Episode Transcript
[00:00:00] Speaker A: I'm Greg Hartin, editorial page editor of the Northwest Arkansas Democrat Gazette. This is the Know the News podcast for the weekend of October 22, 2023. Today, my guest is Jim Petty, who happens to be a state senator from Van Buren. But our reason for talking to him today is his involvement in a project called Patriot Park, designed to help military veterans with housing in Fayetteville.
Mr. Petty, thanks for joining me today.
[00:00:43] Speaker B: I'm glad to do it. I'm looking forward to sharing the exciting news about Patriot Park. It's been a long time coming and certainly going to meet a tremendous need in the community, so I can't wait to have the conversation.
[00:00:56] Speaker A: Well, let's just start there. I mean, tell me about this facility. It's going to be built at the southeast corner of College Avenue North Street in Fayetteville by your company, Strategic Realty. So tell me just about the facility itself and why you chose to pursue a facility that is really specifically targeted toward the needs of veterans.
[00:01:18] Speaker B: Okay, so the facility itself is about a $12.4 million development. There will be 60 units that are set aside for veterans, a preference for veterans, all of which will be limited to the rent levels at an affordable level for all those making at or below 60% of the median income.
There are 24 one bedroom, 24 two bedroom, and twelve three bedroom units. And there are many sources of funding that come together for a project like this. But one of the pieces that kind of leads into your second question is from the National Housing Trust Fund, which provides for a preference for the funding for veteran housing. And so there was a combination of the fact that our company has been in the affordable housing business. We develop affordable housing across Arkansas and Oklahoma, have done so for 30 plus years. Not specifically with my company, but the team, the bulk of the team working for our company also worked for other companies that have done this very same affordable housing development. And so we are in that space first and foremost.
Then beyond that, our companies are a little unique in that we look for the not so boring housing projects to tackle.
Not that this is a very difficult development, but it did come in the middle of a pandemic, and so our challenges have been many. But we are very persistent.
A combination of the fact that we're in the affordable housing space, there was funding that they were pushing out from the federal levels for veterans or veterans preferences. And then the county, the previous county judge, Judge Joseph Wood and his Veteran Services Offices had put out a request for proposal for some veteran housing, and we responded to that response and were selected. Here we are almost four years later. But like I said, we're persistent. We don't give up early.
[00:04:16] Speaker A: So this isn't necessarily a situation where you sat down one day and just kind of said, hey, I want to build some veteran housing. It's that there are these programs out there that help to encourage that.
And you guys are just saying, yeah, we'll do that.
[00:04:32] Speaker B: We answered the call. That's right.
Our expertise is in the affordable housing space, and there are many programs that are out there and available. It is a scarce resource.
The National Housing Trust Fund is a limited available source of funds. That came out a few years ago.
But we were in that space, and we like to solve community needs and problems, affordable housing being the primary. But if in this case, they felt there was an underserved need in the space for veterans. And so we said, let's just combine our expertise, and we responded to the RFQ. And here we are almost four years later with dirt moving.
[00:05:30] Speaker A: I think there's one thing that people need to be clear about. I think you said preference for veterans. I assume that means that this facility will not be excluding other people who meet the qualifications, but its primary focus is veterans. Is that accurate?
[00:05:48] Speaker B: So that's fairly accurate.
The reality is, in working with the Veteran Services offices there at the county and other veteran organizations, we know that there is going to be a tremendous pin up need. We're only talking about 60 units.
We're very confident that the vast majority of the residents will be veterans, if not all of them. I'm fairly confident all of them will be, but not to handcuff us and limit our ability to serve an underlying affordable housing shortage need. They gave the flexibility when they put the program rules out, to allow extremely low income individuals, even if they're not veterans, to be able to participate in this particular program, but therefore be eligible for housing there. So while they leave a little flexibility in case, heaven forbid, we find out there wasn't a market for 60 units and veterans, which we know is not the case, having worked with them. But even if that was the case, or it changed and they made some tremendous investment and all the veterans moved to Central Arkansas for whatever reason, it gives us the flexibility to maintain the project long term financial viability because we can then move on and target others that are still low income and very low income individuals.
[00:07:32] Speaker A: So some people, I think, get the idea that a project like this is kind of designed to kind of resolve the homelessness problems as far as veterans go. But it's really a broader market than that, isn't it?
[00:07:50] Speaker B: That is absolutely correct.
The VA hospital has a homeless division there, and we've had that conversation with them as well.
This was never intended to just address homeless veterans. It was all veterans. Now, that doesn't mean that if there's a homeless veteran that wants to live there and they are eligible for other reasons, they're not excluded, then we can certainly house homeless veterans, but it's available for all veterans.
[00:08:29] Speaker A: Your company, I think I asked you starting out about why to do this and you talked about some of the encouragement from some of the different programs. Your company is not a nonprofit company. It's a for know, we don't see very many companies that kind of get into the affordable housing market in Northwest Arkansas. There's a lot of things going up, but a lot of them don't qualify as affordable to a lot of people. So why does that work for your company?
[00:09:08] Speaker B: So the short answer is it's just an area of real estate development that we had an expertise and had experience in that allowed us to have a viable business and therefore continue to use our expertise in developing the affordable housing. With that being said, as I mentioned earlier, there is a limit to the available funds for these various programs that we use. And so it's not the most abundant available source of funds. And so developing in Northwest Arkansas or other parts of the state, it probably doesn't encourage you, unless you're already in that space, to participate in these programs because in general, they're smaller. In general, there's a whole lot longer holding requirement before you can do anything else with it. A lot of the market rate developers, as you probably are aware, they'll develop something and then they'll stabilize it, and then a few years down the road, they'll sell it.
In our case, it is truly a long term operational hold, which turns some folks off. In our case, we enjoy what we do. We know it makes a difference in the lives of those people that we serve. And for whatever reason, we just feel like it's a fulfilling thing that we can do and yet still employ folks and do good in the community and have a viable business for us to own.
[00:11:10] Speaker A: So just as we conclude here, what else do you feel like important for people to know about this project? Because you guys are out there turning dirt.
[00:11:21] Speaker B: So I think it's important that people understand, like you said, that this is not going to solve the housing for homeless veterans problem, that 60 units is not going to solve any of the affordable housing problems. It's going to begin to meet the need. And so the more we can continue to educate and the more we can raise awareness around affordable housing and the need, then we can help solve potential problems and pitfalls with maybe the community and the types of individuals that live there. Sometimes it's not a well understood when you talk about affordable housing, people don't understand that. And then they start developing their own images and ideas of what affordable housing is and then they kind of cross over their understanding to some of the other housing programs which are operated completely differently and under different regulations, continuing to educate people with what we're doing.
So there's knowledge, there's awareness. And then when we have problems and they do occur, then we can talk to the folks at the city or we can talk to the folks at the county or we can talk to the bankers in the community and we can say, here's a problem.
We need to solve this, work through this.
And their understanding of one the need and it is a tremendous need, not only just in northwest Arkansas, but all over Arkansas and all over the country.
But they understand the need and they understand that it serves a little different purpose in the basic infrastructure of the community, so to speak. And so if we can continue to educate them, continue to show them that we can do tremendous positive things in the community, then the successes will breed more successes, and eventually we will make a dent in the affordable housing arena in Northwest Arkansas and across the state. But until then, there's still a lot of work to be done, both on the education side and just producing the units.
We want to keep the words out. We want to keep creating successful developments like this, and we want to continue to educate the community so all of us together can work to solve the affordable housing problems in Northwest Arkansas and elsewhere.
[00:14:25] Speaker A: Well, I know I drive by that corner quite often, and I am a little tired of it just being an empty parking lot. So I look forward to seeing the project go up in the months to come and appreciate very much what you guys are doing. So, Mr. Petty, thank you so much for joining us. I know you're a very busy man, and so I appreciate your willingness to visit and wish you good fortune.
[00:14:52] Speaker B: Well, I appreciate the opportunity to share our story here and what we're doing and look forward to showing you something here in the near future that everyone can be proud of and can point to as a success for the community.
[00:15:07] Speaker A: All right, well, thank you so much, listeners. If you want to stay with us after this brief message for details about what you can expect in this weekend's editions of the Northwest Arkansas Democrat Gazette, we'll be back in just a few seconds.
[00:15:21] Speaker C: If you're enjoying this podcast, consider a newspaper subscription to the northwest Arkansas democrat gazette or the river valley democrat gazette. We have a special offer for our podcast listeners, so visit Nwanline.com podcast 23 to get started. You can also click the subscribe button on our websites, nwanline.com and rivervalledemocratgazette.com, or call us at 479-684-5509 and be sure to say that you're a podcast listener. Now, back to the show.
[00:15:49] Speaker A: Here's some of what you can expect this weekend from the reporters in Northwest Arkansas in the River Valley, don't miss Saturday's preview and Sunday's excellent coverage by our sports staff of Arkansas's game against Mississippi State, which kicks off Saturday at 11:00 a.m.. In Saturday's paper, you'll also be able to read about a lot of Friday night's high school football action. Lorinda Jinx will tell us about a joint task force of Northwest Arkansas emergency agencies that devote their time to training and to the always important task of rescuing people who have gotten themselves in trouble.
The Washington County Assessor says the county cities and school districts are rolling back tax rates for area property owners. Tom Sissam will explain why in his story. And reporter Ron Wood will detail collaboration between the Northwest Arkansas Regional Planning Commission and other agencies to develop a statewide energy and environment innovation plan and what that means for the future. And in coverage from the River Valley, we'll learn about a meeting Fort Smith Mayor George McGill had with students at the University of Arkansas Fort Smith to discuss the city's appeal to younger people, ways to enhance that and what they expect from their city government. Monica Brick has that story. Thomas Cicente will also tell us about plans by the Fort Chaffee Regional Development Authority to keep building new trails in partnership with the local company, Arkbest, the Arkansas College of Health Education. And, of course, make sure to check out what's up. Our arts and entertainment magazine and our profiles section will feature a story about the well known John Williams, who has been broadcasting in Northwest Arkansas for 30 years.
All that and more will be in the weekend editions of the Northwest Arkansas Democrat Gazette, so be sure to check that out. Until next time. That's it for this edition of Know the News. I'm Greg Hartin. See you soon.
