In a mulched clearing at the edge of the woods on Mar. 27, dozens of people donned hard hats and waited their turns to take part in a ceremonial groundbreaking for the future Homestead Gardens neighborhood. There are so many stakeholders involved that people were split up by organization to come take turns turning the dirt with the shovels.
Just a few minutes before, the large group had crossed the train tracks and walked the sidewalk along Homestead Road from the Episcopal Church of the Advocate, where as many people as possible squeezed into the small sanctuary for speakers to start the ceremony.
The event was fairly elaborate for a groundbreaking ceremony – but the Homestead Gardens community is an elaborate project itself, having taken roughly nine years to reach development.
As Chapel Hill Mayor Jess Anderson said to the crowd, that past and timeline matters much less than what the future holds for the new neighborhood.
“At the end of the day, what matters is simple: Homestead Gardens will create 90 new homes,” she said to applause. “Ninety new opportunities for families, seniors and individuals to build their lives here in Chapel Hill. That is something to celebrate.”
The town government formally designated the 14 acres of land at 2200 Homestead Road for affordable housing in 2017. Since then, the project has gone through several iterations to best strategize and ensure below-market housing units could be constructed on the town-owned land. The version settled upon: 56 apartment units and 33 townhomes, which will be a mix of rental and for-sale – all with prices set for community members earning between 30 and 80% of the Area Median Income.
An aerial map of the layout of Homestead Gardens in Chapel Hill, built at the town-owned property of 2200 Homestead Road. (Photo via the Town of Chapel Hill.)
Part of the solution was funding from not only Chapel Hill and its housing partners, but also from the federal government. Former U.S. Rep. David Price helped secure $2 million for the design of Homestead Gardens through Community Project Funding during the first year of the congressional program’s return in 2021.
“It’s catalytic funding – it’s money that gets the ball rolling,” Price said at the groundbreaking ceremony. “Of course, you have to have willing partners ready to pick it up and go with it. And we’re fortunate to live in a community that values affordable housing, that knows we need to get to work on affordable housing…and to support – financially and in every other way – these great organizations that do the work…who prove they are effective and know what they’re doing, who take up the challenge and get the job done.”
Attendees of the Homestead Gardens groundbreaking gather in the Episcopal Church of the Advocate in Chapel Hill on Mar. 27. Self-Help Venture Fund’s Dan Levine addresses the crowd. (Photo by Brighton McConnell/Chapel Hill Media Group.)
Former U.S. Rep. David Price speaks during the beginning of the groundbreaking ceremony of the Homestead Gardens community. (Photo by Brighton McConnell/Chapel Hill Media Group.)
The stakeholders in Homestead Gardens amount to an all-star cast of local housing nonprofits. Self-Help Ventures Fund in Durham, which also aids Chapel Hill’s affordable housing loan fund, is overseeing the entitlement and initial site development process. Habitat for Humanity of Orange County, CASA and Community Home Trust will construct and then manage the units. Habitat and Community Home Trust are handling the rental and for-sale townhomes, while CASA is leasing the apartment buildings to both low-wage members of the workforce and UNC Horizons, which will provide the apartments to mothers recovering from substance abuse.
Self-Help Director of Real Estate Dan Levine said he felt “a little surprised” the groundbreaking ever arrived. Between the necessary rezoning and redesigns of the land, the coordination of partners and even the name changes of both Homestead Gardens’ architectural and land-planning firms, he highlighted how complex the project was to execute.
But one area that was made easy, Levine said, was getting support from nearby Homestead Road residents.
“You hear a lot about NIMBY-ism and people opposing projects and so on,” he said. “We took this site through rezoning, we had neighbors come out as early as 2018 when the town was doing a visioning process…there are community members really excited about welcoming new families, new neighbors to this community. I don’t take that for granted, and I want to thank them for being here at the beginning, being here today.
“I know you’re going to make [your neighbors] feel right at home when they move in,” Levine concluded.
President and CEO of Orange County’s Habitat for Humanity Jennifer Player shared how the Homestead Gardens project itself reflects that sentiment.
“Today’s groundbreaking is more than shovels and photo-ops,” Player told the gathered crowd. “It’s a promise to the residents who are going to live here. And it’s a promise to the next generation – and to all the residents in Chapel Hill, that we are and are going to continue to be a welcoming place where people can see themselves in this community, where they can find a place for themselves and where their families grow and thrive here.”
In addition to the housing units itself, Homestead Gardens’ current design features a greenway trail connection to Weaver Dairy Extension to the north of the property, as well as other natural surface trails and a bus stop on Homestead Road. There will be a basketball court, a playground, a gazebo and a community room open to use for all residents and maintained by a homeowners association.
The parcel of land immediately to the east of the train tracks and the north side of Homestead Road in Chapel Hill is where Homestead Gardens will eventually be built. (Photo by Brighton McConnell/Chapel Hill Media Group.)
Featured photo by Brighton McConnell/Chapel Hill Media Group.
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