CHICAGO — Preservation of Affordable Housing (POAH) has broken ground on Fifth City Commons, an affordable housing development located on a long-vacant site in the city’s East Garfield Park area. Phase I will consist of 4,300 square feet of commercial space and 43 one-, two- and three-bedroom apartment units. Completion is slated for mid-2024.
The City of Chicago selected POAH for this project in 2019 as part of the C40 Reinventing Cities competition, an international competition designed to attract highly sustainable development examples to urban sites. POAH has used the time since then for extensive community outreach to ensure the final product reflects the community’s desires. The project is named for The Fifth City Human Development Project, a community development organization active in the area.
Fifth City Commons, located blocks from the Chicago Transit Authority’s Green Line and the Blue Line Kedzie train stations, will be reserved for families earning 30 to 80 percent of the area median income. The three-story building part of Phase I will include community rooms, a resident terrace, fitness room, three laundry rooms and onsite management offices.
Phase II will be built across the street on the north side of Fifth Avenue and is slated to include affordable homeownership opportunities. POAH hopes to break ground on Phase II in late 2024 or early 2025.
The 43 apartment units will be built in accordance with Passive House standards, which provide guidelines for energy-efficient construction. Two-thirds of all the building’s energy needs will be supplied by rooftop solar panels.
The City of Chicago provided the bulk of the financing for the development in the form of tax-increment financing and HOME investment partnership program assistance, sales tax bonds, 4 percent Low Income Housing Tax Credits (LIHTC) and tax-exempt bonds. Enterprise Community Investments is the LIHTC and renewable energy credit syndicator, and BMO is the construction lender. Other financing is being provided by ComEd, Strong, Prosperous and Resilient Communities Challenge and Illinois Solar for All.
The project team includes a joint venture construction partnership of Skender and Ashlaur Construction; Perkins + Will and Nia architects; dmHMS, Rubinos & Mesia Engineers; Omni Ecosystems; and TERRA Engineering.