The executive director of the Augusta Land Bank Authority laid out a plan to provide affordable housing to low- and moderate-income people and at the same time address blight in Augusta.
Shawn Edwards brought details of the program to a workshop and blight and affordable housing that had been arranged by Commissioner Ben Hasan. Commissioners John Clarke, Jordan Johnson, Catherine McKnight, Francine Scott, Dennis Williams, Mayor Pro Tem Bobby Williams attended as well as Mayor Hardie Davis Jr.
Using the example of a first-year teacher in Richmond County, making just over $42,000 a year, Edwards explained the individual would need a home in the $100,000 range in order to cover mortgage, insurance, utilities and other, typical monthly expenses. However, it’s not possible to build new housing in that price point.
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He explained a concept called “Living Wage Housing,” which is intermediate, affordable housing for middle income earners. It allows them to build equity and savings by purchasing a lower priced home, while factoring in other expenses.
“What is the product that they have to have in each of the quality-of-life indicators? What level of health care can they actually afford? What level of education can they actually afford? What level of housing can they actually afford? It is not the conversation around how do you increase a household’s income to get them to your benchmark? It’s how do you adjust your benchmark to their existing income. And if that’s even possible, based upon cost of materials, cost of labor, cost of services,” he said.
That, he said, is where the blight ordinance passed by the commission last year, can come into play in combination with $2 million from the funds the city has received so far through the American Rescue Plan Act.
He said the Land Bank can help with the acquisition and demolition of delinquent tax properties. If a structure can be salvaged, he proposed using ARPA funds to rehabilitate the building then offer it for sale. He projected 40 homes could be rehabbed for $30,000 per home.
He said the program would also require partnerships with contractors and developers as well as counselors to provide housing and financial management counseling to prospective buyers.
“We now collaborate extremely well, to try to be able to deal with the blight in the community, the need for affordable housing and how do you transform that into future homeownership, because we understand that Richmond County has to grow in all ways as we see economic development opportunities coming into the area. We understand that working together collaboratively helps everyone,” he said.
Edwards said one thing that needs to happen is to shorten the length of time between when a property is first deemed to be blighted and when the city can force payment of the higher tax bill that is placed on blighted properties or foreclose on the property and take ownership.
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The current ordinance allows for a two-year period during which the property owner can pay the tax bill and bring the property up to code standards. Edwards recommended reducing that to one year, which is permitted under Georgia law.
“Again, we’re dealing with an economic issue that is blighting your community, and we’re creating a pathway to homeownership to deal with that blight,” Edwards said.
Mayor Davis said he believed the program serves to broaden the discussion about affordable housing for lower and medium income people. He said he believes there are some missing pieces.
“What I know about the thousands of vacant blighted and abandoned properties we have in Augusta, not all of them are suitable for rehab, the majority of them are suitable for being torn down, which then would require new construction. I’m concerned about that. When you look at the cost of construction, notwithstanding labor, and materials, those things have to be front and center in any conversation or discussion that we have,” he said.
Edwards also presented a proposal for the May 31 Administrative Services Committee, a motion to immediately release the $2 million to the Land Bank Authority. He proposed that be approved by the full commission at the June 7 meeting.
Dana Lynn McIntyre is a general assignment reporter for The Augusta Press. Reach her at dana@theaugustapress.com
