Charlotte Mayor Vi Lyles says she’s hoping for a unanimous vote to approve eight affordable housing projects at next week’s City Council meeting. If approved, the projects would cost $12.8 million, with funding from the Housing Trust Fund.
Two of the recommended projects would involve renovating aging apartment complexes instead of building new units. Lyles says the upgrade will include landscaping, preservation, and improving in-home appliances to make them more energy efficient.
But there would also housing units built from the ground up. In total, the eight projects involve 950 units. Nearly 200 of them would be set aside for residents who earn less than 30% of the area median income.
“I think we’ve talked about this for so long that finally getting projects that are going to come out of the ground in 2020 is an important thing to build trust with the community,” Lyles said Wednesday on WFAE’s “Charlotte Talks.”
Lyles said construction and renovation could start early next year and could take 18-24 months to finish.
“People are hurting now, and I understand that, but we had to start somewhere,” she said.
The two older complexes that would get upgrades are the Heritage Parks Apartments in east Charlotte and the Wendover Walk Apartments near Cotswold. In exchange for the renovations, the apartments must remain affordable for 15 years.
That’s similar to what the city’s doing with the Sharon Oaks apartments off North Sharon Amity Road. That renovation will cost about $2.1 million.
