Atlanta Housing continues its implementation of the Choice Atlanta Housing Plan with the imminent groundbreaking for blocks G and F of Scholars Landing. The new development will ultimately fully replace The University Homes Public Housing Project, which was demolished in 2009. Blocks G and F will create 130 and 84 new mixed-income apartments units, respectively. The site development for each block is expected to cost $300,000. When completed, Scholars Landing will total 606 mixed-income units, including 100 affordable senior rental units and a 60-unit independent senior living complex which have already been constructed.
Scholars Landing is emblematic of the “Atlanta Model” of mixed-income, public/private partnership driven affordable housing development that seeks to replace traditional public housing complexes. In 2010, Atlanta Housing was awarded a Choice Neighborhoods Planning grant to develop a Neighborhood Transformation Plan (NTP), and in 2015, HUD awarded Atlanta Housing a $30 million Choice Neighborhoods Implementation Grant to construct Scholars Landing. Atlanta Housing leveraged an additional $400 million in funding to begin development of the complex in 2015.
The University Homes Public Housing complex was the country’s first public housing complex for African Americans, built by the Public Works Administration in 1937 as part of the New Deal. The complex was composed of 675 affordable family units, all of which were demolished in 2009. The complex’s Roosevelt Administration Building is the only structure to have been preserved and is slated to be renovated to become Scholars Landing community hub and resource center.
According to Atlanta Housing’s Reoccupancy Plan, Scholars Landing will include 229 Atlanta Housing-assisted replacement units, which will be reserved for previous occupants of University Homes who wish to return to the neighborhood as part of the “Right to Return” policy. In addition to the replacement units, there will be 79 Workforce units (rental units affordable to household incomes at or above 80% to 120% of Area Median Income [AMI]), 24 Low Income Housing Tax Credit (rental units affordable to household incomes at or below 60 percent of AMI) units, and 125 market-rate units. The project will also include 33 for-sale townhomes to be constructed at a later date.
