Housing News

The Golden Gate Village Public Housing Complex in Marin County achieved a significant milestone in rehabilitating it.

The Marin Housing Authority’s Board of Commissioners includes all five Marin county supervisors along with two tenant commissioners who approved the agreement and enabled the county to provide a $3 Million loan to the housing authority so that it can implement its redevelopment plan as soon as possible.

The Housing Authority’s Director Kimberly Carroll said, “Completing the rehab in the most expedient process available to us is in the best interest of the residents of Golden Gate Village as well as the Marin Housing Authority”.

The given funds will cover both the pre-development and the post-development costs if there are additional funds after the pre-development expenses have been covered.

It is revealed that the Housing Authority has already spent $257,000 to hire a consultant recommended by the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) and will use some of the loans to cover those costs.

Golden Gate Village is a nearly 60-year-old complex that requires Millions of dollars of repairs due to the lack of funding by the federal government.

In November 2022, A redevelopment plan was approved by the Housing Authority’s Commissioners that calls for a limited partnership to be formed during the purchase of the buildings and land from the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). The general partner will be the housing authority. The equity will be supplied to the project by the limited partner in return for the tax credits.

According to this scheme, Section 18 of the U.S. Housing Act of 1937 will be used for the conversion of public housing to project-based section 8 voucher assistance. Besides this, Section 18 allows the housing authorities to partner with private investors to finance debt and access other available funds to redevelop Public Housing.

The plan has some financial components that include:

• $26 Million in historic tax credit equity solely because of the site’s historic status
• $102 Million in loan
• $69 Million seller carryback loan
• $13 Million deferred developer fee
• $1.8 Million in accrued interest

Burbank Housing, a Sanoma-based nonprofit, was selected by the Marin Housing Authority to serve as the development partner for this project in December.

The Golden Gate Village resident council along with its supporters who lobbied using a limited equity housing cooperative model instead, opposed the overall plan.

The President of the Resident Council, Royce McLemore including other commenters revealed that they have gained a new understanding of how long the Section 18 process is likely to take following a two-day training by the housing authority.

The former CEO of the Housing Commission of Anne Arundel County in Maryland, Clif Martin conducted the training and emphasized the training of residents on how to organize a resident management corporation to take some of the responsibilities of operating Golden Gate Village after the conversion. Several attendees found the other aspects of the training quite interesting.

Barbara Bogard said, “The major takeaway for me was that the Section 18 conversion process is vastly more complex and complicated than any of us have been led to believe.”

Martin took the portfolio of 1100 public housing units that he oversaw in Maryland via numerous government conversion programs including Section 18.

If the project intends to use low-income housing tax credits as is the case with most conversions, they will have to enter the state competition to obtain them. The fact that the Golden Gate Village Complex has been listed on the National Register is enough to add a layer of complexity to the process.