A ceremonial ground-breaking event took place Thursday on a new affordable housing project in Portland’s Eliot neighborhood.

The five-story, approximately 72,455-square-foot North Williams will occupy a 1.15-acre parcel fronting North Williams Avenue between Tillamook and Thompson streets. It will feature 61 apartments, including 40 for persons earning 30 percent of the regional median income or less ($24,420 for a family of four) and 20 for persons earning 60 percent of the regional median income or less ($48,840 for a family of four). Ten of the deeply affordable units will come with support services intended for people emerging from homelessness.

“Including these homes for our most vulnerable community members in a mixed-income project is exactly what affordable housing should look like in 2019,” Multnomah County Commission Chairwoman Deborah Kafoury . “We just need to keep doing more of it.”

A consortium of parties including nonprofit BRIDGE Housing, Home Forward and the city of Portland are funding the project or providing other incentives including Section 8 housing vouchers. More than $20 million in public and private funding is being used for the project, according to the county.

Ankrom Moisan Architects designed the apartment complex, and general contractor Colas Construction will build it. Plans call for a mix of one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments, ground-floor community space, bicycle parking, an exterior courtyard and a parking lot.

The wood-framed building will have a façade covered with a combination of fiber-cement panels, fiber-cement lap siding and storefront glazing for the first floor.

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The Portland Housing Bureau has chosen Bridge Housing to build 61 new affordable apartments for low-income residents in the Eliot neighborhood, the nonprofit developer announced Monday.

The four-story North Williams Center, designed by Ankrom Moisan Architects, will form a “U” shape around a central courtyard. Ground is expected to be broken on the $18.3 million project in mid-2017.

Apartments will range from one to three bedrooms.

City Commissioner Dan Saltzman, in a prepared statement, said Bridge Housing has taken a “thoughtful approach” to community stability with the project.

Cynthia Parker, Bridge Housing’s president and CEO, said many longtime residents have been priced out and displaced from the Northeast Portland neighborhood.

Bridge said it plans to retain Albertina Kerr, a nonprofit that provides on-site services, to expand art and garden programs to residents.

The project comes as city officials make a major push for affordable housing. Last month, the City Council referred a $258 million housing bond to the November ballot.

The property at 2124-2146 N. Williams Ave. has a long history of shifting uses. Multnomah County acquired the property in 2013. Before that, it had served since 1998 as the site of Port City Development Center, a vocational training center for developmentally disabled clients.

In other periods, the site over nearly three decades had served as an industrial battery manufacturing and recycling center, an upholstery company and a lounge chair manufacturer, according to a Multnomah County report.

The property is approximately 50,000 square feet.

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The Portland Housing Bureau has awarded $47 million in local and federal dollars to , the agency announced Wednesday.

The awards follow the bureau’s notice in October of available money, specifically $61.6 million for project-based Section 8 vouchers. The notice also made five publicly-owned sites available for affordable-housing development.

Funding was awarded to projects backed by REACH, Home Forward, Central City Concern, and California-based developers Meta Housing Corp. and Bridge Housing Corp. The money will enable construction of 585 new affordable units, and preservation of 255 more through renovations, according to the Housing Bureau.

Of the new units, more than 120 are expected to house the lowest-income households – those earning up to 30 percent of median family income, or $15,400 for an individual and $24,300 for a family of four.

The projects are:

• 72Foster. REACH will receive $5 million to build 108 units on Portland Development Commission land in Lents. The project includes commercial space and resident services from the Asian Health & Services Center.

• North Williams Center. Bridge Housing Corp. was awarded $4.5 million to develop 61 new affordable units for low-income families on Multnomah County property in the Interstate Corridor Urban Renewal Area. The project involves a possible partnership with Albertina Kerr to provide programming for developmentally disabled residents.

• The Creators Collective. Meta Housing Corp. was awarded $9 million to develop 76 new affordable units on the Housing Bureau-owned King/Parks site in the Interstate Corridor Urban Renewal Area for very-low-income families, seniors and veterans.

• Block 45. Home Forward received $5.6 million for a mixed-income, mixed-use development with 127 affordable units on Housing Bureau-owned property in the Oregon Convention Center Urban Renewal Area.

• Interstate. Central City Concern was awarded $2.2 million to develop 51 new affordable units in the Interstate Corridor Urban Renewal Area.

• The Henry. Central City Concern was also awarded $12.9 million for seismic and capital renovations to preserve 153 single-room occupancy units in Portland’s Central City.

• Stark I & II. Central City Concern was also awarded $7 million to develop 162 new units on two adjacent parcels in the Hazelwood neighborhood.

• Gladstone Square/Multnomah Manor. Home Forward will receive $1 million to renovate and preserve 102 affordable units serving low-income families in two of its complexes in the Lents and Montavilla neighborhoods.

The Housing Bureau also announced that Human Solutions has been granted an exclusive right to negotiate with the agency for a proposed mixed-use development on PDC-owned land in the Gateway Urban Renewal Area. As proposed, this project would include 40 affordable housing units. The actual mix of site uses – office, retail, housing and community services – will be determined through further negotiations, the bureau said.

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