SAN DIEGO (CNS) - Father Joe's Villages, which provides programs and housing for San Diego's homeless, and a Carlsbad-based development firm Friday announced a coordinated plan to build a mixed-use property with affordable housing in the downtown area.
The city had tagged the parcel at the corner of 13th Street and Broadway to be used for affordable housing prior to the announced partnership between the nonprofit organization and Chelsea Investment Corp. The development will be 14 stories high and include 273 apartments, outdoor recreation spaces, a rooftop deck and supportive services like job training and counseling provided by Father Joe's.
Head Start, the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services' early- childhood education program for low-income families, will open an education center on the building's bottom floor, to be managed by the Neighborhood House Association.
"In this time of crisis, it remains clear that the true end to a person's homelessness is a home," said Father Joe's President and CEO Deacon Jim Vargas. "For the families and individuals who move into these apartments, access to the support they need right in the same building means they can maintain stability and avoid experiencing homelessness again or prevent it altogether."
Including the development, Father Joe's and the Chelsea Investment Corp. plan to create more than 2,000 new affordable housing units in San Diego in the coming years. Father Joe's will also begin renovating converted motels into housing units and plans to break ground on a separate downtown affordable housing complex in 2019.
San Diego-based architecture firm Joseph Wong Design Associates designed the downtown project. The developers expect to begin construction in 2020, with completion targeted for 2022.
"As a family-owned and operated company, we see the need to invest in innovative housing development that will allow more of San Diego's most vulnerable families to find stability," says Chelsea Investment Corp. CEO Jim Schmid. "This mixed-use approach at 13th and Broadway means we are able to get creative to meet the needs of the community."
