If you pay attention to election maps, especially ones that focus on Florida, Alachua County is hard to miss.
See that blue area in the north central part of Florida? That’s Alachua County, a reliable Democratic holdout even as much of the state, including one-time Democratic stronghold Miami-Dade County, goes red.
To someone who doesn’t live in Alachua County, it sure seems like a progressive part of the state, and truthfully, on many issues it is. But on housing, a core issue, one that affects the county on almost every level, Alachua County has repeatedly gone conservative.
The latest area failure on housing took place during Tuesday’s County Commission meeting where the county once again voted against an affordable housing project at Dogwood Village that would have provided 96 new affordable homes that might have served nearly 300 people. Ability Housing, the non-profit developer on this project, has a sterling reputation of building low income housing in the state. Ability received a $15 million grant from the state to develop this project. The cost to the county was just $460,000.
In arguing against this affordable housing project, County Commissioners argued that the East Gainesville location was not ideal. They might want to look at a map of the area again. The proposed site is across the street from a park and two schools and a short bike ride from Boulware Springs Park and a recreational center. And according to the Gainesville Sun, the site is “along several transit routes and, unlike most east Gainesville neighborhoods, is conveniently located within 2 miles of three different grocery chains, several banks and pharmacies.”
County Commissioner Ken Cornell cited a disproportionate amount of low income housing projects on the east side of Gainesville as one reason he opposed the project, but the numbers he used were way off. Cornell said 85% of affordable housing was already located in East Gainesville. The Shinberg Center for Housing Studies says that only 46% of affordable housing county-wide was located in the east.
Curiously, City Commissioner Desmon Duncan-Walker (who, housing votes aside, seems like a legit awesome person) came out in opposition to more affordable housing being built in her district, explaining that affordable housing should be built in “resource-rich neighborhoods” and that her district is “not a resource-rich neighborhood.” Denying more affordable housing won’t do anything to make District 1 a resource-rich area.
When taken together, the comments made by Duncan-Walker and Cornell expressed conceptual support for affordable housing projects. Cornell had previous said this was the “right project in the wrong location.” It’s possible he thought it was the wrong location because he was relying on faulty data. I believe Cornell and the other county commissioners who voted against the Dogwood Village project are searching for the perfect affordable project: ideal developer, ideal location.
The perfect project doesn’t exist.
But this one was pretty close to ideal, with a reputable developer who was interested in improving the neighborhood and a large portion of the funding covered by the State of Florida. Commissioners Cornell, Chuck Chestnut, and Marihelen Wheeler couldn’t support it.
On the easy issues that most folks can agree on, the city and the county do a pretty good job of pushing forward progressive issues. But on the hard ones, the ones that have real impact, on housing, homelessness, and affordable housing, time and time again, the city and the county come up empty, caving into the dozen or so usual public commenters (some of whom are landlords and have some financial interest in keeping our housing stock artificially low) who show up to local governmental meetings.
Between voting against affordable housing in East Gainesville and voting against allowing multifamily housing anywhere, it’s a fair question of where in Alachua County would both county and city commissioners want housing to be built. By their votes, the implicit answer is to support more single family housing developments, which are not affordable and promote sprawl, out west. And in voting against affordable housing and voting against comprehensive rezoning to allow more homes to be built while simultaneously allowing or in some cases encouraging homeless camp sweeps, city and county commissioners give the impression that they either don’t care about housing issues or aren’t serious about seeking solutions to housing issues. All county and city commissioners offer consistently are increasingly empty words of support for the concept of affordable housing. That won’t help someone find a home.