An affordable housing development in English Avenue was almost dead in the water. Then a city council member introduced new stream buffer legislation.

Outside the mixed-use development at 880 North Avenue, a “before” photo on an easel showed an abandoned house that had fallen into disrepair. The gray house was missing siding in places, and part of the roof had caved in—a striking contrast to the modern multi-story building that sprang up to take its place.

But however striking the transformation, it wasn’t sudden. Developer OaksATL, a nonprofit community organization serving the Historic Westside of Atlanta, encountered some significant barriers during the five-year process, the most significant of which was the stream 50 feet behind the planned building footprint.

Atlanta Mayor Andre Dickens cut the ribbon at 880 North on Thursday, June 25. The $3 million project was funded by public and private partners, including Invest Atlanta, City of Atlanta, and Westside Future Fund. $600,000 came from the Westside Tax Allocation District.

Tracking down the owner of the vacant property was the first major challenge. OaksATL eventually tracked down the absentee owner in California and acquired the lot, but the victory was short-lived.

An easel holds a photograph of what the lot at 880 North looked like before the OaksATL development. (Photo: Oli Turner).

“After purchasing the property, designing the building and submitting for permit, we discovered that the new building permit encroached into a stream buffer by roughly 10 feet,” said Matt Maxwell, Executive Director and founder of OaksATL.

The project came to a halt without the possibility of a variance request.

District 3 Atlanta City Councilmember Byron Amos went to bat for the project, proposing a new city ordinance to decrease the stream buffer from 75 feet to 50 feet for affordable housing developments.

“We protected our environment, but we empowered our technical panel with the flexibility needed to approve smart, appropriate, multifamily developments right here in our community. We refused to let outdated regulations stand in our way of progress,” Amos said at the ribbon-cutting ceremony.

District 3 Councilmember Byron Amos speaks at the ribbon cutting ceremony for 880 North on Thursday, June 25. He was responsible for spearheading an ordinance that allowed the project to be built. (Photo by Oli Turner).

With the approval of the new ordinance, the project was able to move forward, and construction was completed this month.

Byron told SaportaReport that making a change to the city ordinance meant “putting forth a requirement, understanding we are changing something for the city to ensure that we didn’t jeopardize other water sources.”

As it turns out, 50 feet is the state-mandated buffer zone in Georgia, although many municipalities have higher stream buffer variances.

Amos said, “The state requirements were less, so we actually rolled it back to the state requirements. … I can understand, because we have so many problems with our combined sewers, with the Chattahoochee, I can understand wanting to protect our streams. But at a time in which housing is in such a crisis — you know.”

Amos said he looks forward to “the opportunity, if it exists, for more affordable housing to be built near our waterways.”

OaksATL founder and Executive Director Matt Maxwell said the development at 880 North Avenue was built to address the lack of housing and necessary amenities in the community.

“How can … our next generation of youth call English Avenue home if there are no quality, affordable places to live? If there is no access to jobs, no access to grocery stores and necessary services?” Maxwell said.

880 North has two retail storefronts on the ground floor, which will be rented at 70% of the market rate to local tenants. (Photo by Oli Turner).

880 North is now leasing six two-bedroom affordable housing units to residents earning between 50 and 80 percent of the area median income, with monthly rents ranging from $1,239 to $1,614. OaksATL gives preference to qualified applicants who are single-parent families or have ties to the English Avenue neighborhood. Tenants will begin moving in in July.

Two mixed-use retail storefronts on the ground floor will be rented at 70 percent of the market rate to “independent, local, and minority- or women-owned businesses that reflect and serve the English Avenue and Westside communities,” according to OaksATL.

“People are like, why don’t y’all build more affordable housing? Well, we just showed you $1.1 million in government subsidy for six units,” Dickens said. He added, “This stuff is not easy. And that’s what the Neighborhood Reinvestment Initiative is all about: making sure more neighborhoods benefit from Atlanta’s growth, making sure the communities that help build this city are part of where the city is going. English Avenue deserves that.”

880 North is just the latest in a succession of English Avenue affordable housing developments by OaksATL since its first renovation project in 2020.