Financing New York City public housing development.

Last year, in one landmark transaction, Citi Community Capital ("Citi") helped the New York City Housing Authority ("NYCHA") secure over $900 million in financing to help restore NYCHA's financial health, begin much-needed rehabilitations at 21 public housing developments throughout New York City and create hundreds of construction jobs on shovel-ready projects. The upgrades will include brick work, façade and roof repairs, elevator replacement, entrance renovations and heating upgrades in 20,000 units, improving the quality of the homes of more than 46,000 low-income New Yorkers.

The deal, which NYCHA's chairman described as "a home run" in the New York Times, was struck as a way to fix a longstanding problem stemming from the orphan status of this particular stock of public housing. Unlike New York City's other public housing complexes, this group of 21 developments received no federal financing, which forced NYCHA to divert federal funds from its other buildings to cover operating and capital costs and caused NYCHA to run up deficits of $80 to 90 million annually.

The dealmakers helped NYCHA structure a transaction that tapped a range of public and private sources including federal economic stimulus funds, a tax-credit equity investment from Citi, New York State modernization funds and bond financing -- on an aggressive timeline.

Citi has also been working with NYCHA to develop new affordable housing on its real estate in New York City. Recently, Citi broke ground on Elliott Chelsea, a 22-story, 168-unit building for low- to middle-income residents in one of Manhattan's most desirable neighborhoods (pictured above). The transaction brought in $4 million in revenue to NYCHA and creates terrific housing opportunities for income-limited New Yorkers.

Lack of affordable housing is a huge challenge for our urban centers. Citi is pleased to bring our experience to bear on solutions that preserve and upgrade housing that already exists and that create new development from the ground up. Citi's work with NYCHA is a superb example of what public-private partnerships can accomplish.