Republic County Economic Development (RCED), in partnership with the City of Belleville, submitted an eighty-page Moderate Income Housing (MIH) grant application for two houses and the beginnings of a five-acre, fifteen-house development in eastern Belleville. The application submitted to the Kansas Housing Resources Corporation, took almost six months to organize and compile by RCED Director Jenny Russell and Architect Harley Schuster.
In working on this application, RCED established lines of collaboration. This has included communication with ten major employers, three community meetings, two Zoom meetings, conversations with the City of Belleville, Republic County, Republic County Economic Development Board, the banks in the county, the lumberyard, one hundred and ten empty lot owners within the city, six major land owners for housing developments, North Central Kansas Regional Planning, and State Representatives. Of course, the most obvious collaboration is between the Republic County Economic Development Board and the City of Belleville for this application.
The issues and concerns remain the same in Republic County as it does overall in north central Kansas – the high cost of materials, low tax valuation, return on investment and renter issues having prohibited new construction. Utility and infrastructure costs can deter the development of new housing projects. Most housing programs are tied to low- or moderate-income housing. Studies have shown that half of all Americans that make less than $50,000 per year are cost burdened. A person or household is considered to be cost burdened, if they need to spend more than 30% of their income on either rent or mortgage. This can be attributed to housing prices increasing while salaries stay the same. For every 1 affordable house that is built, 18 unaffordable houses are built.
Within Republic County, 49.3% of the houses were built before 1939 and 88.5% of the housing were built before 1969. The housing problem is prohibiting employers from hiring and the rural population from growing. The age of the existing housing stock as well the retention of ownership has caused the quality and quantity of affordable housing to decline. This forces families to seek better social environments outside of the county – affecting the economy, health, schools, and sense of belonging of the area. Consequently, as the age of homes increases, so does the cost of upkeep. Although some of these homes may be affordable initially, they are not sustainable, and the overall cost of living is higher. Republic County has a total population of 4,658 people. Within the county, the median income level is $47,976. Of the total population, 52% make less than $50,000 a year.
Expanding housing needs will actually allow Belleville and Republic County to take full advantage of the industrial development and prime location that the community enjoys. There are nine major employers in Belleville alone that have opportunities for growth and development. This is significantly hindered by the lack of workforce housing, which will be alleviated by lessening the housing shortage. Based on the current salaries offered by one of our leading employers and manufacturers the houses we aim to build will fall within affordability ranges as stated within MIH’s 60% to 150% range. If the base fabricator salary is utilized, as reported by the manufacturer, ($35,617) and compare that to the MIH
income requirements for 1-person to 4-person households, these homes will be affordable and help meet the current needs of the community. Doing this housing program will allow for
Republic County to capture workers that are not currently living in the County, but who are working here. This also helps our school system with students and additional revenue from the State. Our NCK Industrial Park, located in Belleville, plans to add three additional businesses to the Industrial Park in the coming year to satisfy a KDOT grant that was received for a road build there. The people hired at these businesses will be additional prospects for this housing.
Republic County Economic Development has actually been working on this issue for fifteen years. The City of Belleville was the pilot for the Nuisance Abatement Program through the NCK Regional Development which targeted cleanup of the City of Belleville in four quadrants. This also included tearing down blighted structures. Republic County participated in the 2021 Statewide Housing Needs Assessment and all follow up calls. In this time period, Republic County and the City of Belleville started working with potential land owners in targeted development areas of Belleville and meeting with housing developers from Manhattan. Additionally, Republic County has worked with NWK Economic Innovation Center on fact finding to housing barriers and long-term housing solutions for the region.
In 2021, Republic County piloted a Republic County Housing Incentives Program through the Dane G. Hansen Foundation that offered a Demolition Assistance Grant, Empty Nester Grant, and a Paint the County Grant. These programs helped to clean up the County and offer some incentives for move over housing, but did not solve the issue of new housing units. In 2020, Republic County participated in the NCK Home Ownership Program that provided home buyers with down payment and closing cost assistance. This successful program helped to sell eleven homes in Republic County with just over $1 million in investment and $132,000 provided by the program. This was a mixed blessing however, because after the program completed, the available housing stock in Republic County was down to one or two houses per realtor and has remained that way throughout 2022.
In 2018 and 2019, Republic County Economic Development (RCED) utilized housing interns through Dane G. Hansen Foundation to try to make progress on this issue, knowing that it was essential to the county’s growth. The interns also conducted an electronic survey of housing needs in the county which included twenty-nine percent of the respondents were 35-44, twenty-three percent were 55-64, and twenty percent were 45-54. Over half of the respondents saw a great need for Moderate Income Housing. In 2016, RCED worked with Jayhawk Consulting at Kansas University, MBA program seeing if these academic minds could assist in the work. While the group did a good job of analyzing the Republic County housing issues, the students didn’t find any new information that we didn’t already know.
In 2014, Buffalo Apartments opened in the former grade school. This project completed by the Pioneer Group, included forty-one low-income apartments and fifteen moderate income apartments. The moderate-income apartments filled up right away and remain full. The low-income apartments struggled to get full, but eventually did.
Now that the Moderate-Income Housing program submission deadline has been met, Republic County is in a holding pattern to see if the community was one of the awardees of the requested $575,000 grant. Grant awards will be announced in November 2022. The Moderate-Income Housing program is a competitive grant program through the Kansas Housing Resources Corporation that went from $2 Million in funding to $62 Million in 2022. Matching funds for the RCED/City of Belleville application came from committed $40,000 in City of Belleville and $35,000 in Republic County ARPA funds.