Adam Zellner, Gov. Jon Corzine's director of policy and planning, expects the initiative to serve as a model for the state. "You cannot, in this state, look at affordable housing. It has to be an element of something else. It cannot succeed on its own," Zellner said. "This is the beginning of investment, not only in the right type of housing, but in sustainable housing."

For Apollo, it's the company's first investment in Newark. The company is said to be actively pursuing other acquisitions in the city, but Simmons declined to disclose any details of the company's discussions.

"Newark has all of the things that should make it a world-class city," he said at yesterday's press conference. "It has great transportation, great parks and a great human culture. What's important today is not these four walls. What's important is providing quality housing for the people who work and live here."

Within a month of closing title on the properties Apollo had renovated model units for prospective tenants to tour in the nine buildings, Simmons revealed. He anticipates completing the upgrades to the common areas and 55 apartments in 603 Elizabeth Ave., where the press conference was held, in March, followed by improvements the other eight buildings. All of the buildings currently have tenants.

Booker noted that 603 Elizabeth Ave., on a bus line overlooking Weequahic Park and golf course, was a diamond of upper crust housing in Newark's heyday, before a decades-long decline that the mayor said "bled away" half the population of the state's largest city.

"When you talk to old-timers, they'll tell you, you'd made it when you got to Elizabeth Avenue," the mayor said. "We're reclaiming our city one block at a time. We're going to set a national standard."