A New Genesis on Main Street

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A New Genesis on Main Street

by Ryan Vaillancourt, Los Angeles Downtown News
March 30, 2010

DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES – Nonprofit developer Skid Row Housing Trust held a groundbreaking ceremony this morning for its affordable housing project the New Genesis Apartments.

The Historic Core project encompasses a few firsts for the developer of permanent supportive housing. The $22.3 million New Genesis, which will include a solar energy system on its roof, will be the first permanent supportive housing effort in Los Angeles built to LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) Platinum certification standards, according to the SRHT.

Designed by Killefer Flammang Architects, which has helmed multiple adaptive reuse conversions in the nearby Old Bank District and throughout Downtown, the New Genesis will provide 106 units, mostly for homeless individuals. It is funded by a mix of local, state and federal sources.

Unlike previous SRHT projects, 25% of the apartments in the New Genesis will be set aside as units for working individuals earning less than $37,260 per year. The inclusion of affordable residences, instead of reserving all units for homeless men and women, was motivated in part by community input, said Molly Rysman, the trust’s director of special projects.

Ninety-eight of the residences will be efficiency apartments, and eight will be one-bedroom, loft-style spaces.

The New Genesis is also a unique effort for the developer in that it will include ground floor commercial spaces fronting Main Street, Rysman said. In most SRHT buildings, the street level spots are reserved for social services. The New Genesis will have supportive services on-site, but they won’t be housed in the street-fronting spaces, she said.

Actual construction of the New Genesis is slated to begin in mid-April, starting with demolition of the Genesis Hotel; completion is expected in August 2011, said Roxana Janka, a project spokeswoman. Over the course of development, Janka said general contractor GB Construction Inc. will employ about 220 workers, all of which will have to be local jobs, in adherence with the Community Redevelopment Agency’s local hiring requirements. Once completed, the project will create eight new permanent jobs, Janka said.

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