The Port KC Board of Commissioners in a Monday afternoon meeting approved the next step for development of a market-rate apartment building near the Country Club Plaza, effectively approving teardown of some of the city’s last affordable housing units.
Port KC board members approved Overland Park-based EPC Real Estate Group’s request for tax breaks on the Lewer Apartments, a 278-unit luxury apartment complex that would generate an estimated $5.3 million in new property taxes over the next 20 years. The building’s construction would also come with “increased contributions to the KC streetcar,” according to a slideshow in the meeting. Commissioner Matthew Oates, a former member of the Kansas City Public Schools board, was the only no vote.
Opponents of the project who testified at the meeting said the Lewer project would destroy the Plaza Broadway Apartments, four 84-year-old buildings that contain some of Kansas City’s last 45 naturally-occurring affordable housing units. Supporters of the Lewer project called those existing units “unrentable.”
Public school districts primarily receive funding from property taxes, which generally increase as property values go up. Tax cuts to incentivize new projects like Lewer reduce the taxes that schools, fire departments and libraries bring in, while sometimes driving up the cost of living.
Some, though, see the project as filling a need — including 1st District councilman-at-large Kevin O’Neill.
“We need density down there, because I think they’re planning on bringing in a lot of new retailers and a lot of new restaurants,” O’Neill said. “I’m for a lot more density in the Plaza area, and I’m also for more workforce housing.”
O’Neill served on Port KC’s board for six years, but resigned last week over “ideological differences.” He said he is “not against anything with the port,” but has concerns about its lack of accountability to taxpayers or elected officials.
Garfield Elementary School principal Lauren Amicone worried that housing wouldn’t be affordable for her district’s workforce, who she said can barely afford the units slated to be demolished to make room for the Lewer project.
“As someone who sees the impact every day of underfunded classrooms and the housing crisis, I am distressed and disappointed by the giving away of decades of potential school district revenue to eliminate affordable housing,” she said in the meeting.
The developer signaled it would donate $1 million to the city’s Affordable Housing Trust Fund to subsidize the loss of the 45 affordable housing units. But Amicone said that would not come close to covering the cost to add as many units as the city will lose.
Kansas City Public Library Chief Finance Officer Qun Fang also questioned the developer’s contribution to the city’s affordable housing trust fund. “Why (are you) making a contribution and asking for a tax exemption at the same time?” Fang asked in the meeting.
The Port KC Board also unanimously approved the construction of a “60-unit workforce multifamily residential project” that will include affordable and workforce housing, according to the slideshow. Lewer Properties, which owns the Plaza Broadway affordable housing units, also paid to relocate the residents to different, “structurally sound” buildings, a representative for the developer said.
