An exterior rendering of City Center Lofts in downtown Green Bay. PC: Fox 11 Online
GREEN BAY, WI (WTAQ-WLUK) — A new nonprofit is looking at bringing more affordable housing to downtown Green Bay, but the plan is receiving strong resistance from the current and former mayor, as well as business owners and leaders.
The Gateway Collective plans to bring ‘socially inclusive housing,’ or affordable housing, to the second floor of the Baylake City Center building.
Two major concerns being raised are a lack of windows for 24 of the 72 units, and the project goes against a downtown development plan created nine years ago.
Construction is underway on what will be known as City Center Lofts. The development is being billed as socially inclusive housing for individuals and families of all income levels.
“To my knowledge, there is nothing like this in the city or in the region,” said Alexia Wood, executive director of The Gateway Collective and former executive director of St. John’s homeless shelter.
Baylake City Center is made up of 12 condo units. The Gateway Collective has agreed to buy the affected six units for $16 million.
Seventy percent of the apartments will be reserved for the workforce, or individuals making between about $33,000 and $66,000 a year, or 60%-120% of the area median income.
“We believe that if we can bring housing stability to the local workforce that local business and small business owners are going to have a stronger workforce both to attract and recruit from but then also retain,” said Wood.
Wood says a capital campaign to help cover the down payment for the development has local business support.
However, business leaders and owners voiced concerns about the plan during a recent meeting of Green Bay’s Redevelopment Authority. They included Steve Schneider, who says he owns 24 downtown properties and has created 270 downtown jobs in the past five years.
“I think we’ve got to open up our pockets, buy that property and then we wouldn’t have this problem,” said Schneider.
Schneider says the city should have purchased the property when a downtown development plan was passed in 2014 that calls for the Baylake City Center to be torn down for the extension of Pine Street and new green space. Jim Schmitt helped come up with the plan as the mayor at the time.
“This plan does not call for socially inclusive housing,” said Schmitt during the June 13 RDA meeting. “This is something that I think we should take a look at but not at that site.”
Another concern raised at the meeting is 24 units are on the building’s interior and currently will only get natural light from large windows to common area hallways that have skylights.
“The design that has been presented to us is substandard,” said Green Bay Mayor Eric Genrich.
“We are continuing to look at opportunities to bringing more natural light into those interior spaces,” said Wood.
Often times, city officials can influence development plans through zoning and permitting. With this project, there isn’t much they can do as the plans already meet city regulations, according to Green Bay Economic Development Director Neil Stechschulte.
“Throughout the project, we’ve worked with appraisers, we’ve worked with financial institutions, we’ve met with property management companies,” said Wood. “None of those experts in this market have asked us to pause out of concern we wouldn’t be able to lease those interior units.”
Wood also points out that since the downtown development plan was passed, all 12 units of the Baylake City Center have been put up for sale, most seeing little or no interest.
The Gateway Collective hopes to eventually create more socially inclusive housing in the area based on the success it believes it will see with the City Center Lofts.
“There is that buy in from individuals in this community, local business support,” said Wood. “And then from there, we are able to cash flow the housing development through rental income both of tenants and of the commercial space, and then over time, reinvest those funds back into the concept itself.”
Rent will start at $800 and go up to $2,200 for a market rate four-bedroom unit.
Square footage will range from 770 feet to 2,200 square feet.
Wood says the first tenants will likely be able to occupy City Center Lofts early next year.
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