Jamestown Development Director Crystal Surdyk addresses citizens at the Housing Committee Meeting (March 10, 2025)
The City of Jamestown is looking at reallocating $640,000 in HOME funds toward rehabilitating the Gateway Lofts Project site.
The resolution would reallocate the monies from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development from fiscal years 2020 through 2024
If approved, the monies would assist in the rehabilitation of the former Chautauqua Hardware building on Water Street into 110 supportive housing rental units.
Southern Tier Environments for Living, or STEL, has been working making the project a reality since 2018 and appears to be getting closer to raising the $77 million needed for the project.
Director of Development Crystal Surdyk said under the original agreement, STEL agreed to use $350,000 to mitigate housing issues by demolishing properties in the City. She said initially, this would have led to around 20 houses being demolished but due to increased costs, it would be less now.
Even though they are a non-profit, STEL agreed to pay an $85,000 payment in lieu of taxes (PILOT) to the City for 15 years.
During a review of the resolution at Monday night’s City Council work session, Council member at large Jeff Russell questioned if the HOME monies could be used for something else if Council doesn’t pass the resolution.
Surdyk said that in the short term, there is “nothing in the hopper” that the funds could be used on and that any projects have to meet HOME program requirements, “But, we would have to create a program. And we would have to have the capacity to administer that program. And right now, I can tell you, we do not. Not with the number of projects we have open that we’re trying to administer.”
Surdyk said the funding can’t be used to demolitions. She added that there is some urgency to spend the monies as there are questions as to what will happen with future federal funding for the Community Development Block grant program and HOME program.
Surdyk said if, for some reason, the Gateway Lofts project does not move forward that the city’s funding could still be used to rehabilitate the site, which is a designated Brownfield site.
She said STEL will be requested to attend the Public Hearing on March 31 to answer questions ahead of City Council voting on the matter that same night.
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