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Assistance centers like this one established in 9/11 aftermath
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In the days, weeks, and months following the attack on the World Trade Center, Lower Manhattan's residential and business communities faced enormous hurdles as they struggled to recover and rebuild.
Many residents, displaced from their homes for weeks and in some cases months, returned only to discover their apartments damaged or covered in debris. Access to homes, streets, and neighborhood services continued to be drastically limited as the recovery effort got underway, leading some residents to decide to leave downtown for good.
Businesses, many coping with damage to storefronts and loss of inventory, were also crippled by significant revenue losses as stores remained shuttered and phone lines inoperable. And even when daily operations began to return to normal, the foot traffic on which so many downtown businesses depend was all but absent.
To help an injured community heal, the city, state, and federal governments put several assistance and incentive programs quickly into place. Through these programs, millions of dollars in aid has been distributed to individuals, families, and businesses that sorely needed it.
Helping Residents
Occupancy rates in Lower Manhattan plunged to as low as 50 percent in the months following 9/11. In an effort to help residents who lived downtown at the time of the attacks, as well as to encourage new residents to move to the area, the LMDC created the Residential Grant Program (RGP) in June 2002. Providing grant assistance to residents who lived in Lower Manhattan on 9/11, as well as to those who made commitments to remain or move downtown, the RGP received more than 40,000 applications and has distributed more than $281 million in aid to date.
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| Grant program incents couple to move downtown |
Successful in its goal of encouraging existing residents to stay downtown, the program was also remarkably effective in attracting new residents to Lower Manhattan. In the area closest to the World Trade Center site, more than 50 percent of applicants to the program identified themselves as new to the downtown area.
In great part as a result of the RGP program, Lower Manhattan's current occupancy rate stands at over 95 percent. Battery Park City, despite being one of the areas nearest the WTC site and therefore hardest hit, today counts more residents than it did on September 10, 2001, its occupancy rate now at an unprecedented 97 percent.
In a continued effort to strengthen the Lower Manhattan residential community, construction of more than 2,500 new residential units is slated to begin in Battery Park City in 2004. In addition, more than $50 million has been allocated for 300 affordable housing units for low- and middle-income working families downtown.
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| Greenmarket reopens downtown |
As these and other longer-term initiatives get underway, the city and state have also worked hard on smaller projects designed to provide convenience and improve quality of life for downtown residents. Recent achievements in this area include the opening of Millennium High School on Broad Street, the return of the Greenmarket to Liberty Plaza, and the christening of new ballfields in Battery Park City.
Finally, in an ongoing effort to listen and respond to the opinions and concerns of downtown residents, the city and LMDC this summer conducted a series of outreach workshops in each downtown neighborhood. Feedback gathered at these sessions will help inform the development of future plans for Lower Manhattan.
Helping Businesses
Mere days after 9/11, city, state, and federal agencies began the crucial work of helping businesses assess and cover damages and create survival plans for the future. In ensuing weeks and months, programs were developed to provide financial assistance to businesses hard hit by a combination of lost revenues, rebuilding expenses, and severely diminished foot traffic to the downtown area.
Additionally, several downtown assistance centers were created to provide counseling and information about available resources, programs to better enable downtown businesses to adjust to a changed economy were launched, and efforts were made (and continue) to help spur the private-market activity that is essential to rebirth downtown.
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| Grace Bar stays open on Franklin thanks to grant aid |
Several grant programs were developed in the immediate aftermath of the terrorist attacks to help businesses stay afloat. One, the Business Recovery Grant (BRG) program, was designed to provided rapid financial aid to businesses large and small that suffered revenue loss as a result of the terrorist attacks. Downtown businesses like Grace Restaurant and Bar on Franklin Street and Federated Mechanical Corporation on Van Dam Street received thousands of dollars through the program -- money that in some instances meant the difference between surviving and shutting down.
All told, the program, which was administered by the Empire State Development Corporation and the city's Economic Development Corporation, disbursed more than $500 million in aid to an estimated 75 to 80 percent of businesses operating in Lower Manhattan on 9/11.
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| Canal Street acupuncturist receives much-needed loan |
Many businesses also took advantage of low-interest loans extended by the federal Small Business Administration as well as by several "micro-lenders," including Seedco, Renaissance Economic Development Corporation, and the Lower East Side People's Federal Credit Union. These loans proved essential to both large businesses, like Yonehama International, which owned and operated two Japanese noodle shops formerly located in the WTC concourse, and smaller ones, like the Canal Street acupuncturist and herbal medicine shop belonging to Dr. Chi Wai Wong.
Other programs continue even today. The Small Firm Attraction and Retention Grant (SFARG), for example, provides incentives to businesses with fewer than 200 employees that make at least a five-year commitment to remain in or relocate to Lower Manhattan. And beyond straight financial aid, additional continuing programs focus on providing businesses with much-needed consulting services and training. These programs, which include the ESDC-administered Technical Assistance Program and Employee Training Assistance Program, help businesses understand the changed downtown economy and adjust in ways that will allow them to prosper in the future.
Helping Convey Information
In yet another effort to provide assistance to downtown residents and businesses, as well as to the area's many visitors, Mayor Bloomberg and Gov. Pataki last September announced the launch of a public information campaign for Lower Manhattan, to have as its central component this website, www.LowerManhattan.info.
"Our hope," said Mayor Bloomberg on the day of the site's launch, "is that this campaign will meet the information needs of our citizens and visitors to the area through an unprecedented effort involving every level of government plus community organizations and the private sector."
Led by the City of New York in partnership with the Lower Manhattan Development Corporation, New York State, and the federal government, LowerManhattan.info has worked for the past year to provide a reliable, up-to-date news source for the downtown community, an effort that will continue in the year to come.
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