84-unit affordable housing community to open in Sarasota

Work on an 84-unit affordable housing community in Sarasota is complete and it will officially open Monday afternoon.

That’s when the Sarasota Housing Authority will hold a ceremonial grand opening on the site of the Cypress Square apartments at 1672 21st St.

The community was built with funds from the sale of Low Income Housing Tax Credits awarded by the Florida Housing Finance Corp. that were bought by Bank of America, SHA officials say. 

Other financing came from American Rescue Plan funds from Sarasota County, funding from the city of Sarasota and a long-term subsidy from the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

According to a statement about the grand opening, Cypress Square was developed in a partnership between the SHA, Fortis Development, Sarasota County, the city of Sarasota, HUD, Florida Housing, Bank of America, Berkadia, Hoyt Architects and NDC Construction.

Cypress Square’s 84 units are a mix of 18 one-bedroom apartments, 36 two-bedroom apartments, 24 three-bedroom apartments and six four-bedroom apartments. It will be open to residents who earn 30% of the area median income and 80% of the area median income.

The authority’s website says the community will have 21 project-based Section 8 Housing Choice Voucher and 63 affordable Low Income Housing Tax Credit apartments.

SHA says in the statement that the new community is the ninth redevelopment it has done with the city and county in the past 16 years. In all, the agency says it provides affordable housing to more than 2,400 families and employs 42 with an annual budget of more than $40 million.

The authority’s CEO William Russell, in the statement, calls Cypress Square a “step towards bridging the affordable housing supply-demand gap.”