000 W Jefferson - Affordable Housing Proposal  

Culver chooses site for entry-level housing development West Jefferson property voted for project to develope more economically diverse apartments, houses

By Jeff Kenney Citizen editor Oct 1, 2015

The town of Culver took concrete steps towards an entry-level housing development last week, though not without a few audience members at the Sept. 22 town council meeting expressing some reseratvations

There are still a number of variables, but if the project proceeds according to council wishes, a combination of apartments and stand-alone houses will be in the works on West Jefferson Street at property owned by Kevin Berger, north of the area occupied today by the 'Puter Pit Stop on that street.

The endeavor is the result of months of efforts by an entry-level housing committee formed last year by the council.

Town manager Jonathan Leist explained that Culver's Redevelopment Commission recently allocated $200,000 towards the project, which earlier this year involved the housing committee's reaching out for a developer capable of handling the effort.

The council discussed that the CRC funds could be used either towards purchase of the mobile home park on the south side of West Jefferson, with the intention of developing new housing there, or alternately towards running utilities from town to the edge of the Berger property, whose larger size would allow for more development than the mobile home site.

Various cost estimates were discussed concerning the Berger property, including the lowest at $200,000, but also a price point of $393,000 to run utilities to the center of Berger's 25 acres, as well as $540,000 to run utilities to the northern end of the site. It was noted some decision needed to be made at the council meeting to allow the Cannel, Indiana-based developer to apply for federal grant funding to move it forward this fall.

CRC member Tom Yuhas listed several pros and cons of each site, noting the town could be stuck with the mobile home park property if it was purchased and the development went forward. Of most concern to several council members was another downside to that land: the displacement of nine families of individuals currently residing there.

Council member Dave Beggs expressed similar concerns but said developing at the Berger property would also give families in the mobile homes a chance to move to the new housing. He pointed to the struggle to keep families in town and the reduction in local student populace as arguments against forcing mobile home park residents to move.

It was noted that rent on apartments at the new development would likely come in at $400 to $800 per month.

Further, some council members noted that any initial development at the Berger site could be added to in the future, given the size of the property and the willingness of Berger hirnsef to support the project

Some discussion centered on future costs to the town at the Berger site, with town clerk Karen Heim noting there is $118,000 in the town's Rainy Day Fund, which could be tapped for some expenses. However, the developer would likely assume the cost of taking utilities into the property from the street, and handling saving, curbing, and lighting once there. With CRC and TIFF funding relating to commercial development, some form of commercial development will be placed on the west end of the property, it was added.

Audience member Patty Stallings asked if townspeople had been consulted as to their support for affordable housing in Culver.

"You're putting a lot into that," she said. "From the people I've talked to, $400 to $800 is not low-income apartment rentals."

Council president Ginny Munroe explained the venture grew from extensive community conversations leading up to Culver's comprehensive plan, which made affordable housing a priority in its final incarnation. The subsequent five-year action plan growing from the comprehensive plan and starting last year also targeted affordable housing. Further, she said the major target for affordable housing centered on three groups: Culver Academies and Culver

Community Schools faculty, and Elkay employees, with the notation that only 17 percent (or about 55 individuals) of the latter plant's employees live in Culver. Munroe added that, with fewer families and teachers at the community school living in Culver, the school corporation has had increased struggles in securing coaching and other after-school activity support. She said groups in those salary ranges, rather than impoverished individuals, were the target group in the town's work.

Stallings and fellow audience member Tom Kearns also asked how the town could ensure that residents of new-developments would not use them as second residences during the summer for lake recreation, though Yuhas said anyone with the income to do so would not qualify for the new housing.

Yuhas went on to explain that income projections relate partly to the average income for Marshall County, which is 45,000, meaning apartment units in the new development would be targeted at individuals making 60 percent of that average, or $27,000 or less. That ceiling would increase with each additional occupant in a given apartment. He also said "scorecard" system gives points for each preferred attribute of the development in the eyes of the government, such as environmental friendliness. The developer - who has developed similar projects across Indiana - would own the properties for 15 years as part of the arrangement.

Mclnturff asserted that Culver already has a low-income apartment complex located on the north end of Forest Place and expressed some concern that the new development would replicate that one. Munroe, however, said the Forest Place complex is designated as Section 8 housing, which includes allowance that residents have no income whatsoever. The new project is planned as a Section 43 development, which requires a minimum income level of at least $13,500 per person.

In response to Stallings' suggestion that the council wait longer to further consider the project, Ricciardi said efforts towards it had been months in the making and that waiting another year would change none of the dynamics. She moved that the project move forward with The Berger property, pending successful grant application from the developer, something the council approved unanimously. The council also approved spending the CRC funds to run infrastructure utilities to the edge of that property, with Beggs abstaining in favor of running utilities instead to the middle of the property.

In response to Kearns' concerns that the town is going too far in assisting the developer with the project, Munroe reiterated the repeated calls for affordable housing in Culver, and council member Jean Rakich noted a similar move was made to facilitate the Garden Court senior housing facility on South Main Street. It was also noted that "many other properties and possibilities" were investigated leading up to the current project.

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Berger property not a new prospect or development

While several assorted factors will need to converge properly to see it come to fruition, Culver's town council last week voted towards developing much-discussed entry-level housing in the Culver area, specifically on property owned on West Jefferson Street by Kevin Berger (who happens to own and operate Easterday Construction on land adjacent to part of the site).

While the move may a new one for the town, Berger has been writing about the possibility of the land as a partial answer to Culver's housing challenges as far back as 2008, on his blog at easterdayconstruction. com blog (look for "Sand Hill Farm," the working name he gave the potential project at the time).

The property, he told the Citizen is made up of approximately 25 acres on the east side of S.R. 17 behind the properties fronting on Jefferson Street from the Boetsma property down to a little east of the Culcom/'Puter Pit Stop building.

Berger spent many hours playing on the property as a child (and he's not alone in so doing), his family having moved to a nearby spot on Washington Street when he was in fourth grade.

"The property was owned by my father's aunt and uncle, Katy and Everett Easterday," says Berger. "My understanding & that it was passed down from Katy's family as part of the Easterday farm directly across S.R. 17 to the west. The other 15 (or so) acres that runs on up to Academy Road behind the ball diamonds belongs to my parents. It is part of Russell Easterday's farm that included the farmland north of 10 and 17 north of the high school and at one time included the property that the high school sits on. Russell was my great grandfather and the founder of Easterday Construction."

When Katy Easterday passed away most of the property was auction off and Berger purchased that on the east side of State Route 17 in 2005.

"My thoughts on the two properties (have) always neen to tie them together with the majority of the 25 acres being used for commercial/industrial development with the upper 15 acres being developed as mixed use residential. The mix of use could vary depending on the demand." Housing concerns in Culver have long been on Berger's mind, and he has posited his belief that the spike in housing costs in Culver are the result of, among other factors, the addition of boat slip rentals at the town park, making the town itself viable for the first as a more affordable form of lake property ownership, even if less direct than houses situated immediately on the shore.

And while a number of ideas and theories have circulated as to addressing the challenges facing Culver's workforce in a community whose homes are increasingly becoming second - or vacation getaway - homes, Berger's sense of direction on matter was honed last fall at an affordable housing conference he attended in Chicago on behalf of the town (he details that experience in a blog post as weill).

"I learned quite a bit about the affordable housing programs that are financed through tax credits," he recalls. "It was through this conference that I brought back ideas for affordable housing to the town council and from that start the Entry Level Housing Committee was formed. While we are planning to use the affordable housing program, we decided to discuss it as 'Entry Level Housing' for a couple of reasons: 'Affordable Housing' has a bad connotation and is often mistakenly associated with the old Section 8 Housing (as occurred at the most recent town council meeting); and second, 'Entry Level Housing' was a better description of what our goals were.

"From the beginning, the committee targeted the new employees slated to be added to the Elkay staff (in Culver) and new teachers both at the community school and the Culver Academies. I was able to gather several contacts from those I met at the Affordable Housing Conference. Interestingly though, the final developer that we are working with came through a contact that Jonathan Leist made.

"I think the moves that are being made will open the property up for other development that will eventually be good for the town," he adds.

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Culver Town Council to Hear Public Input on Housing Project
Posted on May 17, 2017Author Anita Goodan

The Culver Town Council will be opening up a public input session for discussion of the Sand Hill Farms workforce housing development project.

Town Manager Jonathan Leist explained that the project has been in the town’s comprehensive plan ince the plan’s adoption in 2014. The lack of housing was identified as one of the main issues in the plan. Leist said a committee was formed to look into the project.

“We started a housing committee several years ago and they looked at a number of different sites – I think we had five sites and 10 different developers we met with over a six month period. We ended up settling on Sand Hill Farm on Jefferson Street,” commented Leist.

The housing project became part of the town’s application for the Stellar Communities designation last year. Since the town was not chosen as a Stellar Community, the Culver Town Council and the Culver Redevelopment Commission (CRC) are looking at ways to fund the project with or without Stellar funding. According to Leist, a Regional Cities grant worth over $200,000 was awarded toward the project last year and an effort toward some financial viability needs to be submitted by June 1 to keep that award.

Leist said the project has been amended since last year.

Originally when we annexed the property and looked at it as a Stellar Communities project, the commitment from the town was $200,000 for infrastructure that would basically take water and sewer to the site or slightly inside of the property. The discussion at our last meeting was taking water, sewer and the street up to the first apartment building rather than just to the property line.”

The CRC would finance $400,000 for the 24-unit apartment building project with nearly the same financial obligation from the Culver Town Council.

The town council and CRC met in joint session last week where several residents spoke out about the project so the joint entities tabled a housing development agreement and two resolutions in order to gather more opinions before moving forward. Public comment concerning this project will be taken in a public input session on Tuesday, May 23 at 6:30 p.m. ET at the Culver Town Hall prior to the regular public meeting agenda of the town council that evening.