VA Med Center may become home for homeless vets

Nonprofit agency has plans to build a 67-unit development on campus.

Contributed photo A 67-unit low-income housing unit such as this one on Hoover Avenue in Dayton may be built on the Dayton VA Medical Center campus.

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By Ben Sutherly, Staff Writer Updated 8:00 PM Friday, August 12, 2011

DAYTON — By year’s end, the Dayton VA Medical Center hopes to find nonprofit partners to develop 29 acres on the southern and eastern side of its campus, addressing the Department of Veterans Affairs’ top national goal of ending homelessness for veterans by 2015 while marking a return of permanent residential living to the site.

The Dayton VA began as a soldier’s home for Civil War veterans in 1867. Its 382-acre campus at U.S. 35 and Gettysburg Avenue is one of the oldest VA sites in the nation.

St. Mary Development Corp., a nonprofit neighborhood development agency, already has plans to build a $6.5 million, 67-unit low-income housing development on 6 acres on the southwest side of the campus.

That project, endorsed by the VA, hinges on receipt of $4.8 million in federal Housing and Urban Development funding, plus tax credits. St. Mary officials hope both will materialize before the end of the year.

St. Mary hopes to break ground in spring 2012 on the housing project, which would resemble another St. Mary project, Lyons Place, at 1300 Genesis Way off Hoover Avenue in West Dayton. There could eventually be two other housing units built on the six acres, bringing the total number of residential units to about 200.

The demand is great, said Dick McBride, president and CEO of St. Mary. A St. Mary-commissioned market study in April found nearly 2,000 local homeless and low-income veterans would qualify for such housing, he said.

According to a December 2010 VA Building Utilization Review and Reuse (BURR) Initiative Report, 129 of 837 homeless people in the Dayton area, or 28 percent, are veterans. Another 258 veterans are thought to be at risk of homelessness. The BURR report found there is a high need for senior independent living housing and non-senior assisted living locally.

The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs will put out a “request for proposal” in the next two to four weeks, and will require project proposals to be submitted within 30 to 45 days of posting that request. The VA hopes to enter “enhanced-use lease” agreements with one or more developers — who would be responsible for financing — by the end of 2011. The leases would be good for up to 75 years.

The request for proposal will be available at fedbizopps.gov and at va.gov/assetmanagement/burr/

A public hearing Thursday drew fewer than 10 people, mostly representatives of local nonprofits.

“The hospital’s goal is to provide more alternatives for veteran permanent housing,” thereby giving many veterans more convenient access to the Dayton VA’s medical services, said William Montague, acting Dayton VA director.

The Dayton VA does not have a specific number of residential housing units in mind for the campus, Montague said.

Contact this reporter at (937) 225-7457 or bsutherly@ DaytonDailyNews.com.

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