San Jose affordable housing for families to break ground

A busy San Jose thoroughfare will see an infusion of affordable housing as the city faces a lofty goal to build tens of thousands of low-income homes.

The San Jose City Council this week approved the last piece of financing for a $61 million affordable housing project on South Bascom Avenue called Dry Creek Crossing. Construction is set to start in the next few weeks on 65 apartments for individuals whose incomes are between 30% and 70% of the area’s median income—$126,000 for one person in Santa Clara County and $181,300 for a family of four.

The city historically has fallen behind on its affordable housing goals. According to San Jose’s state housing plan, it needs to build a whopping 62,200 affordable homes over the next eight years, with nearly a quarter of them pegged for very low income people.

San Diego-based developer CRP Affordable Housing and Community Development purchased the property from Julian Mollo, who also owns Kirk’s Steakburger that sits on the parcel. The 75-year-old restaurant will close this Sunday and relocate across the street, replacing the Grill Em Steakhouse and Sports Bar which is shutting down.

Dry Creek Crossing is the first CRP project in San Jose and will bring 21 one-bedroom, 25 two-bedroom sand 19 three-bedroom apartments. One thing that sets the project aside is its rich offering of services to needy families.

Nonprofit Pacific Southwest Community Development Corporation will administer on-site supportive services such as after school programs, adult health and education courses, said Jack Burlison, an associate at CRP.

“(It’s) a pretty healthy mix of units that can serve families in the area,” Burlison told San San José Spotlight.

The project will be finished by November 2025, and the developer will transfer ownership to San Jose.

Dry Creek Crossing planned  to offer food distribution on site for residents, but the developer struggled to secure a contract with a local distributor and is considering alternative options, including transportation to food banks.

Martha’s Kitchen and Loaves and Fishes Family Kitchen—two of San Jose’s largest food distributors serving tens of thousands of meals to residents each week—are being forced to rollback services, after millions in pandemic relief grants were not renewed in the city’s 2023-24 budget.

“Because of that, they couldn’t really commit to a contract that will not be effective until two years from now,” Burlison said. “They voiced uncertainty for their future budget.”

The affordable housing project is in District 9, represented by Councilmember Pam Foley. She told San José Spotlight Dry Creek Crossing is in a high-resource area with proximity to jobs, high-performing schools and transit. It is a sought after location for securing competitive state tax credits needed to finance modern affordable housing projects.

“We are severely behind our targets for affordable housing units and many of our residents are unable to continue to live in San Jose due to the high cost of living,” Foley told San José Spotlight. ‘We have nearly 2,000 affordable units (in the pipeline) in District 9.””

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