Jul 6, 2015

A 103-unit Tenderloin affordable housing project that has struggled to find financing for more than a decade won the state’s largest affordable housing grant this week, which will help hasten development.

Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corp.’s Eddy and Taylor project received $10 million from California’s cap-and-trade program. It’s the second major win for the project in the past month, after developer Forest City Enterprises agreed to pour $18 million into the project as part of a deal to get its large 5M mixed-use project approved.

“We are now beyond that critical mass where we can proceed with finishing the design, construction documents, permitting, all that stuff,” said Donald Falk, TNDC’s executive director. “We’re a little more than two years away” from starting construction, he said.

In all, the state dished out$47 million to Bay Area affordable housing projects that are near transit. TNDC’s 143-unit Mission Bay South Block 6 also won $5 million. Six East Bay projects received $23 million in grant money.

Falk said the nonprofit developer hopes to get grants totaling $5 million to $7 million from the state later this year, which would fully finance the Eddy and Taylor project. Affordable housing projects typically need to layer several sources of financing, particularly low-income housing tax credits that nonprofit developers can sell to investors.