By J. Graber | Scottsdale Independent
More low income and transitional housing is coming to Scottsdale.
The Scottsdale City Council voted to build 28 housing units — 22 low income housing units and 6 transitional housing units — on the Paiute Neighborhood Center’s campus.
The construction, scheduled to begin in 2025 and be completed by the end of 2026, will be done in tandem with an upgrade to the center that will include demolishing several buildings and replacing them with a 22,000-square-foot building.
The council approved the housing and center improvement plan in three separate votes.
The first was for the center’s new building, which was approved 6-1. Vice mayor Kathy Littlefield was the lone vote against it.
Her main concern centered on finances of the two projects. The center upgrade is expected to come in at $16.4 million, with $11.1 million coming from the 2019 bond. The other $5.3 million will come from the city’s general fund.
Littlefield’s concern was she believed it would be impossible to keep the housing money and the center upgrade money separate. That would mean bond money would, at least in part, be used to build the housing units, she said.
Councilmember Tom Durham disagreed with Littlefield.
“We do these things right,” Durham said. “We don’t just lollygag and throw some stuff together. We have great staff who do these things right … accountants can distinguish from the bond funds and the homeless funds. That’s what they’re for.”
Based on a question from Councilmember Barry Graham, city engineer Allison Tymkiw said construction invoices will carefully list how much each part of the two projects cost and what funds are being used to pay for them.
Council then voted 5-2 on two separate agenda items that would allow the city to move forward with the housing proposal.
Littlefield and Graham were the dissenting votes.
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