Brutalist block
The state has spent almost A$7 million maintaining the homes over two years, with costs more than four times the average for New South Wales public housing, it said when first announcing the sale in March. For every property sold in the program, which includes 79 apartments in the concrete brutalist Sirius building in the historic Rocks district, three could be built elsewhere to help accommodate 59,000 households waiting for public housing, it has since said.
Barney Gardner, 65, who has lived in Millers Point his whole life, isn't convinced.
"It's a planned attack by the government to get rid of us; by not doing maintenance the places have deteriorated," he said. "It's basically eviction by dereliction."
In Gardner's home, natural light is scant and his backyard is a narrow alleyway. In the bathroom and second bedroom, parts of walls are without paint after lacking proper maintenance for at least a decade, he said. Tenants pay a quarter of their income in rent, in Gardner's case about A$108 a week.
Six-star hotel
From his front porch, Gardner regards another world. Where wharves that supported Sydney's shipping industry sat for more than a century, workers hired by Lend Lease Group are building Barangaroo, a new financial district of skyscrapers, luxury apartments and a six-star hotel and casino.
"It's morally the correct decision; it's taxpayers' money that's been subsidising the housing here," said Blair Hayden, 63, who co-owns the Lord Nelson Brewery Hotel, the nation's oldest pub brewery, in the Rocks district. "Whilst I feel for the people tremendously, things move, things change."
A road alongside the pub will be one of the main walking thoroughfares to Barangaroo when it's finished, he said.
Millers Point was among the first areas of Sydney to be settled by Europeans after Britain established a penal colony in 1788. It prospered as one of the city's most important maritime areas, until the bubonic plague hit in 1900, and the state government seized thousands of properties to disinfect them, Shirley Fitzgerald and Christopher Keating wrote in Millers Point: The Urban Village.
Wharf workers
In the 1920s, the state rented the homes to wharf workers, creating Sydney's first public housing. Residents could make their own improvements and pass the homes on to their children.
"The properties were definitely assumed to be secure, not only for their own use but for their children and descendants," Fitzgerald and Keating wrote.
The rest of Sydney looked on the area as a slum, until a 1960s construction boom had developers coveting its water views and proximity to the city centre, according to the book. The threat to its heritage and close-knit community drew protests, and the city designated Millers Point a residential precinct, putting pre-20th century buildings on a preservation list.
The push to offload state-owned properties in the area started in the late 1980s when the government, amid protests, began advertising some hotels and shops for sale to raise funds to provide other homes. It irked locals further in 2010 by offering 99-year leases on a further 36 homes.
Sponsored gentrification
"The fact that the government is willing to clear that area of anyone who can't afford A$1.5 million or A$2 million for a home is the sort of thing that governments shouldn't be in the business of doing," said Bill Randolph, director of the University of New South Wales' City Futures Research Centre. "It's government sponsored gentrification."
Authorities say proceeds from the sales will be spent on new homes and maintenance.
"While the government understands that Millers Point tenants have a strong connection to the area, it needs to balance this against its obligation to make sure that public resources are used to benefit as many people in need as possible," the Department of Family and Community Services said in an emailed response to questions. "All proceeds of the sales will be invested in the social housing system."
Still, a lack of detail about plans for new housing has failed to convince critics that supply will increase.
"I don't trust that commitment at all," said Darcy Byrne, a councillor and former mayor of Leichhardt Council, an inner Sydney suburb about 7 kilometres (4.3 miles) southwest of Millers Point, which has joined with surrounding councils in a campaign against future public housing sales. "They've yet to identify a single example of where new housing will be built."
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Surging prices
Six of the Millers Point properties have been sold in closed auctions as part of a pilot round of sales that raised A$15 million. Three more homes are to be auctioned next month. The state is benefiting from Sydney house prices that RP Data Pty said jumped 14 per cent in the year through October, taking the median tag to A$792,000.
"Some residents put forth a proposal with alternate models to retain some public housing and sell others to make it sustainable, and that was ignored," Sydney Deputy Lord Mayor Robyn Kemmis said in an interview. The sales are proceeding even after an independent assessment said that older people are negatively affected by severing community ties, she said.
Leaky roof
Millers Point's median has soared 34 per cent in the past year to A$1.38 million, according to Domain Group, and RP Data named it Australia's fourth-priciest suburb. Still, many homes being sold require about A$1 million of renovations, estimates Bulford, who had to fix a leaky roof, falling plaster, a collapsed floor and damp in the basement.
Some of the heritage-listed properties are located under the Harbour Bridge, meaning residents must put up with the steady roar of commuter trains passing overhead. For Gardner, who like other residents is being offered relocation expenses, it's the only home he's ever known.
"What if they offered me a penthouse somewhere?" he said. "Nah. This is where I was born."
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