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A classroom exercise has given rise to a real mixed-income housing plan for one of three properties Kansas City owns and targets for redevelopment in the Hospital Hill area.
The City Council voted Thursday afternoon to authorize City Manager Brian Platt to negotiate sale and redevelopment agreements for three properties totaling close to 9 acres in and near the UMKC Health Sciences District. The sites were part of a November request for proposals, from which the city received and considered five responses, officials said this week.
A city selection committee recommended a multifamily proposal by co-developers Riverstone Platform Partners LLC and Iconic Development, respectively headed by Kelley Hrabe and Chris Sally, for one 1.6-acre site southwest of 25th and Campbell streets.
The site was a recent focus of Urban Land Institute Kansas City's Real Estate Diversity Initiative (REDI), under which last year's student class was tasked with creating conceptual development plans for the grassy parcels. The exercise inspired Sally, a REDI team adviser, to connect and work with Hrabe so the two could put together a formal plan submission for the city's RFP, which ran through January.
The local developers' preliminary plans, tentatively called Harmony Hill, include 95 studio, one- and two-bedroom apartments, with rents targeted as affordable for renters earning 30% to 80% of the area's median family income (MFI). The project also would have about 10,000 square feet of "flex space" that Hrabe said could support community uses like a 24-hour daycare, transit center or bodega.
"Up in Hospital Hill, there's really a lack of not only housing, but particularly more affordable, attainable workforce-type housing for folks that may be working in the hospitals and have to drive clear out to the hinterlands after work," he said Thursday. "So what we're trying to do is create an environment where people can work and live closer to their jobs."
Hrabe and Sally intend to apply for low-income housing tax credits through the Missouri Housing Development Commission in the fall. Contingent on the credits, plus city plan approvals, Hrabe said construction on the apartments could start in 2025.
The project team includes DRAW Architecture + Urban Design LLC and Taliaferro & Browne Inc. The team also plans to involve some REDI students through a mentor-protégé concept, in line with the initiative's focus on advancing women and people of color in real estate.
Block Real Estate Services LLC is the recommended developer for the city's other two Hospital Hill properties — a 5.9-acre site southeast of 24th and Campbell streets, partially housing the Kansas City Health Department's building at 2400 Troost Ave., as well as 1.1 acres that sits catty-corner northeast of 24th Street and Troost Avenue.
The larger of those sites is anticipated to support a mixed-use project with residential, office and ground-floor retail space, said Morgan Holecek, senior adviser to the city manager, during a Tuesday meeting of the Special Committee for Legal Review. The Health Department operations will continue, as will onsite leases with nonprofits Turn the Page KC and Charlie's House, she said.
At the smaller site, Block's future plans are anticipated to include a hotel, Holecek said. The city's property northeast of 24th and Troost sits just east of the La Quinta Inn & Suites by Wyndham Kansas City Beacon Hill, which opened in 2019.
Block did not provide more information on its Hospital Hill plans ahead of the city's vote and prospective negotiations.
Mayor Quinton Lucas voiced support for the proposed Hospital Hill investment on social media Tuesday, following the committee meeting.
The city's development talks come as another big Hospital Hill project — UMKC's $120 million Healthcare Delivery and Innovation Building — gears up for a 2024 construction start northeast of 25th and Charlotte streets. UMKC officials have said the facility will help position the Health Sciences District as a major regional academic medical center that can yield billions of dollars in metro jobs and economic impact.