What form will the new housing development in Scarboro take?
This map shows the current plan for a new housing development in Scarboro. (photo:Ben Pounds )
It’s a public-private partnership between the Oak Ridge Housing Authority and Collaborative Housing Solutions.
Richelle Patton, that company’s president, showed concept maps of the current plan at a recent meeting. This was just the latest of many meetings with citizens, which Patton said had influenced the plan she presented.
“Nobody is going to get 100% of what they want, but hopefully most of us will get most of what we want,” she said.
As an example, she said the current plan to avoid going over two stories with any buildings hurts the project financially, but people had requested it.
If it goes ahead, the project will be on about nine acres of currently vacant land ORHA purchased from the city of Oak Ridge between South Dillard, South Benedict, Carver and Wilberforce avenues, behind the Scarboro Community Center and across the street from Oak Ridge Schools’ Scarboro Preschool.
Diagrams presented at the meeting show the development’s entrance coming in from Carver Avenue and running parallel to the parking lot of Scarboro Community Center.
Along that edge of the development behind the community center and the existing playground will be 10 for-sale homes.
Behind them will be three apartment buildings with 25 apartments, 20 apartments and 18 apartments each, along with some kind of community space at one of them. Patton said that might include a computer lab.
At the other end of the development will be more rentals, including 18 stacked flats and 23 townhomes. Among the rentals, 18% will be one-bedroom, 53% two-bedroom and 29% three-bedroom.
An exit onto South Dillard Avenue will be for emergencies only.
“This is tentative; it’s still not final,” he said.
The housing authority has described these units as affordable under a specific definition.
Maria Catron, ORHA executive director, said it means a household pays no more than 30% of its gross income toward housing and utility costs.
Within Oak Ridge, she said, the people who need affordable housing earn less than 60% of the median income for their household size.
Several citizens visiting the meeting said they had questions about the effects on the surrounding neighborhood.
Kevin Steen told The Courier News that he wasn’t sure whether property taxes for residents would rise.
He said they had already begun to rise with the construction of the Oak Ridge Schools preschool in the same neighborhood.
John Spratling told The Courier News he had broader questions about the development’s effects on business.
“What tangible things is the community going to get out of this?” he asked, explaining that the neighborhood used to have its own businesses, which he said he would like to see again.