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Former NYC Juvenile Jail to Become Housing Complex

One of New York City’s most notorious juvenile detention centers is getting a new lease on life as a 700-unit affordable housing complex.
According to a New York Daily News report, the City Council Thursday unanimously approved plans to turn the former Spofford Juvenile Detention Center in the Bronx into a $300 million, five-acre campus called The Peninsula, which will include ground-floor retail and light industrial manufacturing space in addition to new housing. All 700 of the units will be income-restricted, with apartments reserved for those making from 30 percent to 90 percent of the area median income.
Seventy-five units will be set aside for formerly homeless residents.
The massive and imposing Spofford was shut down in 2011 following years of complaints of harsh treatment of juvenile inmates. In a statement, Mayor Bill de Blasio praised the new project as opening a new chapter for the city, noting that “we are seeing a community rising and the righting of old wrongs.”
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