SIOUX FALLS, S.D. (KELO.com) -- A series of public/private partnerships valued at 17-million dollars will provide 129 affordable new homes in Sioux Falls.
The City announced the projects today at a news conference at City Hall.
The projects are:
- Majestic Ridge--Southeast Sioux Falls, $8.3 million project, 53 units for tenants at 60 percent or less of area median income. Costello Companies, developer. City providing $500,000 loan.
- Cleveland Center--East 8th Street, $4.5 million project, 39 units for tenants at 50 percent or less of area median income. Lloyd Companies, developer. South Dakota Housing Development Authority providing $4.48 million, $20,000 contribution by the City.
- The Glory House Project--Current Glory House campus, $2.6 million project, 25 units for tenants who have been incarcerated and are reentering the community. SDHDA providing $2.3 million, City $300,000.
- Sherwood Triplex/Twinhome Project--Northeast Sioux Falls, $2.6 million project, 12 units for owners with incomes at 80 percent or less of area median income. Sioux Falls Housing and Redevelopment Commission and Affordable Housing Solutions, developers. City providing $2.4 million loan, SDHDA providing $240,000 in down payment assistance to buyers.
Unfortunately, the demand for lower income housing is so great, they'll get snapped up, developers and officials say. Officials estimate approximately 2,000 families on various waiting lists in Sioux Falls for affordable housing. This project would cover just over five percent of that current need.
"It's a constant battle, I suppose, for all us in this industry to try assess ultimately what true level is of need," said the Lloyd Companies' Erica Beck.
Beck says one Lloyd Companies affordable housing project filled up in a few months. Others fill in less than a month or so, according to Beck and other developers.
"I don't want to use the term 'drop in the bucket' but I guess I just did," said Les Kinstad, the City's affordable housing manager. He also welcomed local banks to assist with funding additional affordable housing projects in the city.
Another concern officials and developers expressed was that the current tax code made these loans and grants possible, as well as other provisions of the tax code that help incentivize commercial developers to be involved in affordable housing projects. The final version of the tax reform bill now pending in Congress could take away many of those incentives.
"They are estimating with the decrease in the corporate tax level, that will create 15 percent less tax credit projects, with those types of levels of 20 percent taxable rates for corporarations," SDHDA executive director Mark Lauseng said.
A few of the projects will be finished in 2018, the rest in 2019.
