Vengroff Abandons Sarasota Affordable Housing Project (Bee Ridge, Laurel: low income, apartment complex, renting)

[wondermint2]

Vengroff abandons Sarasota affordable housing project - News - Sarasota Herald-Tribune - Sarasota, FL

Kind of surprising and not good news for working-class folks trying to get by on modest wages. Are there any other comparable projects in the works? I reckon Sarasota will always primarily be a place for independently wealthy retirees.

[Sunshine Rules]

Vengroff then explained: “I have decided not to continue to spend any additional funds for the development application or any other fees to the City of Sarasota.

“Since we started this process several years ago, building costs have increased substantially and impact fees make our project no longer affordable.”

[d4g4m]

'Impact fee' Thousands of dollars paid up front to the County before the lot is even cleared.

[beach43ofus]

Can anyone tell me how this "problem" is manifesting itself? Every restaurant I go to has plenty of staff, there are nurses in the Doctor's offices I go to, every retail establishment seems to have plenty of help, even car washes (which is pretty hard work outside in the weather here) are fully staffed. I'm not seeing any labor shortage at all.

Grocery stores fully staffed, Starbucks, UPS Store, Banks, retail stores in the malls all fully staffed. None of these folks are destitute and living on the streets.

If its a bad labor market where entry level participants are living in their cars, or on the streets, I'm not seeing it.

All these wonderful people who we all value so much seem to be fine to me. In fact, they seem quite content.

Seems to me that this developer tried to provide low cost housing, and the city, or county, wouldn't give them a deal on the impact fees, so they took their marbles and went home.

Looks to me like the city/county agrees with me that there's not really a problem regarding affordable housing around here.

Can anyone who reads this website honestly tell me they have been unable to attain any goods or services they sought out due to the lack of affordable housing? I've been here since June 30th, and I have not had any issues at all.

[craigiri]

One word - mobile homes.
But, honestly, it doesn't do a whole lotta good for a landscape. So if you want a city and county full of trailer parks, that's where we are going.

Also - traffic. Those low cost workers don't live near their jobs.

Think.

[beach43ofus]

Apartments are what Mr. Vengroff proposed, not mobile homes.

Government uses taxes, fees, laws, restrictions, regulations, ect. as tools to control human behavior within their jurisdictions.

By applying these tools (or not), Governments don't have to openly state (by the written or verbal word) what they want, or don't want. Instead, they just use the tools, or don't use the tools.

Mr. Vengroff was either misled, or failed to get the "message" Sarasota County was sending via their tools. Or, the County simply changed its mind on his plans. Maybe new County Commissioners were elected after he began the process who saw his plans differently than their predecessors.

[beach43ofus]

As a follow up, Wondermint2 and craigiri will both be pleased to know that Sarasota County has adopted the 2050 plan which mandates 15% of new housing developments include "attainable" housing for people who earn below median incomes.

These are not mobile homes, but real homes/condo/villa's.

You see, if they allow large scale low income...oops, I mean "attainable" housing in a high-density format (like Mr. Vengroff planned), they have a strong probability of winding up with a high-crime infested apartment complex.

Now, if they take those same low-income residents, spread them out in smaller groups, and force them into more affluent neighborhoods, our County Commissioners are hoping that will reduce, or eliminate, crime amongst that same low-income population. I'm not sure exactly how that is supposed to happen, do you? Peer pressure? Community policing?

Time will tell if their social engineering experiment will be successful, but since I don't have a better solution, or evidence to the contrary, I'll have to take a wait and see posture towards it. We'll know about Ten years from now after their 2050 plan is implemented, and the crime statistics are tabulated. I'm trying hard to be optimistic about the outcome.

Do you agree with the County Commissioners that their 2050 plan is a better way to provide low-crime, attainable housing for low-income residents?

Or, are we just exposing our more affluent residents to a low-income population that is more likely to commit crimes?

Or, do you feel there is little, or no connection at all, between income level, and criminal activity?

[craigiri]

Originally Posted by beach43ofus

Or, are we just exposing our more affluent residents to a low-income population that is more likely to commit crimes?

Or, do you feel there is little, or no connection at all, between income level, and criminal activity?

Little or no connection.

What you seem to be saying is that those thousands of people we come in contact with every week at restaurants, stores and everywhere else where the pay is less than $20+ per hour are salivating for the day when 15% of them have a decent townhouse near some people who make more......and they are getting ready to form gangs and take your stuff.

Not IMHO...nor in my experience. Ever hear of the Mt Laurel Decision? I lived there for 26 years.

I now also live in one of the highest end towns in the USA and they have large neighborhoods of low cost housing (subsidized, I assume).

In fact, you already know a major criminal from there - his name is Flynn and his network includes his son and probably many other criminals.

[beach43ofus]

Thx for your opinion. I wasn't making any statements whatsoever, just stating facts, some doubt, and my enthusiasm for a positive outcome. I'd love to hear from others in this forum. Will this work, or not?

[Easy Life]

Not surprised at all within The City of Sarasota and Sarasota County government


For decades upon decades these governments have intentionally slow walked or directly denied permits for even upscale "apartments", not to mention mid-priced other multi-family/cluster housing!


For decades upon decades Sarasota, en masse has dissuaded builders' applications and sneakily "encouraged" (aka referred) these same builders to seek locations in MANATEE COUNTY, not "Sarasota" (unless of course it was Northport..lol)


Sarasota did the same sneaky, elitist ckrap with manaufacturing/small businesse.


Nope, I'm not a newcomer either, not by a LONGshot.


One other poster is also very correct in that the "worker bees" arriving to all of these lousy jobs in Sarasota (which indeed are somewhat plentiful), DO NOT LIVE near their SRQ jobs whatsoever.


In fact, the bifurcation of jobs is so dramatic (i.e. earnings) that a very large percentage of these "worker bees" within SRQ have ONE to THREE ROOMATES in many many cases. Just drive around AT LATE NIGHT in a number of neighborhoods (single family), around Beneva, Webber, Clark, Bee Ridge, 17th, Lockwood, etc and you will invariably see houses with 3-5 unrelated vehicles (sometimes more) in the driveways on lawns or on the street in front of various houses all the time on a continuum.


One subdivision within Manatee County just off Whitfield, called "RIOMAR" had/has a tremendous problem with larger house owners renting out their houses to one lessee and the lessees turning around and renting out rooms to 3 other occupants. Some of these houses were larger 3100 sq ft houses even with pools.


It got so bad that the female contract MAIL CARRIER complained to the USPS and the HOA because she couldn't ascertain with confidence of who was living where, for how long, or even still living at the houses address. I know of several house owners who ended up selling their houses for that reason and others, and moved to another development. This multiple occupant event is also very commonplace in subdivisions all within Palm Aire as well.