DELRAY BEACH, Fla. --- Eliot Kleinberg at the Palm Beach Post reports that neighbors opposed to a CWHIP-financed 116-unit town home project with a three-story, 30,000-square-foot medical office building plan to pack the Delray Beach city council chambers tonight and play their 'porno' card to stop it.Someone's been watching to much TV. Ascot's project partner is the City of Delray Beach, which waived building, paving, irrigation and plan review fees for Ascot's affordable housing units.
Besides, Ascot's den of iniquity is a smart idea, if a bit more market-driven than purposeful---one of the not-so-unintended consequences of the CWHIP program (Fla.'s new Community Workforce Housing Innovative Pilot program):
Delray Beach-based Ascot Development bought 10 acres of... former grove... for $4.5'million in 2005...Ascot plans to offer 32 of the [116] units for $225,000 to $275,000, to people from professions such as teaching, nursing and firefighting. The firm is set to receive a $5 million state [CWHIP] grant for the affordable housing units.
Some residents in area subdivisions have hired a lawyer to fight the project, and a troop of 150 showed up at last month's P&Z session with their tennis shoes on. Ascot co-founder and partner Teri Gevinson summoned her best PR sense, or hired some:
"It's another attempt by the neighbors to not allow the same people who are teaching their children, saving their lives in the emergency room, or putting out a fire that could possibly happen in their house, to live in their neighborhood," ...Gevinson said. "It's really sad for the city I live in, and it's embarrassing."And, she said, "I see no reason why the NIMBYs are going to win." NIMBY is an acronym for "Not in my back yard."
For their part, the NIMBYs are out for developer blood. Kleinberg reports they'll try to paint Gevinson's 47-year old partner and Ascot co-founder Garrett M. Bender as a sleaze-meister. Is seems he once ran an online financial services company similar to PayPal whose clients included Disney, Sony and a British Virgin Islands-based enterprise that uploaded porn videos for Japanese customers.
Midtown Delray's project overview from the 2006 CWHIP Annual Report:
Midtown Delray located in Palm Beach County was awarded $5,000,000 in CWHIP funds. The proposed development consists of 32 town home units. Affordability for these units will be maintained through a Community Land Trust which will own the land and provide a ground lease to the homeowner. Midtown Delray is part of a larger development that consists of 124 residential units and a 20,000 square foot medical facility. The proposed development is adjacent to an elementary school and a fire station.The public-private partnership for Midtown Delray consists of the developer, Midtown Delray, LLC, the City of Delray Beach, Delray Beach Community Land Trust and Delray Beach Chamber of Commerce. The development will be able to utilize a variety of financing options, including SHIP and Community Development Block Grant funds, available to affordable housing developments located in Delray Beach. Additionally, the City of Delray Beach has adopted a policy for the waiver of building, paving, irrigation and plan review fees for affordable housing units, which will provide a savings total of $1,200 in permit fees for each homebuyer. Palm Beach County has existing land use policies that require development of affordable housing near transportation areas and employment facilities. The county allows for mixed land uses where households can live, obtain services and work in the same area.
An expedited review process is provided and density bonuses are allowed for affordable housing developments.
And just to wring every drop of irony from this story, USA Today recently proclaimed Delray Beach as "the next South Beach."
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