Collier County Affordable Housing Grant Nixed By State

The state of Florida has rejected a much-touted and anticipated application for a $5 million state grant to build workforce housing specifically for essential service personnel such as teachers and law enforcement officers in Collier County, the Naples Daily News reports.

Charged with choosing the grant recipients picked 11 of 33 applications from across the state to receive a portion of the $50 million set aside last legislative session to help generate more affordable housing across the state for essential workers, The Florida Housing Finance Corp. went with other applicants.

While the future of Florida housing is an issue that hits close to millions, the application being turned down has to be especially painful for Collier County, considering the law creating the fund itself was sponsored by Naples Rep. Mike Davis, who shepherded the massive bill through both houses of the Legislature.

The law was designed to give special preference to 10 high-growth, high-cost counties in Florida, which many thought made Collier a shoo-in, because with the Naples housing market and several other overvalued, expensive areas, it is the highest-cost county in the state.

But even as Florida mortgage problems mount in the area, the application was rejected because the committee didn’t agree that Collier met the $5.2 million contribution required, according to Bill Klohn, president of MDG Capital Corp., the developer of the 300-unit project.

The e-mail said the committee accepted $4.6 million in contributions but didn’t accept the $700,000 in impact fees that were to be deferred. The winning applicants had waived the impact fees, not simply deferred them. Collier County government doesn’t waive impact fees.

MDG Capital said Saturday that it intends to go ahead with the 300-unit Fountain Lakes development in East Naples.

Some 150 of the new condo units were to have been subsidized with the $5 million, bringing the prices of the units low enough for essential service workers to purchase. The other 150 were to be priced at fair market value.

The legislation called for public-private partnerships, including Naples hospitals, the Sheriff’s Office, the Collier County School District, and the city of Naples, each of which was to get 30 units.

Rising Florida mortgage loan costs have made the dream of home ownership next to impossible for many in Southwest Florida. It remains to be seen if hurdles such as this can be overcome, or if that dream will continue to die hard for millions.