Big demand for affordable housing calls for big approach in suburban Nebraska
Hoppe Development's Tallgrass mixed-income housing site. (Courtesy of DAA, FoleyShald, Hoppe Development)
PAPILLION, Nebraska — Nebraska's big demand for affordable housing calls for big ideas, and the new Tallgrass housing project in Sarpy County is one developer's novel approach to helping fill that tall order.
Lincoln-based Hoppe Development started out with a blank 35-acre canvas on which it plans to grow an entire mixed-income neighborhood inside a more massive 440-acre multi-use development.
The private developer with help from a nonprofit partner will plant a variety of affordable housing types among Tallgrass' 600 dwellings — a feat that required competitive applications to gain funding from multiple governmental and other sources.
But perhaps the most atypical element is the location — the Tallgrass neighborhood is rising in Papillion, a suburban city in one of the fastest-growing and wealthiest per capita counties of the state, rather than in a more common inner city setting where most housing for lower income residents is concentrated.
Jake Hoppe, the company's chief executive, said the venture represents a newer approach to building affordable housing in Nebraska — one that integrates affordable units at a larger scale within a specially designed mixed-income suburban neighborhood. A similar Hoppe-led development launched a couple of years ago in Lincoln.
His company points to research that shows lower-income families have greater success in breaking the cycle of poverty when living in an area with broader access to jobs, schools and opportunity, and amidst a mix of peers and lifestyles.
Said company principal Fred Hoppe: 'If we are going to address the affordable housing challenges of our communities, we have to build affordable housing at scale alongside market rate housing, in highly desirable areas of town with strong schools and supportive community infrastructure.'
Jake Hoppe is among a lineup of state and national experts set to speak — at a two-day Reignite2Unite symposium beginning June 4 — about successes and innovative efforts aimed at growing affordable and diverse housing across Nebraska.
Organized by the Omaha Municipal Land Bank, Spark CDI and Front Porch Investments, the conference at Omaha Marriott Downtown builds on the inaugural Reignite event last year, which offered tools and information to help emerging developers transform infill properties into community assets.
Leah Rothstein, a housing policy expert and co-author of 'Just Action: How to Challenge Segregation Enacted under the Color of Law,' is a keynote speaker.
Rothstein collaborated with her father, Richard Rothstein, on the book that is a sequel to his 'The Color of Law,' a groundbreaking history of how the U.S. government imposed racial segregation on neighborhoods nationwide.
In an interview with the Nebraska Examiner, Rothstein offered examples of policies that helped other communities improve access to affordable housing.
Among them: zoning reform that allows a broader range of housing sizes and types in a neighborhood; inclusionary housing policies that call for a certain percentage of new construction projects to be affordable; property tax abatements in return for affordable units, and nonprofit community land trusts that provide affordable housing in perpetuity by owning and leasing land to income-eligible people who live in houses built on the land.
This year's conference comes as officials continue to address what's been called a 'crisis' shortage of affordable housing options in Nebraska, with too many households 'cost-burdened' by spending more than 30% of their income on housing.
State officials have said rising housing costs have impacted the state's competitive edge and hampered its ability to fill open jobs. A study led by the Nebraska Investment Finance Authority and released in 2023 identified a goal to create, by 2028, at least 35,000 affordable and attainable homes across the state for low- to middle-income earners, which authors said would reduce the number of needed housing units by about a third.
Rothstein said she was heartened to hear of the Tallgrass project she views as an inroad to counter segregation. Building affordable housing in suburban areas often faces the NIMBY (not in my backyard) battle from people who fear such projects could lower property values, she said.
In the case of Tallgrass, Hoppe said NIMBY so far has not been an issue, as the developer controls the tract on which it and partners have plotted out the mix and styles to blend as a neighborhood. He said a key was buying the large undeveloped property early on, allowing his team to design from the ground up.
'We'll be our own neighbor,' he said.
If we are going to address the affordable housing challenges of our communities, we have to build affordable housing at scale alongside market rate housing, in highly desirable areas of town with strong schools and supportive community infrastructure.
– Fred Hoppe, Hoppe Development
Habitat for Humanity of Omaha, with a $7 million assist from Cobalt Credit Union, is partnering with Hoppe in building 30 for-sale row houses that Habitat will make available for income-eligible buyers at the Tallgrass site.
Habitat's Lacey Studnicka, who also will speak at the Reignite event, said the nonprofit has a dominant presence in northeast Omaha but provides homeownership opportunities to lower income families in five counties. She said its first new-build project in Papillion came as home prices were rising and teachers, laborers and others were being priced out of the area.
'Partnering with Habitat for Humanity of Omaha to bring affordable housing to Sarpy County reflects our shared belief that everyone deserves a place to build their life and their dreams,' said Cobalt CEO Robin Larsen.
Site preparation also has started at Tallgrass for 198 rental units affordable to families at 60% of the area median income and below. Those dwellings are funded through the Low Income Housing Tax Credit program administered by NIFA and the Community Development Block Grant program administered by the Nebraska Department of Economic Development.
Ahead are other phases that include upscale market-rate apartments with a fitness center and swimming pool accessible to the whole development, as well as more for-sale homes funded in part by the Nebraska State Affordable Housing Trust Fund.
Hoppe said his team took a page from the playbook of purpose-built mixed-income housing areas steered by Seventy Five North and Canopy South. A difference is that those are inner city infill developments in the eastern part of Omaha, whereas Tallgrass took the model to a greenfield in the suburbs.
Helping get Tallgrass off the ground was an initial $2 million low-income loan from the nonprofit Front Porch's 'innovation fund.' Hoppe said the boost triggered the purchase of land at Papillion's 72nd Street and Capehart Road, inside the larger Oak Leaf subdivision.
At least one challenge, Hoppe said, is ensuring that supportive services are available for families that otherwise likely would live in older, more established neighborhoods, where child care options are more familiar and public transportation is more accessible.
He said his company has been exploring ways to respond to service gaps. A future elementary school 'hopefully will be responsive to the needs of the neighborhood' as well. A commercial town center and walking trails also are planned.
The developer had looked at economically thriving Elkhorn as a potential site, but Hoppe said his team chose Papillion partly because of Amazon and other warehouse jobs available in the vicinity.
Judging from Hoppe Development's similarly designed Lincoln Foxtail Meadows development — which is 650 units and built in a cornfield near a church — Jake Hoppe anticipates a positive response and outcome for Tallgrass.
Each is expected to take five to seven years to build out.
'It's been great,' he said of the first few phases so far in the Lincoln mixed-income neighborhood, supported by various state and federal affordable housing funds and city-approved tax-increment financing. 'No one can tell who lives in an affordable or market rate unit.'
OMAHA — A vacant downtown Omaha hotel property with an assorted and sometimes sketchy past, is set to be demolished to make way for a $16 million mixed-income residential property.
A unique element of that venture is its team: Lincoln-based Hoppe Development, seasoned in the affordable housing field, paired up with Omahan Donell Brown, who is learning the industry.
Such alliances, which help increase diversity among real estate developers, is a goal of this week's Reignite2Unite symposium and related efforts by organizers Spark and Omaha's Municipal Land Bank.
The conference is expected to draw 250 people over two days starting Wednesday.
Brown is a participant in Spark's co-development apprenticeship that aims to set up budding developers with a project site and experienced team to give them more of a running start.
Brown recently completed a single-family home project and said he was eager to absorb the expertise of developers accustomed to assembling funding sources for more complicated projects.
With the 2211 Douglas St. project, Brown said he is dealing with a gamut of federal, state and city officials. He's become aware of how to raise a score on a low-income housing tax credit application and plan a 'community engagement strategy.'
'It's pushing the limits of what I know and have done before to keep me growing and learning things,' said Brown.
Jake Hoppe, CEO of Hoppe Development, said the plan is for the former hotel property, once the 402 Hotel and EconoLodge, to be razed. Most recently, the structure was used by Together Inc., as a non-congregate shelter during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Together Inc. and another nonprofit, Omaha-based Front Porch Investments, sought proposals to redevelop the site. Hoppe Development was selected and received the property for free.
The plan is a new residential building of about 70 units, about half affordable housing for seniors and the rest units at market rate. The development team expects to apply for tax-increment financing and low-income housing tax credits.
Hoppe said adding Brown to the team adds a new perspective. Brown said he appreciates learning 'method to the madness.'
'They know the path,' Brown said of Hoppe partners. 'It helps in thinking bigger in what you can perform and do.'
— Cindy Gonzalez
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