Leon County commissioners advance plan to fund affordable housing by diverting money to roads

TALLAHASSEE, Fla. (WCTV) – The Leon County Commission is considering a proposal to redirect funding from road improvement projects to affordable housing.

During Tuesday’s commission meeting, county commissioners voted to allow staff to review the proposal proposed by the Capital Area Justice Department (CAJM).

The vote came after CAJM announced they plan to urge county commissioners to reallocate nearly $1.2 million annually to affordable housing. However, this money has already been spent on improving roads.

“However, we know that if you have the will, there is a way to be creative and achieve more,” said Rev. Dr. Latricia Scriven. “And we believe that finding affordable housing for our community members should be at the top of that list.”

If CAJM’s proposal is approved, county commissioners would shift road money from road projects to housing projects.

Their plan is quite simple and based on the Pinellas County program. Leon County bought land every year and leased it cheap to a developer.

In exchange, the developer will build a certain number of affordable apartments for both low and “extremely low” income people.

“And that’s so important because the affordable housing that’s been built in this area provides 82%, 100% of the median income, and we’re talking about people between the ages of 30 and 50,” said the Rev. Dr. Robert Gibbs. “And they spend more than half their income on rent.”

The redistribution was almost passed at the previous Blueprint meeting. Blueprint is a sales tax authority whose dollars are controlled by a joint board of all county and city commissioners.

While most of this tax goes to Blueprint, some goes directly to the county. With Blueprint’s five county commissioners supporting the project, CJAM believes they will have better luck with Leon County.

“Yes, people came because they cared,” Scriven said. “They are concerned that in our community there are more than 16,000 families struggling to find affordable housing specifically for people with very low and extremely low incomes.”

At Tuesday’s meeting, CJAM representatives were asked why the city of Tallahassee had not agreed to a similar program. Gibbs told WCTV they’ve been trying to get their program adopted by city commissioners for the past few years, but have had no luck.

CJAM hopes to prove that the program will work with the county first, which could convince the city to join.

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