Over 70 units of affordable housing come to area near Woodlawn Cemetery
By Sam Catanzaro
A 70-unit-plus affordable housing development broke ground recently in Santa Monica’s Pico neighborhood.
On February 9, R.D. Olson Construction announced it had broke ground on a 73-unit, 94,000-square-foot, affordable housing community at 1834 14th Street in Santa Monica, across from Woodlawn Cemetery. The project, called Las Flores Santa Monica is expected to be complete in fall of 2022 with a mix of 35 one-, 19 two- and 19 three-bedroom units.
“Low-cost housing, particularly in high-cost areas, such as Santa Monica, is in extremely short supply in Southern California,” said Bill Wilhelm, president of R.D. Olson Construction.
R.D. Olson is partnering with developer Community Corporation of Santa Monica and architect DE Architects on the project. As reported by Urbanize, as of April 2020, Community Corp. has secured $20.6 million in funds for the project from the City of Santa Monica. The report went on to say that bank loans and tax credit equity are expected to account for the rest of Las Flores’ construction costs.
Just a block north of Las Flores is another affordable housing project underway. Located at 1413 Michigan Avenue, developer EAH Housing is proposing a project–known as The Laurel–that would entail the construction of a four-story building on the property with 58 apartments (including 57 permanent supportive housing units), 12 parking spaces and ground-floor amenities. The property currently contains Nikkei Hall, a historic building with ties to the city’s Japanese community that has been unused for 20 years.
