The City of Alamosa in southern Colorado has secured $4.2 million for the building of infrastructure that will be a crucial part of a new and big affordable housing community.
That funding is coming through the state’s Department of Local Affairs in the form of what is called a Transformational Affordable Housing Grant.
The Tierra Azul project is set to go up near the intersection of South Craft Drive and West 8th Street on a sweeping and currently vacant 43-acre site. That site was earlier purchased by the nonprofit group Community Resources & Housing Development Corporation.
Long in the planning stage, the Tierra Azul project is expected to be developed over a span of six phases, resulting in the building of 406 new affordable housing units.
According to city documents, the goal of the project is to develop a “diversity of affordable housing typologies to appropriately address the housing needs of Alamosa.”
That diversity of housing will include everything from single-family and multi-family houses to townhomes, and apartment buildings.
The project has been in the talking and planning stage for at least three years and is expected to have an expansive development life, taking at least 25 years to finally complete.
Regarded as a game-changer by many in local housing industry, the project has been described by the Alamosa Citizen as “Alamosa’s largest-ever housing development.”
While Tierra Azul, according to its supporters, will be designed to substantially increase Alamosa’s affordable housing stock, it will also have housing units for all the components of the modern housing market base, including families, single homeowners, renters, and seniors.
The $4.2 million grant awarded to the Tierra Azul project is part of a larger $48 million in grants via Colorado’s Transformational Housing Program, which this year is providing funding for affordable housing projects in 13 counties of the Centennial State.
By Garry Boulard
