department of Housing and Urban Development for the area.
As reported by NorthJersey.com, “The need for affordable housing in Newark is dire. The Brick City needs an additional 16,000 low-rent units to meet the city’s demand, according to a 2021 study by the Rutgers Center on Law, Inequality, and Metropolitan Equity. Nearly 60% of Newark renters are cost-burdened, meaning they spend more than a third of their incomes on housing.”
The statement went on to say, “According to the study, an affordable rental unit for a Newark household costs $763 a month. That’s $330 less than the city’s median market rent, and $600 less than what the U.S Department of Housing and Urban Development conifers the city fair market rent.”
Lastly, the statement said, “And researchers completed this study before the state’s COVID-spurred ban on evictions ended. Essex County had more than 19,000 pending eviction cases as of the end of March, and a large portion of those are estimated to be in Newark.”
BlueSugar Corp. is the development firm that will be heading the Rise Living project and it is also the firm that Queen Latifah is the co-president.
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