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Wilmington Mayor Carney seeks more public funds for affordable housing

June 16, 2025 |By Katie Tabeling

June25_WEB-mayor-carney-NCCC_ktabeling — Wilmington Mayor John Carney said his top priority is to secure more funds for the Neighborhood Stabilization Fund to acquire and renovate abandoned homes in the city. | DBT PHOTO BY KATIE TABELING

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WILMINGTON — Now that the city budget is settled, Wilmington Mayor John Carney’s top priority is bolstering aid in building more affordable housing. To move the needle, Carney is looking for $5 million in state money for Wilmington’s Neighborhood Stabilization Fund. That fund is designated to buy abandoned properties to then demolish and rebuild in hopes of selling or renting the new structures out to residents. The Wilmington mayor called it his “highest priority.” “I got my fingers and toes crossed,” he said, referencing his chances to see the funding appropriated by the Delaware General Assembly. Carney spoke at the inaugural Mayor’s Luncheon, hosted by the New Castle County Chamber of Commerce. The event held at the Chase Center at the Riverfront was sold out with top executives and local and state government officials across the county in attendance. The Wilmington Mayor had talked about his economic policy which, in his view, focused entirely on making the city a safer place to live with attractive places to enjoy. Carney acknowledged he had little control over the macroeconomic factors that drive up housing costs, but he does see a path ahead where the city continues partnerships to help bring more affordable housing units to the market. Two weeks after the controversial ordinance to cap rent increases in Wilmington died in the City Council, Carney said that there was a need for both subsidized housing and market rate housing to ensure a balance. “Sometimes our council misses out on the fact that you’ve got to have higher-end housing units as well as subsidized, because you’re not going to have the [property tax] revenues you need to support the whole city. That’s one of the biggest challenges,” he said. Wilmington has used several state and local programs to incentivize affordable housing projects, including the Downtown Development Districts (DDD), offering a 20% rebate for qualified projects. In the past, nonprofits like Interfaith Community Housing of Delaware have successfully used the DDD to rehabilitate housing, while others, like Buccini Pollin Group, the largest landlord in the city, have used it to help aid in office-to-apartment conversion projects. Former Wilmington Mayor Mike Purzycki worked to jumpstart revitalization with small projects throughout the city before the COVID-19 pandemic. Back in 2019, his office unveiled a landmark project that included $2 million in renovations for six townhomes that were sold at 80% of the Average Median Income. Purzycki also allocated significant portions of its share of the American Rescue Plan Act to an ambitious redevelopment plan, which included $5 million in the Neighborhood Stabilization Fund. Since then, the city has been able to allocate $2.5 million each year since it was created in 2024. That includes the budget the Wilmington City Council just passed. [caption id="attachment_472070" align="alignleft" width="300"]

In a fireside chat, REACH Riverside CEO Logan Herring, left, asks Mayor John Carney about his outlook on the city. | DBT PHOTO BY KATIE TABELING[/caption] Carney acknowledged that rehabilitating what once was a vacant run-down house means there’s a loss for the city government, as the housing costs rising means the fund gets depleted a lot quicker. For example, he said notable partner Wilmington Neighborhood Conservancy Land Bank was able to buy houses for $30,000 in the past. Now it’s around $100,000. “That makes it tough, and that’s because we have people coming in from Philadelphia, New York to buy those vacant units and do the same thing except not sell it back as an affordable unit,” the mayor said. There’s also a question about partner agencies that may have the capacity to take on major redevelopment to the scale the city needs. The Woodland Trustees is forging ahead with affordable senior housing units at the Flats, as well as the Imani Village that REACH Riverside is heading up, but the smaller contractors to handle one or two townhomes at a time are equally important. Logan Herring, the CEO of REACH Riverside, said that his team has calculated the cost for Imani Village at about $400,000 per home. “Affordable housing is expensive, and we’re building on 10 lots we got from the [Wilmington] Land Bank, and we’re building eight of our first homeownership units on Davis Street. We calculate it’s probably about $250,000 for those units as well,” Herring said. “To be able to provide that price point that people can afford, you have to build subsidies in the mis, and that’s what you’re referring to.”