Jamie Fleury did a nice article on The Paddocks that appeared in the Pilot News and Culver Citizen this past week. As always, we appreciate the press. We continue to get emails from people interested in these apartments so it would appear the need is there. The last I check, there are 15 on the list for when things open up. It’s always good to have that confirmed beyond the market study and the Stellar Committee’s (and before that the Entry Level Housing Committee’s) gut feeling.
The Paddocks, though not known by that name at that time, was the signature project in Culver’s Stellar Communities application in 2016 & 2017. Seeing it come to fruition should be a great boon to Culver and the Town’s efforts to boost our population by providing housing for Culver Community School teachers, Culver Academies staff and ACPI employees.
All the siding is on the first townhome building. As you can see in the above picture, we’re preparing to install the stone veneer accents. Those will be field stone following Culver’s Design Charrette recommendations.
The first building passed it’s NGBS inspection from Energy Diagnostics last week. That’s the outside consulting firm we are using to verify compliance. That allows the first building to move forward with drywall installation next week.
We’ve also been having meetings with Cardno regarding the landscaping. The project will have a sustainable landscape. There will be some limited turf, but there will be other areas with prairie plantings, low-mow fescue and pollinator plantings. We are planning a presentation to the Town since this will fall outside their normal ordinance requirements.
Keep checking here and at the Sand Hill Farm site for updates.
A lot has gone on at The Paddocks apartments in Culver since our last post here. Things have been busy in the field so that’s cut into writing time. The latest thing to get underway is some of the masonry. All of the buildings have masonry accents. For the apartments, those accents are split face block on the sides between the balconies/patios. The picture above shows progress on the masonry accents on the first (west – Apt bld 100) apartment building.
The first townhome building on the south side of Cavalier Drive is up and weathered in with shingles on the roof and windows & doors in place. It had inspections on plumbing, electrical and HVAC ductwork rough-ins completed yesterday by the Marshall County Building Inspector. These buildings will be well inspected since we not only have the local inspector looking at them, but they are being visited by an inspector from IHCDA (Indiana Housing and Community Development Authority) and from an engineering firm working for the lender. We are also going for NGBS (National Green Building Standard) Silver status which means there will be another inspector coming out to inspect the HVAC system and the building envelope to meet those standards.
The first two apartment buildings (100 & 200) are up and weathered in with shingles on the roof and windows & doors in place. Most of the HVAC system rough-in is done in both of these buildings. Plumbing rough-in is nearly complete in the building 100 and underway in building 200. Electrical rough-in is underway in building 100. The balcony decks are in place on both buildings. We have ordered the stairs and railings. They will be aluminum in a similar style to what was used at Sand Hill Farm apartments. The masonry accents are now in place on building 100 and are underway on building 200.
Apt Bld 300 has second floor framing underway
The last apartment building (300) has the foundation and slab in place and framing is currently underway. Roof trusses were delivered today. It should be weathered in within a few weeks, weather permitting
Along with the building construction a lot of the site work is in place. The drive for the first townhome building has the base stone in place. The pad for the next townhome building is prep’d and ready for footing excavation. The sites for the last two buildings, another townhome and a community building, are close to grade now. The site water, sewer and storm infrastructure are complete in some areas. We’ll be preparing the main parking lot for its stone base soon.
An Odd Juxtaposition this Week
May 29, 2024
Kevin Berger
Commentary, Marshall County, Plymouth, projects, Stellar, Tips
Affordable Housing, Community, Entry Level Housing, government, Multi-family, Stellar Region, Trends, Workforce Housing
On Thursday we had the Ribbon Cutting for Riverside Commons Apartments in Plymouth and LaPaz Commons Apartments in LaPaz. This project resulted from Marshall County Crossroads‘ Stellar Designation. Matthew Celmer spoke on behalf of the Crossroads committee. Gary Neidig spoke on behalf of One Marshall County, the new reiteration of Crossroads. Mayor Listenberger spoke on behalf of the City of Plymouth. Alan Rakowski, Director of Real Estate Acquisition, for IHCDA spoke as well. It was also nice to see Don Ecker there representing the Plymouth Common Council, Lynn Gorski, Clerk Treasurer, representing the Plymouth Clerks’ office and Ralph Booker representing the Plymouth Plan Commission. All of them praised the new development and the what it would do for the City of Plymouth. (Marty Oosterbaan was there as a former Crossroads’ leader. He was also responsible for a lot of help in pulling the Ribbon Cutting together.) Thanks also to Easterday Construction Co., Inc. Project Superintendent, Bob Cooper, and Office Manager, Julie Heise for their help throughout the project and at the Ribbon Cutting.
The juxtaposition occurred later that day when a letter began circulating around Plymouth, on Facebook, and in other venues, condemning the Mayor and others such as myself involved with the proposed GC Horizons project – a project very similar to Riverside Commons. That was followed by a negative Letter to the Editor in the Pilot News. It was odd, being praised for doing something good for the community at the Ribbon Cutting and then later the same day, being attacked on Facebook for wanting to do more of the same.
Riverside Commons and the proposed GC Horizons are both IHCDA RHTC (Rental Housing Tax Credit) projects. The only difference is that GC Horizons will include 8 PSH (Permanent Supportive Housing) units similar to those at Serenity Place – 8 of the 34 total units. The “GC” in GC Horizons stands for Garden Court. Garden Count has been a respected not-for-profit entity providing affordable housing to the community for decades. They were also denigrated for attempting to do more good in the community.
While I know it’s unwise to feed the trolls by attempting to rebut their falsehoods online, I thought it worthwhile to present some of the facts here:
There were other specious Facebook comments that were just mean spirited and unworthy of responses. Few of them suggested alternate solutions, though at least one’s solution advocated violence and destruction of property. The negativity is hard to shake off. That said, one thing stood out from the Riverside Commons Ribbon Cutting on Thursday… We had a two story townhouse unit open after the ribbon cutting for guests to tour. Everyone was complimentary. As I was walking out with a couple of guests, there were two women sitting and talking on a neighboring porch. One of the women asked if we liked the unit? She then asked if we would like to see one of the flats, since she lived in a flat. I smiled and thanked her, saying I was familiar since I was part of the construction team. She smiled broadly and proceeded to tell me how happy she was with her new apartment, how she had made new friends there and how there was a sense of community. She ended it saying thank you for making the apartments available to her. She is one of the reasons for doing this and her heartfelt, unsolicited gratitude helps as some of the negativity comes my way.
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