$2.1M for affordable housing projects
5 sites will share funds for 190 units
Five Marin affordable housing projects comprising 190 residences will share about $2.1 million in local and state funding following action by the county Board of Supervisors.
“We're all really glad that there is some money to add to the significant portfolio of funding that each project has to put together,” Supervisor Katie Rice said during the board's meeting on Tuesday.
Half of the money came from the county's Affordable Housing Trust Fund while the rest came from the state's Permanent Local Housing Allocation (PLHA) program. The trust fund has a remaining balance of $9.7 million.
The PLHA program was born out of the Building Homes and Jobs Act, which state legislators passed in 2017. The bill established a $75 recording fee on real estate documents to help fund the creation of affordable homes.
Municipalities with populations over 50,000, or counties with populations over 200,000
that participate in the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program, are eligible to receive PLHA grants. The grants must be matched with local funds.
To participate in the CDBG program, jurisdictions must comply with certain requirements.
“It's worth noting that the funds are aligned with our goals to affirmatively further fair housing by considering how they will support actions and address patterns of residential racial segregation in our community,” said Leelee Thomas, a county planning official.
Last year, Marin County received $725,571 in PLHA grants, and this year it got more than $1.1 million. The county expects to receive at least $2.5 million in additional PLHA grant allocations over the next three years.
Because the grant money is intended to benefit San Rafael and Novato as well as the unincorporated areas overseen by the county, the councils of those two cities helped decide which projects received funds. Eight applications were received seeking $3.9 million.
Eden Housing received two of the grants. The nonprofit received $714,250 to help it retrofit a threestory office building at 3301 Kerner Blvd. in San Rafael into 40 apartments of permanent supportive housing for the homeless. The site was purchased with the help of a Project Homekey grant.
The other grant, for $605,296, is to help the nonprofit rehabilitate the former Coast Guard site in Point Reyes Station and convert it into 50 affordable residences. Eden is developing the project with the Community Land Trust Association of West Marin.
Homeward Bound of Marin was awarded a $392,446 grant for a project at 826 State Access Road in Novato, near its headquarters. It plans to build 24 one-bedroom apartments of permanent supportive housing for veterans, 26 one-bedroom apartments of workforce affordable housing and a job training center.
Mary Kay Sweeney, coexecutive director of Homeward Bound of Marin, said it is securing final city approvals for the project and hopes to begin demolishing existing buildings by the end of the year.
Habitat for Humanity Greater San Francisco received a $321,804 grant to help it build 80 attached homes to sell to low- and moderate-income households in Novato. The project, at a greenfield site at 8161 Redwood Blvd., will include 18 two-bedroom homes, 37 three-bedroom homes and 25 four-bedroom homes.
Bolinas Community Land Trust was awarded a $108,954 grant to help in build nine two- and threebedroom affordable apartments and one small commercial space at 31 Wharf Road in downtown Bolinas.
Among the projects that didn't get funding in this round was Canal Alliance's effort to acquire a 32-apartment complex in San Rafael's Canal neighborhood to convert to affordable housing.
Aline Tanielian, a county planner, told supervisors the project was passed over because Canal Alliance couldn't demonstrate “site control.”
“We are working with Canal Alliance to see what other funding sources may become available as they move through their project,” Tanielian said.
In addition to site control, criteria for funding included project readiness and the number of residences the projects would create for households earning 60% of local area median income.
Thomas said that in keeping with HUD's fair housing requirement, projects were also evaluated based on the racial makeup of people living in their existing housing developments in Marin and the racial demographics of the housing organization's staff and board members.