Tracy Dubb Founder of the Youth Council for the Long Island Housing Partnership

By Maureen Traxler

Come September, Tracy Dubb will be a senior at Jericho High School Ü a time when many teens are feeling a little less academic pressure, planning for the Senior Prom, and anticipating the freedom that will come when they go off to college, if that be their choice. Although Tracy is similar in many ways to her peers, she has some ideas that go beyond her years, and she's decided to start her senior year by tackling a cause that has perplexed adults on Long Island for nearly a decade. "I grew up on Long Island, my family lives here, but I didn't have any idea about the affordable housing problem," says Tracy. "If I was clueless, the rest of the people in my age group were probably clueless about the problem that is affecting our generation. I began to fear that I might not be able to return to live here after college."

This 17-year-old's interest in the controversial problem of affordable housing for singles, seniors and members of the Island's workforce is not as strange as it may seem. Tracy is the daughter of Michael Dubb, co-founder of The Beechwood Organization, a developer of over 45 communities and over 4,000 homes throughout New York. Housing piqued her interest.

Dubb and daughter Tracy had several conversations about the workforce housing shortage, and Tracy began to do some informal research of her own. She discovered returning college grads live with their parents, and in apartments in their parents' or family members' homes because they couldn't afford to rent. "Businesses can't keep young employees because they can't afford to live here, so they go to other places where it's more affordable," comments Tracy. "Affordable housing would give more people an opportunity to live on Long Island." A bright and ambitious girl with leadership abilities, Tracy approached the Long Island Housing Partnership (LIHP) this spring with the idea to establish a Youth Council, under the guidi ng eye of the Partnership, which would bring the message about the next generation housing shortage to young people. LIHP CFO Peter Elkowitz favors of the idea, and points out that the 2000 census shows Long Island is losing young people between the ages of 18-34 at a rate five times faster than the national average. Tracy is coordinating the Youth Council start-up, and LIHP will provide the meeting place for a September organizational meeting. LIHP's vice president Diana Weir believes the Youth Council will provide an opportunity for the organization to "mentor future leaders of our communities" and "help educate them about housing issues." The experience will be invaluable for the young people, too, she adds, helping them to learn the ins and outs of speaking before advisory and town boards, getting involved in government, and being part of the solution.Youth Council.

Dubb says that his daughter envisions setting up the Youth Council "to model the structure of a nonprofit organization with a board of directors, president and vice president." Already Tracy is planning to form fundraising, education and action committees. "Young people can help educate Long Islanders to the needs and benefits of affordable housing in their neighborhoods," says Tracy, who's well aware of the "Not In My Backyard" (NIMBYism) that lingers around the Island. Action committee members will participate in lobbying political leaders, attending hearings, talking with town boards, coordinating with people on the LIHP housing wait list, engaging in community service, and manning booths at trade shows. Tracy has already posted a Youth Council website, <a href="http://www.lihpyouthcouncil.com">www.lihpyouthcouncil.com</a>, in order to attract young people to the campaign.

Tracy began her efforts at the end of last school year, contacting school principals and guidance counselors to help spread the word among teenagers. She's reached out to about 10 high schools already and one of her goals is to organize teens in communities where workforce housing is a possibility. Weir believes the young people will be "goodwill ambassadors" for affordable housing and will be "well received" by their communities because they live there. "It's time to put a face on affordable housing," comments Elkowitz, "We need to mobilize the people who need affordable housing." LIHP now has over 17,000 names on its waiting list for affordable housing and to put that in perspective, Elkowitz notes that he received 37 bins of mail containing 5,500 applications for 8 - only eight - homeowner units in a new Bridgehampton development - and that was before their required marketing campaign began! Since the founding of LIHP in 1987, the organization has provided technical assistance and has completed or is in the planning stages of 3,500 units. Currently, 25 projects containing 650 new homes are in the development process.

Affordable housing starts "It takes three to five years for a development to come to fruition," comments Elkowitz - from setting up a plan, forming a development team, requesting subsidies to make the units affordable, to actually building the project. Elkowitz feels the Youth Council can be effective spreading the message about the need for next generation housing among the members' parents. "Kids take home what they learn," he adds. A major difficulty in development is dealing with the many levels of government. Elkowitz says Long Island has 2 counties, 2 cities, 13 towns, 95 villages and 256 hamlets, plus many smaller districts, like water and sewer. Long Island home prices are four times the national average with the average home in Nassau County listing at $421,000 and in Suffolk, $389,000. Only some towns have passed "inclusionary zoning," which requires developers to build a percentage of affordable units within a project. Dubb points out that the recently completed Southwind development in Bay Shore, a LIHP project, took years to get off the ground because of its seven different sources of funding and the incredible amount of paperwork required by the town, state and federal government. "We came in at the last minute as the developer," notes Dubb, after several other developers backed out. The Bay Shore project was the redevelopment of a downtown area and contains 78 units- 26 rentals for seniors and families and 52 home ownership units.

About Tracy

This summer, Tracy has been expanding her horizons. She spent three weeks in July as part of a teen service team with Lifeworks, an organization offering teens a broad range of international youth community service summer programs. She traveled to Tortola in the British Virgin Islands where she helped protect and preserve the natural environment and reclaim beachfront. In addition to travel, Tracy says, "I'll help fix up communities and community centers. I hope to have an impact on society." Back in Jericho High School, Tracy's a good student - scoring a 2260, out of 2400, on the new SATs. She's taken Advanced Placement courses, and she's a member of the Spanish, Latin and National Honor Societies. She's participated in community service, like Habitat for Humanity, and events for cancer research and AIDS awareness. Tracy's an athlete, playing on traveling soccer teams, and her dad says she's been recruited by top colleges. Tracy is aware of the importance of education and exploring subjects in areas that may fit into a future career. She took physics and math because of her interest in architecture, and hopes to take classes this year that will "shape my future and narrow down my interests. I hope to take informative electives, especially business law." After high school, Tracy looks forward to pursuing real estate, development or home building. In July, she told Networking Magazine that she can sees herself "in real estate law, I like the legislation aspect of developing housing projects." "Tracy listens and draws her own conclusions," says Dubb. "The Youth Council experience will serve as an introduction to real estate and an introduction to a crusade to spread the word to young people that there's trouble in Paradise."