IRVINE : Affordable-Housing Project Is Delayed

What was slated to be Orange County’s largest affordable-housing apartment complex has been put on hold until at least next year, one of the project’s partners said Monday.

The 382-unit, $42-million project proposed by the Irvine Co. and the nonprofit BRIDGE Housing Corp. of San Francisco is not dead but will have to wait until the economy picks up, said C. Keith Greer, president of Irvine Community Builders, an Irvine Co. subsidiary.

Irvine Co. and BRIDGE officials had hoped to begin grading this month on the site at Harvard Avenue and San Leon, near City Hall.

Delaying the project will mean that an application to the state for a $28-million, low-interest loan will be canceled, said Peter Hersh, Irvine’s manager of planning services.

Irvine’s allocation of $700,000 in federal grant funds to the project might also have to be rescinded because federal rules require that the money be spent by March 15, Hersh said.

The BRIDGE apartment complex, which the city approved last June, would have been the largest affordable housing complex in Orange County, according to officials. As many as half of the apartments would be rented to families earning up to 50% of the county’s median income. That would translate into a two-bedroom apartment renting for about $600 a month, about $400 less than other apartments in the area.

An agreement between the Irvine Co. and BRIDGE calls for the company to provide the land and part of the financing for the project. Rents would repay the low-interest loans and help reimburse the company for its investment.

The Irvine Co. cannot afford the amount of subsidy and equity needed to build the BRIDGE project until the area’s building slump eases, Greer said. The only way to move forward now with BRIDGE would have been under unfavorable loan terms and with the Irvine Co. guaranteeing repayment, he explained.

“The realities are that we will simply have to defer the project--not eliminate it,” Greer said. “We’re having to be very judicious in how we’re investing in affordable housing and other types of things. . . . It’s a matter of making a very difficult business choice.”

The company has already invested $1 million in architect fees, city fees, engineering studies and other project start-up costs, he said.