The City of Bethlehem hosted an “Opening Doors” meeting Wednesday at Northampton Community College’s Fowler Family Center to discuss housing affordability in Bethlehem.
This meeting was part of a larger series of community outreach events launched in 2022 to encourage dialogue about affordable living. Bethlehem residents and public officials attended to hear from four panelists who described their work in urban planning and charitable assistance.
The presenters included Laura Collins, Bethlehem’s director of community and economic development, Sara Satullo, Bethlehem’s deputy director of community development, Anna Smith, the director of the nonprofit Community Action Development Bethlehem and Marc Rittle, the executive director of the nonprofit New Bethany.
The given presentation reviewed major housing projects and short-term solutions.
Collins said Bethlehem was one of 14 communities to receive a U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development Choice Neighborhoods Planning Grant in 2023. The grant will be used to revitalize the Pembroke Village public housing complex.
The grant funded a two-year planning process calling for the replacement of the current units and increasing the number of units available from 196 to 456, including 80 townhomes, 216 walk-up residences, 104 apartments for people 65 and older and 56 additional apartments.
“Another critical piece of the Choice Neighborhoods program and the directive from (the department) is that this cannot be a top-down planning process,” Collins said. “It has to be a bottom-up, community-driven process. There is a lot of thoughtfulness around listening to people who live in public housing, to learning from, to visioning with and creating strategies alongside (them).”
Collins said Smith and the nonprofit Community Action helped facilitate the connection between Pembroke Village’s residents and the grant’s planning team. Smith said she identified three Pembroke ambassadors who helped to create an inclusive survey of the area.
“Our ambassadors ensured that the survey was asking the right questions, that they were phrased in a way that made sense to residents, that it reflected the reality on the ground of the neighborhoods they were living in,” Smith said.
More than half of Pembroke’s residents completed the survey, providing direct feedback on the community’s challenges. With this information, the ambassadors helped plan events such as a movie festival and a neighborhood-led trash collection to revitalize the area while awaiting implementation of the Choice Neighborhoods grant.
In addition to the grant updates, Rittle spoke about the removal of a homeless encampment located under the Hill-to-Hill Bridge along the Lehigh River.
In a letter to Bethlehem Police Chief Michelle Kott on Aug. 26, the railroad holding company Norfolk Southern requested the encampment be dismantled by Dec. 15, citing health and safety risks near the operating train tracks.
Rittle said his nonprofit is working with other Bethlehem organizations to relocate individuals living in the encampment.
He said Bethlehem Emergency Sheltering and the Conference of Churches are using a street-outreach team, Bethlehem Community Connections, to connect with people on-site. He also said Valley Health Partners, which began as a part of the Lehigh Valley Health Network, is providing medical assistance in addition to social services.
“This is a disaster, and I will be the first to say that this is a disaster,” Rittle said. “This should not be happening. However, if it is going to happen, we couldn’t be better equipped.
Both Rittle and Satullo agreed the key to addressing the relocation is getting to know each affected individual personally.
Satullo said New Bethany maintains case files on everyone in the encampment to determine who will need shelter. She also said Community Action Development Bethlehem helps through their landlord-tenant engagement program.
“We have this opportunity that we will have solutions for each and every person,” Rittle said.
Bethlehem City Councilwoman Hillary Kwiatek, an attendee of the event, said she agrees that addressing homelessness is most effective when advocacy is tailored to individuals.
Kwiatek attended a city council meeting on Sept. 3, where a local college student said she felt discouraged from leaving the encampment after receiving unhelpful, generalized assistance.
“I think that she was frustrated because she doesn’t have mental health or addiction problems, and a lot of the help that comes seems to focus on that,” Kwiatek said. “So I think that was her own personal challenge, finding the right resources for her.”
Satullo said Bethlehem has committed $2 million toward renovating the Bethlehem Emergency Shelter as a long-term investment, but she said they won’t be able to raise the $6 million needed to renovate it to accommodate more people before Dec. 15, meaning they need to find other short-term solutions.
Right now, Satullo said the Bethlehem Emergency Shelter only has one shower for the 70 people that sleep there every night.
Smith said she values the creative collaboration between her and her colleagues in times like these where a community needs to come together to help.
“We don’t see a lot of other communities that are working together as well, and across different areas — like from homelessness to city to community development organizations,” Smith said. “We’re all working together.”
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