The Fairfax County Board of Supervisors directed staff last Tuesday (Sept. 9) to take a six-month-long deep dive into current housing policies, hoping to eliminate bureaucratic hurdles hampering the creation of more affordable units across the community.
“This is absolutely an essential part of our economic strategy,” said Board Chairman Jeff McKay, who proposed the action. “It comes up in every conversation with the public.”
The Fairfax County Board of Supervisors on Tuesday (Sept. 9) adopted a package of new guidelines for relocating tenants when affordable apartments are slated for redevelopment, acquisition or condominium conversion.
“The overarching goal is to assist displaced tenants in moving to safe and affordable replacement housing convenient to their employment or school, while facilitating tenants’ return to preserved affordable units to the greatest extent possible,” county staff said in the report’s overview.
The One University housing complex in Fairfax weathered widespread community opposition, rising costs and a worldwide pandemic during its decade of progression from concept to reality.
But affordable housing supporters are confident that the development near George Mason University’s campus just outside Fairfax City was, in the end, worth the trials and tribulations.
A church that wants to build affordable housing on its campus in the Herndon area will soon step up its efforts to win over skeptical neighbors.
The Community of Faith United Methodist Church announced on Wednesday (Aug. 20) that it has partnered with the affordable housing developer Pennrose on the project, which could bring around 90 apartments to its 8.9-acre property at 13224 Franklin Farm Road.
Members of the City of Fairfax Planning Commission reacted generally favorably to a conceptual plan that would massively redevelop a key stretch of Main Street (Route 236).
“I like the concept, I like the responsiveness,” commission chair James Feather said Monday night (June 14) after a briefing on the proposal by Van Metre Companies plan to redevelop the Fairfax Square Professional Center, an office and retail park at 9840-9946 Main Street.
Plans to redevelop the Crescent Apartments, which trace their lineage nearly back to Reston’s founding, took a key procedural step forward on Tuesday (July 16).
The Fairfax County Board of Supervisors voted 9-0 to transfer the 16.5-acre site to the Fairfax County Redevelopment and Housing Authority, enabling the agency to work on finding a private partner for the redevelopment project.
Housing costs are daunting for Fairfax County residents in general, but for seniors with limited financial resources, even subsidized housing options are becoming increasingly beyond their means, county staff say.
“We’re starting to see some disconnect,” Fairfax County Department of Housing and Community Development Director Tom Fleetwood said, describing the “emerging challenges” to the Board of Supervisors at a housing committee meeting on Tuesday (July 8).
Fairfax County’s efforts to support additional affordable housing may have received an unexpected boost from the recently passed federal budget reconciliation act.
County officials are working through the details, but the changes in federal law could represent “a significant step forward” in financing affordable housing, Tom Fleetwood, director of the county’s Department of Housing and Community Development, told the Board of Supervisors at a housing committee meeting yesterday (Tuesday).
A high-priority project to create more affordable housing in Merrifield is officially underway.
Officials with Fairfax County and developer Conifer Realty broke ground Monday (June 23) on a project to repurpose the currently vacant, four-floor office building at 2990 Telestar Court as an 80-unit affordable apartment building.
A nearly 60% reduction in initially proposed units has not swayed many Franklin Farm residents to support efforts to bring affordable housing to a church site in their community.
But the project nonetheless took a procedural step forward at a Fairfax County Planning Commission meeting on May 22.
