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The City Council has unanimously authorized the Land Use Law Center to create the Newburgh Community Land Bank, to be incorporated under the Private Housing Finance Law. As such, it is legally authorized to take title to city-owned parcels for a negotiated price as low as $1.00 and is not required to pay property and sales taxes until the properties are restored and sold to new owners. The Newburgh Community Land Bank is chartered to hold, maintain, rehabilitate, and dispose of these parcels in order to ensure that they revitalize Newburgh's neighborhoods and put the properties back on the City's tax rolls.
The Newburgh Land Bank is concentrating focus on a target area generally bounded to the North by South Street, to the West by Route 9W, to the South by Broadway, and to the East by the Waterfront. The City has committed to concentrate its police and code enforcement efforts in this target area to ensure the success of the Land Bank's operations.
The Newburgh Community Land Bank works closely with the three area anchor institutions – Mount Saint Mary College, St. Luke’s Cornwall Hospital, and SUNY Orange. In addition, the Newburgh Community Land Bank is working with major private sector institutions in property selection, maintenance, repair, and disposition.
The Newburgh Community Land Bank is seeking other funding including state and federal grants and loans, and to otherwise take advantage of private sector and institutional expertise to ensure the success of its efforts to permanently revitalize the target area. This effort holds much promise. The Newburgh Community Land Bank is the first of its kind in the state and is being watched carefully by state agencies as a model for other cities to emulate. The partnership between City Council, the major non-profit educational and medical institutions in the City, and the private sector, reflects a vision of hope and determination to attract significant outside support to restore Newburgh's historic district and to change the community's image.
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