A group of city and county officials broke ground Wednesday on a future supportive housing complex in San Ysidro.

The San Ysidro Senior Village will offer supportive housing to homeless residents 55 and older, including senior veterans. The complex includes 50 housing units and one for a site manager. In addition, county health officials and local social services organizations like Father Joe’s Villages and the Hope Through Housing Foundation will provide services like mental health care, substance abuse services and custodial nursing care.

“When this is done, that’s when the real building begins, because we’re going to be building not just buildings, but we’re going to be building people’s lives,” said Brian Woods, senior director of strategic partnerships for the Hope Through Housing Foundation. “So we’re going to change the lives of the 50 people that live here and we’re going to rebuild those lives.”

The San Diego Housing Commission awarded $760,000 in funding for the project to the developer National Community Renaissance via the agency’s Housing First San Diego initiative. The San Diego City Council also authorized a loan of $5.5 million for the complex, totaling $6.2 million.

Future tenants of the apartment complex will receive rent assistance, made possible by federal housing vouchers. The Housing Commission will fund nearly $80 million in housing between 2018 and 2020 as part of Housing First San Diego.

“This is going to offer long-term, community-based permanent supportive housing with high-quality wraparound services,” said John Seymour, vice president of acquisitions and forward planning for National Community Renaissance. “So it’s just not the sticks and the bricks. It’s not just permanent supportive housing. It goes beyond that.”

The San Ysidro Senior Village will eventually sit in the Sunset Neighborhood, less than a mile from the Beyer Boulevard trolley station. Developers expect the complex to take roughly 18 months to complete and receive Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design designation from the U.S. Green Building Council, certifying it as a sustainable development.

— City News Service

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