A social services organization has launched a new housing initiative to develop affordable housing alongside its wraparound services for the neighborhood.

Self Enhancement Inc.’s housing initiative, SEI Living, will break ground this summer with two projects: Mississippi Heights and Ruby-Mac Place.

SEI Living builds on SEI’s work co-developing affordable housing projects across Portland. In partnership with Community Development Partners (CDP), SEI co-developed the Alberta Alive affordable housing initiative, which includes five developments along Northeast Alberta Street; most recently the Luther Strong Jr. and Dr. Jackie Strong Empowerment Village.

SEI has been serving Portland for 45 years. Its work started with service to young people and then expanded to wrap-around services from “cradle to career,” said Trent Aldridge, chief executive officer of SEI, adding that the programming has been ongoing for three decades.

“In the last seven to eight years our housing department was one of the most referred parts of our programming,” Aldridge said. “Affordability really just became one of the main things we were working toward.”

Each SEI Living development, starting with Mississippi Heights and Ruby-Mac Place, will include SEI’s own wraparound services in the neighborhood, which include 40 programs and 400 services. These will include case management, after school programs, summer programming, sports, food pantries, educational support, health services and basic needs.

“Our approach here, the end result isn’t stable housing,” Aldridge said. “Getting into a place where you can pay your rent isn’t the end for us.”

SEI’s approach is to get residents stabilized with services such as mental health support, finishing school, job readiness such as working on resumes and supporting students with after school and summer programs.

“We want you to be able to go from stable at 30 percent to much more stable at 60 percent, getting you ready for the Ruby-Mac, which is 80 percent AMI,” Aldridge said. “You would get some support to get a stabilized job but also ready to rent or homeownership opportunities and first-time homebuyer programs.”

SEI Living’s first project, Mississippi Heights, is expected to break ground in a few weeks and be complete by September 2027.

Located at 4424 N. Mississippi Ave. in the historic Albina district in North Portland, the development will provide larger two- and three-bedroom units for families. The five-story, 29,465-square-foot building features 30 one-, two- and three-bedroom units, a community room, offices and support spaces for resident services. The units will be for households making no more than 60 percent of the area’s median income, with about 25 percent of the units dedicated to Permanent Supportive Housing.

The project team includes architect MWA Architects, Vega Civil Engineering, structural engineer VALAR Consulting Engineering of Clackamas, landscape architect Bothwell Landscape Studio, geotech Pali Consulting of West Linn and general contractor Walsh Construction Co.

Mississippi Heights is estimated to cost $24.5 million.

The second project, Ruby-Mac Place, is scheduled to break ground in September and be complete by mid-2028.

Located at 9801 N.E. 13th Ave. in Northeast Portland, the project will create 49 affordable homes designed to help families build stability and generational wealth, according to SEI.

The development will be managed under a community land trust model, with homeowners owning their homes and SEI maintaining ownership of the land over the long term. The development will offer homes for purchase to households earning up to 80 percent of the area median income.

Aldridge said the idea of Ruby-Mac Place is to get people across the threshold to own a home and take the equity built and be able to afford to buy a market-rate home in Portland in the future. SEI will offer services for the neighborhood, such as learning to take care of a home.

The net-zero development will feature a mix of single-family homes, cottages, duplexes and townhomes on a 6.5-acre site. Homes will be built using modular construction and net-zero energy design.

The project team includes architectural partners Propel Studio Architecture and Green Canopy NODE of Seattle, civil engineer and landscape architect Stantec, structural engineer Froelich Engineers, Pali Consulting and general contractor Colas Construction.

Ruby-Mac Place is estimated to cost $22.6 million.

Aldridge said SEI has a pipeline system so there will always be something in predevelopment. The organization plans to do this work in communities where they have roots in the schools and the community.

Up next, SEI plans to close on Garfield Commons at the end of the summer. It will be a 59-unit affordable housing building. In July or August 2027, SEI expects to break ground on the fourth planned project, another affordable housing project for the Gordly Burch House. The house is formerly the childhood family home of Oregon’s first Black woman senator, Avel Louise Gordly. The first floor will honor the Gordly family.

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By Sharon Fisher

91��Ƶ Newswires

BOISE, Idaho – A factory that is intended to help automate modular construction for affordable housing is scheduled to open soon in Nampa.

Affordable housing vacancy rates are at a crisis level, and the only way to meet the demand is through manufacturing and automation, said Rick Murdock, CEO of Autovol. He spoke to the Boise Metro Chamber last month as part of its CEO Speaker Series.

“Why automation?” Murdock said. “My question is: Why not automation?”

Everything in the U.S. except housing is manufactured, according to Murdock. And automated modular construction typically is 20 percent to 25 percent cheaper than stick-built, he said. The advantage of automation is it takes away the heavy lifting so workers aren’t tired by 1 p.m., plus it’s faster and requires fewer workers – an advantage amid the lack of skilled labor these days, he said. It’s also safer and more efficient, he added.

Automation still requires humans, but it can take place in areas where wages are lower, Murdock said.

Modular construction in general can better avoid problems caused by weather, and save time by allowing tasks to happen in parallel, Murdock said. While the ground is being prepped, workers can be in the factory constructing the buildings, sending them out as soon as the land is ready, he said. An entire building can be constructed in three weeks or less, he said. Not constructing on-site also lowers traffic congestion and neighborhood interruption, he added.

Autovol is slated to start prototyping in April with some small builds; its first scheduled project is set for May and June, Murdock said. Its first three projects are all in California, he added, though he wouldn’t provide details. The modular buildings, once made in Nampa, can be moved within an 800-mile radius – essentially from Colorado to Canada, he said.

What the company needs to do now that its building is essentially completed – on time and on budget, Murdock said – is program the robots to perform the actual construction.

“The robot’s not an issue,” he said. “It’s a tool. Until you program it, it’s just going to sit there.” Every movement the robot makes has to be programmed, he said.

PrefabLogic, based in Boise, is putting together the software and training employees – whom Murdock calls “solutioneers” – in modular techniques. House of Design, a Nampa-based robotics company, is building the automation, after Autovol switched from the company it had been using in Sweden, he said. Communication had been difficult, he explained.

The project cost $104 million, primarily for the automation, Murdock said. Also, at first there was no internet connection, he said, joking that tin cans and wire were being used in the meantime.

Murdock is looking to hire 250 to 300 people to staff the factory. That included, as of mid-December, a chief financial officer.

Most of the company’s suppliers will be from Idaho, Murdock said. However, not many of Autovol’s customers are likely to be in Idaho because construction isn’t expensive enough here for it to pencil out, though Boise is on the cusp, he said. The company is focusing on high-cost areas because that’s where people are suffering the most, and on apartments because it’s tough for factory workers to build both single-family and multifamily housing at the same time, he said.

While the modular units could also be used for hotels and resorts, Autovol’s focus is on affordable housing, Murdock said.

As an homage to the site’s original use, barns located on the property were taken down board by board and included in the offices to show what used to be there, Murdock said.

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