Study Finds ‘Gold Mine’ of City-Owned Land in Newark Could Benefit Public

Matt Kadosh

28 May, 2024

NEWARK — The city owns 27.1 acres of land that it could use to help meet its severe need for affordable housing, another 21.3 acres are available for equitable commercial development, and 17 acres can be put toward green infrastructure, a study from Rutgers Center on Law, Inequality and Metropolitan Equity has found.

CLiME worked with Newark officials to inventory hundreds of vacant city-owned parcels and, in a wide-ranging report, made recommendations on how the city could use the property to further equitable development.

“What we found was a gold mine of opportunity to address critical policymaking needs with the city’s undesignated property,” law professor David Troutt, director of CLiME, said in an interview. “This was property that the city acquired from Newarkers through abandonment and foreclosure. Newark owns much more property per square mile than most cities, so this is an unusual asset that probably results from a lot of tragedy when people lost their homes and businesses.”

Continue reading this press release from the TapintoNewark in its entirety below:
Study Finds ‘Gold Mine’ of City-Owned Land in Newark Could Benefit Public