Local College Taking Over Senior Citizen Apartment Building
By KYW's David Madden
(PHILADELPHIA, PA) -- Residents of a low income senior apartment building just off City Line Avenue will be moving over the next year to make room for student housing at the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine.
Notices went out this week to more than 200 tenants in the Overmont House on Monument Road. PCOM owns the building but has leased it to HUD since the 1970's. That 40 year lease expires next year and PCOM President Jay Feldstein has new plans for the place.
"We've made a decision that, in terms of our growth plan and our mission, we want to convert it to graduate apartments," Feldstein told KYW Newsradio.
That conversion won't be completed until at least the fall of 2018. He says the on-campus housing will help lower the overall cost of obtaining a graduate degree by offering housing at lower rates than those in the neighborhood.
As for the current tenants, Feldstein says they're not only getting a year's notice, but they'll also get assistance in finding a new place to live.
"We're going to pay their moving expenses," he said. "We'll pay to reconnect their cable. Their phone. We're really going to try and make this as painless as possible."
The school has also hired a relocation specialist who had worked for the Philadelphia Housing Authority to aid senior citizens in the transition.
