City to get new housing project
By Steve Herring
Published in News on August 21, 2014 1:46 PM
A Raleigh development company has been awarded $660,000 in federal tax credits to build Lochstone, an 84-unit affordable apartment complex on West Lockhaven Drive.
Pendergraph Development LLC will construct the complex.
Another $461,966 in tax credits went to Brookwood Partners for rehabilitation work at the 65-unit Brookwood Apartments complex just off County Road in Mount Olive.
The tax credits, announced Tuesday by the North Carolina Housing Finance Agency, reduce the amount of tax for which a developer is liable.
Developers raise capital or equity by selling the tax credits, thereby reducing the debt they otherwise would have to borrow. Since the debt is reduced, a tax-credit property can offer more affordable rents.
The Lochstone project has been approved by the Goldsboro City Council and the company is ready to start, city planning officials said.
The property is located on the west side of West Lockhaven Drive between Wayne Memorial Drive and Norwood Avenue.
The complex will be privately managed and is not part of the Goldsboro Housing Authority.
The City Council originally rezoned the property on March 4, 2013, from Office and Industrial-1 to R-6 Residential Conditional District.
City Council approved the site, landscape and building elevation plans on May 6, 2013, which called for a 72-unit multi-family apartment facility spanning three three-story buildings.
The plans also included a community building with an adjacent playground and covered picnic area within 2.1 acres of open space.
However, the original developer was unable to proceed and sold the project to Pendergraph, which proposed a few changes that the City Council approved on March 3.
One of the changes was to increase the number of multi-family units to 84, but still use three buildings.
The overall lot size has not changed, but the orientation and access points have.
Access to West Lockhaven Drive will be achieved by extending a publicly dedicated road east across a vacant lot that would provide access to Stevens Memorial Place, which in turn would provide access to West Lockhaven Drive.
The city will not issue a certificate of occupancy until the new roadway is completed and approved by the city.
Access would also be provided to Norwood Avenue to the west.
The community building and playground and picnic areas remain in the new plans.
A call to Pendergraph had not been returned prior to press time this morning.
Overall, the state was awarded federal tax credits and other financing to build $423 million of affordable apartments in 37 North Carolina counties. The work is expected to support 8,540 jobs and generate more than $13.4 million in local tax revenue.
All of the apartments are affordable for households earning 60 percent of a county's median income, and many are affordable at 50 percent or 40 percent of median as the result of the additional financing.
The state's Key Program operating assistance makes apartments affordable for persons with disabilities who are living on Supplemental Security Income (SSI), which is currently $721 a month.
The N.C. Housing Finance Agency evaluates the tax credit applications on behalf of the N.C. Federal Tax Reform Allocation Committee.
The funding will produce 3,683 privately owned, privately managed affordable apartments.