On Friday, November 17, Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz announced a $250,000 allocation from his Housing Development Fund at the groundbreaking ceremony of a new affordable housing project for seniors in Sunset Park. The allocation was to aid in the construction of Lutheran Health Care’s Sunset Gardens, a unique community for seniors ages 62 and older.

The 80-unit facility will provide seniors with affordable, high quality housing. Borough President Markowitz was joined at the event by Congresswoman Nydia M. Velázquez, Assemblyman Felix Ortiz, Councilwoman Sara M. Gonzalez, Representatives from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development and Community Board 7, and President and CEO of Lutheran HealthCare Wendy Z. Goldstein. Borough President Markowitz’s $250,000 allocation will be used to outfit the facility with amenities such as landscaping, an emergency generator, and electronic entry doors, not covered by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Sunset Gardens is slated to open in November of 2007 and will be an affordable home sweet home for Brooklyn seniors.

The borough president’s 2007 budget includes the $3 million Housing Development Fund, which helps create additional units in affordable projects or adds amenities to affordable projects, such as Sunset Gardens. (A complete list of the funds projects is available from the borough president’s office.)

“We owe it to our seniors to make sure that residents who have worked and spent their lives in this city are able to stay here in their golden years,” said Borough President Markowitz. “Brooklyn is the place to spend the best years of one’s life, with its public transportation, quality restaurants, world-class museums and cultural attractions. As the Brooklyn renaissance continues this allocation goes beyond ‘if we build it they will come’ to ‘if we build it, they will stay.’”