SEATTLE—December 10, 2003—In recent months SHA has purchased several properties in order to preserve affordable housing and to improve the neighborhood surrounding recently SHA redevelopments. The Ritz Apartments, a 30-unit building at 13th and Yesler will be preserved as affordable housing for low-income households living and working in the Central Area.
SHA has also purchased the 42-unit Westwood Heights East apartments and six four-plexes on the same block in West Seattle across the street from the newly-refurbished Westwood Heights senior-designated high-rise.
SHA purchased the Ritz Apartments when approached to do so by Beacon Development and the City's Office of Housing. The property had been affordable housing for people with incomes below 80 percent of the area median. The owner was in bankruptcy proceedings. The owner, Beacon Development and the City wanted to complete the sale quickly before the property was foreclosed to make sure that the housing would remain affordable.
Beacon Development, a firm that specializes in developing affordable housing, will act on behalf of SHA to secure funds and oversee the rehab of the building.
With a $17 million HOPE VI grant, SHA revitalized a small but severely distressed area on the southern city limits. Before HOPE VI, Roxbury House and Village consisted of a 150-unit high-rise for elderly and disabled households completely surrounded by a poorly-designed and -constructed 60-unit townhouse village for large families. The HOPE VI grant allowed SHA to rehab Roxbury House, rename it Westwood Heights and target it for elderly residents. The Lutheran Alliance to Create Housing built and manages a new 45-unit, mixed income family village, Longfellow and Westwood Courts, across a new street from Westwood Heights.
About a year and a half ago, SHA and LATCH saw that illegal and anti-social activities in privately-owned properties across 27th Avenue SW to the east of Westwood Heights were interfering with neighborhood revitalization. Drug trafficking and drive-by shootings across the street drove potential tenants away.
SHA joined with several City of Seattle departments and neighborhood organizations in a concerted effort to stop the illegal activity through surveillance, stepped up patrols, and enforcement of Housing Choice Voucher payment contracts against the less-than-diligent landlords of some of these properties. When these efforts proved insufficient, SHA decided to buy the properties, and to improve management and "curb appeal," thereby protecting the safety and quality of life of Westwood Heights and Westwood and Longfellow Courts residents and the taxpayers' multi-million dollar investment in the neighborhood through HOPE VI.
It took over a year, but by the end of November 2003, SHA had bought the 42-unit apartment building and the six four-plexes facing Westwood Heights across 27th Avenue SW, where problem tenants and absentee landlords allowed gang members to rule the street. Now that SHA owns the entire half-block facing Westwood Heights, the criminal activity has died down, and improvements in curb appeal will be made to aid revitalization of the neighborhood.
Twenty-one Westwood Heights East units count toward HOPE VI replacement housing goals for Holly Park and Rainier Vista.