Tim Rudd, the city's former budget director, is running for mayor on an independent ballot line. Credit: Courtesy of Tim Rudd

Tim Rudd, the city’s former budget director, is running for mayor on an independent ballot line. If he wins, Rudd wants to prioritize densifying development along East Genesee and Almond streets to make the city feel like a connected “urban core.”

“This is the opportunity to reshape it for the next 60 years,” Timothy Rudd told Central Current during an interview.

Rudd is one of the four contenders for Syracuse mayor, alongside Deputy Mayor and Democratic Candidate Sharon Owens, Republican Candidate Thomas Babilon, and independent candidate Alfonso Davis. 

During the race, he pushed back on the desire to redevelop public housing as Syracuse Housing Authority has planned. Rudd is opposed to moving residents out of McKinney Manor and Pioneer Homes.

“I think it’s a cop out with McKinney Manor, because they chose to divest from McKinney Manor,” Rudd said. “Pioneer homes is solid, it’s brick, and their roofs look good. I think many people like living there. There are challenges, as there are in any community, that require support, but I don’t see displacing the community as solving the problems.”

Rudd, an avid advocate for the Interstate 81 viaduct coming down, criticized the planned Children Rising Center — now on pause — and insisted the housing authority should invest in Wilson Park Community Center. 

“The simple fact is, there is a community center in Wilson Park already, and I think it’s probably under-resourced and understaffed and under-appreciated in many ways, but it’s there. It’s a legitimate facility. So the idea that we can’t build around that, right? I just think there’s more practical ways that would be more efficient and less threatening to the population that we’re currently housing,” Rudd said. 

Editor’s note: The following interview has been edited for length and clarity. 

Central Current: How would you have handled the East Adams public housing redevelopment project until now?

Rudd: With the Highway coming down, we really do have an opportunity to stitch the university area together with downtown, but I think the energy and the development really needs to go around East Genesee Street and Almond Street. I think that’s where the natural connection is. I think that can be the center of Syracuse in the future. There’s already private development on East Genesee Street. I think it would be easy to unleash more of that, making it easier for the developers, maybe some economic incentives, maybe some tax increment financing-type arrangements to help encourage the infrastructure investment that you may need for denser housing. But I think it’s hard to do that when you’ve built a very intensive plan around the housing authority, and I really do view it as a displacement-first approach. So in an environment where we’re worried about keeping the residents we have, it doesn’t make sense that we would have a displacement first for the residents who are literally in government provided housing, especially when that’s the best location for the housing authority. When I walk around or bike around that neighborhood, I don’t see the housing authority as the problem. I see the highway as the problem, and the way that the institutional nonprofits, the hospitals and universities, have essentially turned their backside to the housing authority, which is the most undesirable area of the entire thing. So they kind of take license to not have trees, to put all the fans and exhaust facing that. So I really think otherwise with the highway coming down, it’s a much better place to live. 

But also in terms of concentrated poverty, which I do believe is a real problem in Syracuse, that census tract has high levels of concentrated poverty by definition, because they’ve drawn a circle on the housing authority, but it has proximal access to opportunity. So you’re close to the university, there’s jobs at the university. You’re close to downtown, there’s jobs downtown, so you don’t have the transit problems that you do in getting to work other places. So it’s really a good place for affordable housing in the long run. So it looks to me like it would make sense to invest in the property that we have and invest in the people that we have. 

And I do think a fair criticism of the housing authority would be that people get stuck there, right? I do think the housing authority could be invested in to do more kind of like empowerment skills, life skills, coaching, follow up to make sure people are following the rules, which is really in their interest, right? It’s trying to help them live a healthier life. And I think that could help people cycle into either, like tenancy beyond the housing authority, or even home ownership in a neighborhood and an affordable housing environment and then that would make it so there’s turnover for people who are coming in, access. And I also think it’s such a resource intensive approach that it limits the housing authority’s ability to do anything else. They’re focused on design plans, they’re focused on relocation strategies, and that comes at a great cost. And I really do think a number of the housing initiatives, which are well intentioned in a way, have unintentionally made it harder to manage dense properties. So that, in a way, can kind of create opportunity if the Housing Authority is nimble. So instead of Ballantyne Gardens being bought by people from Brooklyn or overseas or wherever, and speculating, I think there’s no reason the Housing Authority couldn’t be buying that. It matches the kind of traditional housing that the housing authority does, which means their staff could probably handle it and right now, those places with the speculation sit largely vacant, right? So now we’re creating more vacancies like McKinney Manor. So I just think if we really do have this housing crisis and there’s a need, then it should be the traditional government housing authority that takes on that responsibility, and I think we could invest in it in a different way. It would be far more efficient. And at the same time, ironically, I think it would help attract … people with money paying for the proximal access to downtown.

How can Syracuse grow? We have to grow and we have to keep the people. And hopefully, we add people who are bringing resources to the community, and that itself will create opportunities for the people who are here, as long as we can keep them. So I see this as a much safer, realistic approach, because the people who have resources, who may want, in theory, those new apartments that are going to be mixed, would happily go to East Genesee street along that corridor or even more in the downtown footprint on East Genesee street. There’s just so much room for fill-in development there and even that traditional kind of land that goes to the state or whoever to fill in there. There’s so much land, we are so empty, and we have 100,000 fewer people than we used to, that there’s no reason to have a displacement first approach. 

And I just think that you’re not allowed to question the power structure in this town. So everybody has accepted the East Adams plan as some type of benevolent approach. And I don’t think it is. I think it’s a replication of the same mentality that put the highway there, and we just can’t afford to make the same thing. Like there is real community there. And why would we uproot it and pretend that we can plant it back when it’s all done?

[Editor’s Note: Central Current planned to question Rudd a separate question about how we would move forward with the East Adams public housing redevelopment project but Rudd’s answer came with the previous question.] 

Central Current: As mayor, what are some potential changes you might bring to the table with housing in that area?

Rudd: Well, I do understand that the housing authority is not a department, but you control a critical appointment of the boards. But you do have to let things expire. But I think you have to appoint people who buy into the ‘we’re not going to pursue this option and we’re going to invest in the housing stock we have, and we’re going to be an entity that really builds the capacity of our tenants.’ So we’re saying we’ll take everyone, and we’re saying we’re going to build them up and get them ready to not be in the housing authority footprint. And I think there are many others who would buy into that vision. So that’s main with the housing authority, is the appointments and the vision setting, and then I think just the accountability, so actually knowing what’s going on and making sure things are happening. 

But I mean, I think there’s going to be a likely change in leadership, no matter what, if nothing else. Because whether [SHA Executive Director] Bill Simmons is fabulous or not, he’s been there a long time, and most people generally stop when they’re older. … I think there’s going to be an opportunity for a pivot and given the reality of what we see for finance, for funding, the likelihood and just the path, I think it makes sense to pivot now.

You really want the buildings coming up when the highway comes down. And right now that’s not happening. There’s too many barriers to it. So I think that has to be the focus: attracting private investment. I do think we have a disproportionate share of the poverty of the region in the city. So the only math out of that is either the people who are too poor become not poor and that is very hard work, right? There are very few communities who, in isolation, have had all the poor people become not poor. And I would just say I worked at a social policy research group that studied anti-poverty programs using (random controlled trials). So there’s very few things that can do that. But I do think there’s math. The level of poverty is so unhealthy, but it makes living in poverty worse, right? So I do actually think if you can bring in more people with resources to like, increase the percentage of people who are not poor, that actually improves the quality of life and opportunity of the people who are there, as long as you don’t displace them in the process. 

So once again, it does not make sense to have a displacement first strategy for your housing authority, which is literally, in theory, providing for the most vulnerable, right? So that’s where I think you have to add more people. You focus on where the private investment is largely already happening. That’s essentially what the housing study says that the mayor paid millions of dollars for, is develop the areas where the private market is sort of going already, because once the investment follows, follows investment, so you can really plow it into those corridors, and also it can reinforce the overall like urban development strategy around (bus rapid transit). We lack a viable public transit system. BRT is the only option we really have given our current density. But we need to make sure the zoning and the investment goes where those routes are. We can’t afford to let investment go randomly throughout the city and then chase the BRT route to meet it, we have to send a signal of, this is where the private investment goes, and we will encourage it in ways. And I do think there needs to be partnerships with the county to, at the same time, discourage the sprawl. 

So I think it’s got to become a very hard perception of, it’s hard to do business in the county, in the suburbs, and it’s easier to do business in the city and then it becomes really an issue of affordability. So I do think in a city, housing and transportation should really be combined as a category, because if you have a viable public transit network, then you may not need a car. So if you do not need a car or have a lower budget for your transportation, you can inherently afford a little bit more for rent. But you need the density to make that choice. That’s what many people do in bigger cities. They choose to have a closer apartment or a better apartment, and they decide not to have a car. So because they have viable transit options here, we don’t traditionally have that, but that’s what BRT has to be. But you have to have discipline to say here are the areas, if you build outside the quarter mile of the BRT route, like we’re not coming to help you because you should be building within a quarter mile of the BRT route, because that’s walkable.

Central Current: Regarding the I-81 Viaduct Project, you were an advocate for taking down the viaduct. Since there is a lot of construction going on, what will you do as mayor to ensure the protection of residents’ health during and especially after the construction is over?

Rudd: The housing authority needs to be coaching and developing people. You ran an article about sticky mats the other day, and I read it, and in my house, we take off our shoes at the door, and some people do and some people don’t. But I do think that’s the best practice the housing authority should encourage. And then, I don’t know all the other points of contamination, but I would assume windows become a major part. So you probably need more window cleaning, and you probably have to encourage tenants — and this is really true for the whole city — to be more active in their management of dust, because the dust is what carries the lead. And there have to be standard practices. Like we live in a community that has had many demolitions. Those demolitions are not done with a tent, right? They knock it down. So they’re supposed to have like a hose and they’re supposed to be spraying the building while they demolish it to minimize the dust and to keep it in its footprint. So there definitely have to be standard practices that I would make sure they’re in place to protect everyone. 

It’s not just the housing authority. It’s everyone who lives and works downtown. It’s everyone who lives and attends Syracuse University. We’re all in the same climate, so it’s in everyone’s incentive to make sure that they don’t just drop it and have the plume of dust go all over the whole city. So I just think what we really need to do to make sure the air is safe, because if you move everyone out of there, which they’re not going to do in time, it’s fake, they’re not going to have all the people out of there by the time they knock the highway down. But there’s still Syracuse University, there’s still everyone downtown, there’s still the surrounding neighborhoods. So what they don’t matter? Like you don’t have to do the same thing regardless to make sure it’s safe and we’re not contaminating the air? You do. 

So I think it has to be like making sure the state is honoring all the processes they have in place to do this type of work. And the truth is it, in the long run, repairs the air quality, because it removes the viaduct, which is the constant pollution. So it is a short term thing. It’s almost like you’re renovating a house in the long run where it’s going to be lead safe. But does that mean everybody has to leave? I don’t, personally, think so. I think it means maybe you have to move the people that are immediately adjacent, like, 20 feet. The people have Windows immediately adjacent for a period of time, and I can’t even imagine that would need to be more than, like, a month or two for when they’re actually dropping that section. But like in that environment, I would say you shouldn’t even have to permanently leave your apartment. You should just, like, go to a hotel for a month. 

So I think there are strategies with which to protect people that are far less disruptive, that you need to be out, especially when they’ve said the whole time you will be able to move back, but they don’t have the thing built. So it’s pure displacement. I don’t understand how everybody can’t see that this is a displacement first strategy.

Also, there is a stickiness to the place. So once you leave and you’re forced to leave, are you going to leave again? Like you just got forcibly moved when you didn’t want to. The odds of you wanting to move again is low. And people can say, well, that’s because they got a better place or whatever. Maybe, I don’t know. But I just don’t think it’s necessary. And I think that’s where you can be transparent with the people around the air quality, the dangers during the period, and they can be empowered with choices. I don’t think it has to be some illusion that they’re safe if they are gone and that they’re in danger if they stay. It should be if you’re staying here are the risks, here’s the ways to minimize it. And that should be beyond the Housing Authority. That’s a communication the whole city really needs. 

Central Current: Are there any issues you’d press NYSDOT on as mayor with regards to the project?

Rudd: I think you really need to buy into redevelopment of the urban core and stitching Syracuse University to downtown to make one urban core. And I think that requires a lot of thoughtful infrastructure investment, whether that be bike lanes. Like there was the initiative that was going to give some $30 million to help redo some of the infrastructure, including building bike lanes with the Highway coming down. There’s a real need to look at the public infrastructure we have and not feel at all committed to it. Like this is the opportunity to reshape it for the next 60 years. We should be bold. We should have dedicated bike lanes. We should have dedicated sidewalks. We should have lots of green space. We lack transit. So investment in BRT, investment in amenities around the BRT that make taking BRT pleasant, whether that be benches, whether it be like, almost like a bus oriented playground, at spots that like, things that people do in other cities. We need that investment to make it so people want to live in Syracuse first.

I think it needs to be such that the people who are getting these very wonderful, high paying jobs in Micron, actually say I don’t want to live next to Micron. I want to live downtown, and I’m going to have a park in a parking garage somewhere, but then I’m going to only take my car when I go to work or the grocery store or whatever. But I’m going to live primarily downtown. I’m going to walk because it has density, it has vitality, it has diversity. And I do think a lot of the people who will have the skills to work there will choose such an environment, right? It may be that they’re from cities, it may be that they are international. They want to be around people who are similarly diverse.

I think the city too often wastes money when it’s too late. So, like the current mayor and administration, spent over a million dollars for sure, revisioning the highway when it was already too late. They built all these conceptual drawings that were fake. They’re fake because the DOT already made the decisions and did all the environmental studies. And they kind of pretend, well, maybe next time it’ll be useful, but it’s not. So I do think the process for the state is what it is, but it’s the right decision. So we should be celebrating that, making sure it’s all working and there’s not enough oversight on all levels of government in general. 

The city is not an effective check on itself. So there’s many projects that are not happening, don’t go forward, are, at best, ineffective and at worst, totally corrupt. And so the idea that the city is going to somehow regulate the state or the feds, I find hard to believe, because they’re not even really managing themselves. So I think there’s a need to like, ‘we got the right decision. Let’s move forward.’ We can control the Housing Authority strategy. I think that allows for a more effective deployment of resources regionally, that would get more people living in the city faster, which would help alleviate the concentrated poverty that we have, and would just help have more people paying for a concentrated infrastructure that would be easier to support. 

I do think I would still push back on certain road changes. Like there is the private investment I was speaking of on East Genesee Street, and there is a reorientation of the main exits so that Adams and maybe Harrison, I think, become in a way, bigger. I think those expanded footprints, I’ve never understood them. They’re literally curbs that are brand new, with tree spaces that are less than four years old, they’re expanding to have more traffic lanes that can go. So I would still push back against those kinds of things, because I would hope that there’s a way to be like, how about we just experiment with this, and you don’t move it right now, and if it causes a problem, we then do it. Like, let’s do that last. So I think there needs to be a prioritization on space making, not car building. 

So I would be a relentless advocate against cars with DOT, in favor of people, bicycles and just general safety slowness, like the way we have dramatically slowed cars with the cameras in front of schools. There needs to be physical and infrastructure investments downtown to make it safe, like students at SU have literally been getting killed crossing the street, essentially on campus, by giant dump trucks. Something’s wrong with the infrastructure in a way that the cars are moving in that type of vehicles are moving in that type of way. I I think it’s just this question of what are the resources we have? If the authentic story is that the highway divided the university from downtown, that’s the truth. So with the Highway coming down, it only makes sense that the most important thing is to stitch them together in a meaningful way. And then when we built the highway, it was really that we don’t care about the fear of displacement. We’re going to displace whoever we have to. I really think that cannot be the same mentality we adopt now, of like, ‘well, we’re just going to displace them and we’ll figure it out. And by the way, living there sucks, so don’t feel bad about it.’ Like, that’s essentially what people said about the 15th ward. It’s like they would make the decision for the people saying, well, that’s a horrible place to live. They just don’t know any different, right? Like, that’s kind of the mentality that is at play once again. And I just disagree.

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Debadrita Sur is a multimedia journalist and Report for America corps member who reports on the I-81 project and public housing for Central Current. In 2023, Sur graduated with a master’s degree in journalism...