Naples approves $176.8M budget, no money for affordable housing

Naples passed a $176.8 million budget for fiscal year 2021-22, which began Oct. 1, but it did not allocate money for affordable housing even though subsidized housing in the area is at risk.

In the next 10 years, three apartment complexes with 458 affordable units in the Naples area may stop accepting subsidies, a city-funded report on affordable housing says.

Only two apartment complexes with 142 subsidized units combined remain within city limits, and another five area developments with 1,088 units stopped accepting subsidies between 2010 and 2015.

For subscribers:Naples' Gordon River Apartments in River Park sold for $17.5M; residents fear being displaced

In the budget, the city added a new "affordable housing projects" line, but it did not allocate funds to it because the Community Redevelopment Agency, or CRA, has not identified a specific affordable housing project or program that would be beneficial to the community, its interim manager Jeffrey Oris said in an email last week. 

The CRA, whose board comprises the members of the City Council, has been tasked with addressing the need for affordable housing in neighborhoods such as River Park since 1994. 

There has been no real effort to invest in or plan for affordable housing going back almost three decades, said Councilman Ray Christman, who also is chairman of the CRA. 

In 1993, the city of Naples leased more than 6 acres in the River Park West neighborhood for 50 years to a private company with the purpose of building the Jasmine Cay Apartments, an affordable housing apartment complex that accepts subsidies.

The George Washington Carver Apartments, the only other affordable housing apartment complex in the city, was built in 1981 as a result of a similar agreement with the city.

"Since then, there certainly has not been results in terms of progress on the affordable housing front," Christman said.

Earlier this year, the CRA authorized a $100,000 study to create an affordable housing strategy for the city, and it received the study's first of three reports in late August. The study's second and third reports are expected by Dec. 9 and Feb. 10, respectively. 

"The CRA wants to be prepared if a beneficial opportunity presents itself or a feasible project or program is recommended by the affordable housing strategy once it is completed. Having the line item allows for the CRA to transfer funds within its budget and immediately take action on an identified opportunity," Oris, the CRA interim manager, wrote in an email last week. 

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However, some residents of the Gordon River Apartments, now renamed The Cove at Naples Bay, may not be able to wait until the study is completed to find affordable housing in the city.

In September, Corridor Ventures, a Connecticut-based real estate investment firm, purchased the 95-unit apartment complex with a view of the Gordon River in the River Park East neighborhood for $17.5 million, prompting several residents to fear being displaced if rents are raised.

In 1998, a former owner of the apartment complex opted out of a subsidy from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, or HUD.

Kari Price-Crick, who pays $1,100 a month for a two-bedroom unit at the apartment complex, said last month in a CRA-sponsored affordable housing meeting that she could become one of those displaced residents soon.

Starting on Dec. 1, a two-bedroom unit at the Cove will rent for $1,650 a month and a three-bedroom unit for $1,850, both with "fresh upgrades." A three-bedroom unit with no recent upgrades is going for $1,400, the Cove's new website shows.

The price of the upgraded three-bedroom apartment is approximately two times more than what a single, full-time worker earning the median wage ($17.53 per hour) for Collier County can afford, assuming the household pays 30% of income for rent and utilities as recommended by HUD.

As of last month, the old website of the apartment complex said its rents ranged from $1,200 to $1,545 per month.

"They do not want us there," Price-Crick said.

River Park residents speak up on affordable housing

Price-Crick was not the only person at the meeting who said she may have to move outside city limits.

Fahlon Johnson-Harris, another resident of the Cove, said she is panicking because she needs more time to move if her rent is raised. She has tried without luck to find affordable housing in the area for herself and her three kids.

"There is nothing available. I can't just up and go," she said.

These and other similar statements from Cove tenants prompted City Council members and staff to invite the new owner of the apartment complex to a joint public meeting between the CRA and its advisory board in the River Park Community Center at 8:30 a.m., Oct. 14, Monique Barnhart, a spokeswoman with the city, said in an email last week.

"The city and the CRA want to know the same thing as the residents… What are their plans for the apartment complex?" Barnhart wrote.

Related:Collier County commissioners unanimously approve apartment complex with affordable unitsThe purpose of the meeting is also to try to find short-term assistance for some of the Cove's tenants to "at least avoid any kind of sudden displacement," Christman said.

As of Tuesday, Corridor Properties had not decided whether it will send a representative to the meeting, said its co-founder Brown Hagan.

But the concerns about being priced out of the city go beyond the Cove.

For people like Curtis Williams, a River Park resident, the city is moving too slowly to preserve affordable housing as developers "wipe out" his neighborhood, he said.

In the first report of the affordable housing study, the CRA was presented with four options to expand affordable housing in the area. They all involved the city acquiring the former Gordon River Apartments. In January, a city-paid appraisal of the apartment complex came in at $14.3 million.

Despite these recent efforts, Williams told City Council members at the recent public meeting, the city does not really want affordable housing. 

"Quit sugarcoating everything. Just do what you are going to do. Hopefully, the right developer will come through and give (homeowners) a nice prize, and we will get the hell up out," he said.

Mayor Teresa Heitmann said the criticism against the city is legitimate.

"I think that our past actions have shown that we have not really put our focus and effort into securing affordable housing," Heitmann said. 

Naples' top expenses

One of the city's top capital improvement projects, or CIP, which are the expenses needed to acquire and maintain infrastructure, is a CRA project to build a parking garage.

Of the CRA's $10.5 million CIP budget, $9 million, or 86%, is allocated for the construction of a three-story, four-level parking garage near a future Gulfshore Playhouse theater and education center.

The city already budgeted $1 million for the garage's design during fiscal 2020-21, the budget shows.

In June, City Council approved in a 6-1 vote a partnership agreement with Gulfshore Playhouse Inc. and the Wynn family acting as Downtown Naples LLC to build the garage by the intersection of First Avenue South and 12th Street South.

As part of the agreement, the private organizations would transfer to the city more than 1 acre with a value of approximately $4.72 million to build the garage in exchange for a share of its parking spaces to support their individual development projects.

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The parking spaces in the garage will not be reserved for the organizations, interim City Manager Dana Souza said in June.

The construction of the garage is expected to begin in the next year, completely funded by the CRA, the plan says.

The parking garage is not the city's most expensive CIP this year.

The city budgeted more than $16.6 million to improve a stormwater discharge system that serves an area south of the former Naples Beach Hotel and Golf Club by removing pipes and the discharge of stormwater from the shoreline and replacing it with one offshore discharge, city reports say. 

"The pipes currently discharge untreated stormwater runoff from private properties and roadways to the shallow, swimming area of the beach. The proposal is to treat the water with many water quality improvement devices and send the water much farther out into the Gulf in deeper waters," Andy Holland, deputy director of the city's Streets and Stormwater Department, said in an email last week.

These outfalls and others in the area of the former hotel serve a drainage area of approximately 395 acres, the city's website says.

In 2012, the city amended its stormwater master plan to require the removal of stormwater beach outfalls in response to a state Department of Environmental Protection mandate to remove them.

More than 68% of the project's expenses will be covered by the revenue of the one-cent sales tax, which was approved by voters in 2018 to pay for local infrastructure projects. Nearly 32% will be financed by a stormwater fund. 

The fund is paid into by users who are charged a fee. The fee for a typical homeowner is $13.93 per month, or $27.86 per bi-monthly bill, the city's most recent Capital Improvement Plan says.

The city allocated $1.6 million in the past fiscal year. In fiscal 2022-23, the city plans to spend $15.5 million to improve the stormwater discharge system that serves the area of the former hotel, the budget shows.

The first phase of the south system, which includes extending into the Gulf, is ready to be bid for construction, and several permit applications to state and federal government agencies have been submitted for the north system, Holland wrote. 

The third most expensive capital project this year involves the replacement of at least three miles of water mains and service lines that were selected due to age, having hydraulic issues or otherwise identified as in need of being replaced, the plan says.

It also involves replacing about 200 large meters that do not pass an annual water meter test.

The improvements will provide better water pressure for consumers, a longer life expectancy for the new pipes, and more accurate meter readings, Bob Middleton, utilities director, said in an email last week.

The city budgeted $3.5 million for this project from a water and sewer fund. It also allocated the same amount for this project last year, the budget shows.

Projects in the water and sewer fund are funded primarily by the rates paid by water, sewer, and irrigation customers. Retained earnings, impact fees, grants, and special assessments are other sources of revenue for these projects, the plan says.

The city also plans to spend an additional $12.5 million on this project during the next four fiscal years, the budget shows, and construction will take place outside of tourist season, Middleton wrote.

Contact Omar at omar.rodriguezortiz@naplesnews.com, and follow him on Twitter as @Omar_fromPR. Support his work by subscribing to Naples Daily News.