City Rejects Sale Of Iconic Bronx Building
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The city’s Department of Housing Preservation and Development yesterday rejected the sale of 1520 Sedgwick Ave., the iconic west Bronx apartment building that has entered into urban lore as one of the possible birthplaces of hip-hop. In a letter sent to a number of the developers, the Department of Housing Preservation and Development said that under the Mitchell-Lama affordable housing program, financing for the building’s estimated $9 million purchase price was not viable. Mitchell-Lama offers owners incentives such as low-rate mortgages and tax breaks in exchange for charging tenants low to moderate rents for certain periods of time. In the early 1970s, DJ Kool Herc began spinning records at parties in the recreation room located at the basement of the building and many believe his sound eventually helped give birth to the hip-hop genre.
