REACH Community Development held an opening celebration Wednesday to mark completion of the third and final phase of its Orchards at Orenco affordable housing development in Hillsboro. Residents recently began moving into Orchards at Orenco Phase III, a 52-unit workforce housing building intended to fulfill the need for family-size housing. The building holds 33 two-bedroom units and 19 three-bedroom units, eight of which will have project-based Section 8 vouchers targeted to households earning 30 percent or less of Median Family Income. The remaining units will be targeted to households earning 45 percent or less of area MFI.

The completion of the project caps a nearly 10-year development effort that led to the opening in 2015 of Phase I, a 57-unit workforce housing building, and in 2016 of Phase II, a 58-unit building. The three buildings occupy a six-acre parcel near a MAX light-rail station.

Like the first two phases, Orchards at Orenco Phase III was designed by Ankrom Moisan Architects and built by Walsh Construction Co. Unlike the first two phases, the third was not built to stringent Passive House energy standards; the project team will seek Earth Advantage certification instead. The same mechanical, electrical, plumbing and framing subcontractors worked on all three projects, and lessons learned on the first two carried over to the final one, including use of spray foam in the attic to reduce heat loss. According to Jay Nees and Jeremy Brooks, Walsh Construction Co.’s respective project manager and superintendent, a recent whole building airtightness test yielded results similar to Passive House standards. A rooftop photovoltaic array will provide the building electricity, and a lobby monitor will provide energy consumption data for residents.

Multiple trees had to remain as a condition of development; those that were removed were repurposed throughout the site, including in wall art, benches, handrails, shelving, siding and corner guards, as well as a large table in the building’s community room. Walker Macy served as the landscape architect on the project, which include a children’s play area, a basketball court and raised gardening beds.

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When the first phase of the Orchards at Orenco affordable housing development opened in Hillsboro last year, it was built to stringent – and expensive – passive house standards. But the developer, REACH Community Development, didn’t think it would be possible to do the same for the second phase because of higher construction costs.

Yet thanks to lessons learned during the first phase and assistance of a national passive house nonprofit, the second phase of Orchards at Orenco not only was completed for less money than the first phase, but also achieved passive house certification.

To meet passive house standards, according to Michael Bonn, a senior associate at Ankrom Moisan Architects, which designed the second phase, a building “must have super insulation, super-efficient HVAC and be super airtight.”

The decision to shoot for passive house certification, Bonn said, was made early in the design phase at the urging of Katrin Klingenberg, co-founder and executive director of the Passive House Institute US (PHIUS). The organization also provided financial help.

No money was budgeted for a passive house consultant on the project, Bonn said, but during the schematic design phase, PHIUS officials ran tests for passive house through their software and filled in as low-cost consultants.

“They really stepped up to help support the passive house campus as an example of what could be done,” Bonn said.

PHIUS was able to provide consulting services “for a nominal fee” because it had received a MacArthur Foundation grant to encourage more affordable housing construction featuring passive house standards, according to Mike Steffen, vice president and general manager of Walsh Construction, the project’s general contractor.

By applying what it had learned in phase one, Steffen said, the phase two team was able to reduce the cost of meeting passive house certification requirements. The total cost of the first phase was $14,565,874, while the cost of the second phase was $13,641,339.

The main cost-saving design change that allowed pursuit of passive house certification was in building orientation and shape. The first phase was an L-shaped building with one wing running east to west and the other running north to south, Steffen said. For the second phase, the massing was changed and the shape simplified.

“In phase two the building is wider and shorter – a simple rectangle shape,” he said.

The newer building is oriented completely east and west, which improves energy efficiency and helps reduce solar loads, he said.

A more efficient design has allowed more units per square foot: 58 apartments per 49,000 square feet area in the second phase, compared to 57 apartments per 57,000 square feet in the first. Bonn said that was possible because the building’s shape allowed for narrower and deeper units without a reduction in floor area.

Space was also saved because the second phase didn’t require a large community room, as the first phase did. Slightly smaller lobbies and entrances at each floor saved even more space.

Because the building’s shape improved the skin-to-volume ratio, Bonn said, less insulation was needed under the slab. Also, exterior wall framing studs could be reduced to 2 inches by 8 inches, from 2 inches by 10 inches in the first phase, and less exterior insulation was needed.

“For the same reason, the walls could be a couple of inches thinner,” he said. “We reduced the cost premium by 8 percentage points, just under $1 million savings while still achieving passive house.”

In addition, a less expensive roof design was used for phase two, Bonn said, even though that made airtightness more difficult to achieve. A flat roof with a parapet was used in the first phase, while a standard, sloping truss roof was used in the second.

That made the project much harder for the contractor, Steffen said, and took a lot of effort.

“It was a real challenge for us when the decision was made to go for passive house,” he said. “It was tricky construction and took a lot of quality control and special inspections with infrared cameras and heat and pressurization.”

To keep in line with passive house standards, triple-pane windows and an HVAC system similar to the one used in the first phase were used in the second, Bonn said. But the better orientation and shape of the second building resulted in more efficiency.

Both buildings feature heavy timber deck framing and American Craftsman-style-inspired sun shades over the windows, three different patterns of shingles and lap siding, Bonn said.

The second Orenco at Orchards building also includes many amenities, including exterior decks on the second and third floors, common laundry rooms, a fitness room and an outdoor playground. Like the first building, it also will have displays in the lobby so that tenants can track their energy use.

“We’re wrapping up installation right now so they can compare, and we hope it creates positive peer pressure,” Bonn said.

A third phase for Orchards at Orenco is being planned, said Ben Sturtz, REACH Community Development’s housing development project manager. Plans call for 19 three-bedroom units in two buildings joined by a sky bridge. Because of that design and the need for bigger apartments, it is unlikely to be built to passive house standards.

“Our goal is to try to continue to build (to) passive house standards,” Sturtz said, “but it will become more of a challenge in the future.”

Orchards at Orenco II

Developer: REACH Community Development

General contractor: Walsh Construction

Architect: Ankrom Moisan Architects

Landscape architect: Walker Macy

Civil engineer: Humber Design Group

Structural engineer: Stone Wood Design Center

Mechanical engineer: PAE Engineers

Third-party certification: Earth Advantage

Owner’s representative: Housing Development Center

Total cost: $13,641,339

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For the past 15 years, thousands of housing units have popped up around Orenco Station in Hillsboro, but they have been out of reach for people who earn $30,000 a year or less.

That situation is about to change with the opening of the first phase of Orchards at Orenco, a 57-unit affordable housing project that owner and developer REACH Community Development says is on target to become the largest multifamily passive house building in the country.

The decision to design and construct Orchards’ first phase to achieve one of the highest benchmarks of energy efficiency in the building world was about more than a title. In addition to filling a much-needed housing gap for those who earn 50 percent or less of median income for Washington County, where the project is located, pursuing an actual passive house project has given REACH a foundation for creating highly energy-efficient buildings that the organization will be able to implement on future affordable housing projects throughout the Portland-metro area, according to Laura Recko, REACH’s director of fundraising and public relations.

It also offered some valuable lessons for the construction firms that worked on the project, starting with general contractor Walsh Construction Co.

Students become teachers

Before joining the Orchards at Orenco project, Walsh had been introduced to the high standards of passive house while helping another organization study the feasibility of converting an existing building to meet passive house standards, said Mike Steffen, Walsh’s general manager  and the company’s principal in charge of the Orchards project. Even so, the general contractor faced a learning curve when it joined the Orchards project team, a situation that Steffen says was eased by the collaborative environment and the fact that Walsh was involved in the project from the earliest stages.

Walsh soon found itself passing the lessons it learned on to project subcontractors, few of which had ever been involved in a passive house project.

“We did the education … as part of the bid process,” Steffen said.

Throughout construction, the company also provided subcontractors with reminders that a passive house project requires flexibility and a new way of thinking about the building process.

A Walsh foreman, for example, posted a cup next to a sign with a message: “Normal does not exist here.” Each time someone working on the project said, “That’s not how we normally do it,” he or she was required to place a dollar in the cup.

“They learned not to say ‘normally’ very quickly,” Steffen said.

Education about the project is extending beyond just those who helped build it. Tenants who will live in the building also need to be taught a whole new way of interacting with their living environment.

“We’re really engaging our residents in new ways,” said Ben Sturtz, REACH’s housing development project manager.

Something as simple as how residents treat the triple-paned windows in their apartments, for example, is critical.

“The windows are crucial to (the residents’) indoor air quality and their comfort,” Sturtz said. “But also, if we’re really going to make this (project) energy efficient, how those windows get used is crucial.”

Tracking how residents interact with the energy-efficient features of their units will be boosted by an energy monitoring system installed in the lobby area, Recko said. The flat-screen television will show how much energy is used in each unit throughout each month.

While the screen will allow residents to engage in a friendly competition to save energy, the monitor also will let REACH determine which residents need more help understanding how to obtain the best performance from the energy-saving features in their units.

“If we see hot spots, that will show us that we need to do more education and will allow us to offer incentives to reward those who are doing well,” Recko said.

Planning for the future

Units in Orchards at Orenco already are in high demand, Sturtz said. Part of the draw is the opportunity for renters already watching their budgets to save money with lower utility bills. But another part of the attraction is a simple matter of supply and demand.

Sturtz estimates that there’s a need for approximately 19,000 living units in Washington County for residents who earn at or below the 50 percent median income level. But REACH and other groups that focus on affordable housing are only able to bring a total of roughly 150 units online each year. Surtz doesn’t see the imbalance improving in the future.

“As Portland becomes more unaffordable, it becomes an even bigger challenge,” Sturtz said.

Recko, Sturtz and others at REACH consider their foray into the world of passive house a success. But while future phases of the development – as well as REACH projects throughout the Portland-metro area – will likely be “passive house inspired, they won’t be designed and built to pursue official designations, Sturtz said.

Finding the funding to cover the extra costs that came with the decision to pursue a designation for phase one, which Recko estimates increased the project cost by 10 percent to 11 percent, required stitching together money from several sources, which likely won’t be available for future phases. A $500,000 grant received for the first phase of Orchards, for example, was a one-time opportunity.

“We made a pitch to Meyer,” Recko said. “What they did was over and above what they would typically invest. They were investing in (research and development).”

Ground will be broken this month on a second phase of Orchards, near the first. Its 58 units of workforce housing are expected to be ready for tenants around June 2016.

A third, final phase is further down the road. REACH is considering possibly locating that development near an elementary school and including two- and three-bedroom units to serve families, according to Recko. But right now, planning is still in the early stages.

“We’re at the point where we’re starting to seek out financing,” she said.

If you go

What: Orchards at Orenco phase I grand opening

When: June 29, 10:30 a.m.

Where: 6520 N.E. Cherry Drive, Hillsboro

More information: call 503-231-0682
Orchards at Orenco Phase 1

Owner/developer: REACH Community Development

Architects: Ankrom Moisan Architects (of record), William Wilson Architects (design)

General contractor: Walsh Construction

Construction manager: Housing Development Center

Passive house consultant: Green Hammer

Special limited partner: Washington County Housing Authority

Funding partners: Enterprise Community Partners, Community Housing Fund, Energy Trust of Oregon, Meyer Memorial Trust, NOAH, Oregon Housing and Community Services, NeighborWorks America, Washington County Office of Community Development, Wells Fargo

The post Atypical affordable housing appeared first on Daily Journal of Commerce.

$18 million of state money awarded to REACH Community Development will help it construct and rehabilitate dozens of affordable housing units in the Portland-metro area.

The nonprofit will use low-income housing tax credits and grant money from Oregon Housing and Community Services to construct the second phase of the Orchards at Orenco affordable housing complex in Hillsboro and renovate the Bronaugh Apartments in downtown Portland, REACH spokeswoman Laura Recko said.

The project to build the 150-unit Orchards at Orenco on a six-acre property off of Northeast Cherry Drive in Hillsboro has been broken into three phases, Recko said. The $14.5 million, 57-unit first phase is under construction and scheduled to finish in June 2015. The $13.6 million, 58-unit second phase is scheduled to start in June 2015 and wrap up in June 2016.

Walsh Construction Co. is the general contractor for the first phase of the project and will construct the second phase. William Wilson Architects and Ankrom Moisan Architects designed the first phase; Ankrom Moisan is designing the second.

No start date is set yet for the third phase, Recko said.

“It’s still several years out for us,” she said. “It’s definitely in our plans to finish it.”

REACH also will use state money to tackle a $13.6 million renovation of the historic, 109-year-old Bronaugh Apartments. The 50-unit building, home to low-income elderly and disabled residents, most recently was renovated in 1982.

Plans for an upcoming renovation include a full seismic upgrade, a courtyard upgrade and installation of new walls, flooring and heaters in units.

Walsh Construction crews will start work in May 2015 on the Bronaugh Apartments project, designed by Carleton Hart Architecture. Construction is scheduled to wrap up in May 2016.

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Walsh Construction is building a highly efficient, transit-oriented workforce housing project in the Orenco Station neighborhood of Hillsboro for owner/developer REACH CDC. The 57-unit project, designed by Ankrom Moisan Architects, is the first phase of the development, which over the course of three phases will total approximately 150 units.

The $14.5 million project is being built to Passive House standards with the goal of reducing tenants’ monthly energy bills. Green Hammer is serving as a consultant on the building, which will be the largest multifamily Passive House project in the country when completed. Work on the 12-month project is slated to wrap in June 2015.

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REACH Community Development is now closer to development of an affordable housing project in Hillsboro.

The Portland-based developer received a $500,000 grant from the Meyer Memorial Trust. The award will go toward development of REACH’s Orchards at Orenco Station, a 57-unit multifamily project that William Wilson Architects, Walsh Construction, Green Hammer and PAE Consulting Engineers are creating to meet passive house standards.

Passive house designs use superior insulation and air ventilation systems to reduce energy consumption. The Orchards complex is expected to cut down on heat loads by 90 percent and be one of the first passive multifamily projects in the nation.

The goal is to minimize ongoing housing-related costs for tenants. The development will cater to residents earning 50 percent of median family income, or $25,000 for a single-person household. In a prepared statement, Meyer Memorial Trust CEO Doug Stamm, said planning for affordable housing in Washington County is important for the area’s rapidly expanding workforce.

The award from the Meyer Memorial Trust follows a $750,000 grant that REACH received in February 2012 from Washington County.

REACH hoped to receive a 9 percent housing tax credit from Oregon Housing and Community Services last year, but it was not selected. REACH project manager Jessica Woodruff said the organization intended to re-enter the competitive process for the tax credit in 2013.

REACH had hoped to begin construction of the $8.2 million to $8.4 million project this fall, but Woodruff said the team now is shooting for spring 2014.

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The team at REACH Community Development, an affordable housing developer based in Portland, is ratcheting its focus up a notch from affordable housing to affordable living.

“If we really think through all the things we do, we can really enable our residents to have lower housing costs, lower energy costs and lower transportation costs, which are the biggest bills people deal with,” REACH project manager Jessica Woodruff said.

With that pursuit in mind, REACH is developing a 57-unit affordable housing complex in Hillsboro with passive house design. Craig Kelley, senior project manager for the Housing Development Center, said it is cost-engineering the Orchards at Orenco Station, between $8.2 million and $8.4 million, with William Wilson Architects, Walsh Construction, Green Hammer and PAE Consulting Engineers, to optimize energy performance and minimize incremental costs.

Passive house design uses superior insulation and air ventilation systems to dramatically reduce energy consumption, and Dylan Lamar, certified passive house consultant with Portland-based Green Hammer, said the building will be one of the first passive house multifamily buildings in the nation.

“It’s a fabulously innovative project that’s going to reduce total heat loads in the building by about 90 percent from a typical building,” he said.

Lamar participated in the design of one of the first low-income passive houses in the country, a single-family project in Urbana, Ill. He said the size of the Orchards at Orenco Station will present its own unique design challenges, such as the creation of an elaborate ventilation system to continuously cycle air throughout the complex.

The building will use 11-inch-thick walls with several inches of exterior insulation, and triple-paned windows to make the building’s envelope nearly airtight. Lamar said that one advantage of incorporating passive design in a larger building with many rooms is that it does not require 16-inch-thick walls typically needed in single-family homes.

“I think the most exciting part of it is to be able to provide what’s typically a very expensive way to build for a low-income population,” he said.

Passive house can add roughly 10 percent to the front end of construction costs, but Woodruff said it will save money over the life of the project because of lower utility bills, which are expected to climb faster than the rate of inflation. They expect that electricity for one unit could cost as little as $15 a month.

Woodruff said the Orchards at Orenco Station will be geared toward people who earn 50 percent of the area’s median income – approximately $25,000 a year.

According to Washington County’s Comprehensive Plan, between 12,000 and 20,000 households in the county are in that income bracket and have affordable housing needs not being met by current supply. In addition, approximately 34 percent of households have extremely low (below 30 percent of the area’s median), low (below 50 percent of the area’s median) or moderate (below 80 percent of the area’s median) incomes. Of those with low incomes, 49 percent are likely to spend more than half of their pay on housing.

“It’s a wonderful neighborhood; there’s just no affordable housing there,” Woodruff said. “So we are hoping to sort of round that out and make it a little bit more holistic of a neighborhood.”

But getting the financing for that kind of a development in today’s economy – in which the majority of projects that pencil out are high-end multifamily – can be difficult.

Woodruff said the Washington County Office of Community Development recently awarded the project a grant of $750,000 and that Enterprise Community Investment and NeighborWorks America previously awarded grants. REACH also is applying to Oregon Housing and Community Services for a 9 percent housing tax credit.

REACH has a purchase and sale agreement for the entire six-acre, greenfield plot that sits just north of the MAX light-rail line and south of Cherry Drive at Northwest 231st Avenue. The land’s owner is Tom Walsh, via Orenco III LLC.

Woodruff said the 57-unit building is planned as the first phase of a three-phase project to develop 140 to 150 units on the site. The group is approximately 75 percent done with its schematic design and hopes to begin construction in fall 2013. Whether those second and third buildings use passive design will depend on the success of the first, Woodruff said.

Kelley said he thinks it will pencil out in the long run.

“It’s not something you can necessarily underwrite to, but there’s a lot of studies out there that green buildings generally … tend to have higher resident satisfaction. They tend to lease up faster and they tend to turn over less,” he said.

Lamar agrees and hopes the project will attract the attention of other developers.

“It’s a more superior living environment, and I suspect they’re going to have a much lower turnover rate in their tenancy as a result, which I hope will start to sell the concept with other developers that are more financially driven and not so vision-driven,” Lamar said.

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