Closed South Whittier Library to make way for low-income housing for Rio Hondo students
Los Angeles County plans to build a 27-unit apartment complex at the site of the former South Whittier Library for low-income Rio Hondo College students.
The county Board of Supervisors this week approved a 180-day exclusive negotiating agreement with Long Beach-based LINC Housing Corp., a local nonprofit developer, to work on the plan.
The previous library operated out of a 17,000 square-foot strip mall-like building that eventually will be razed, said Ivan Sulic, field deputy for Hahn.
“This is a promising project that will provide local students with safe places to live and give them the opportunity to focus on their studies and their bright futures,” Hahn wrote.“We are using all of the tools at our disposal to address the homelessness crisis at every level, and we will not ignore the staggering number of local college students who are struggling with homelessness,” Supervisor Janice Hahn said in an emailed statement.
Butch Redman, a long-time South Whittier activist, likes the project.
“It’s a good thing,” Redman said. “There’s a lot of college students who are homeless and living out of cars or wherever they can flop.”
The next step is to organize the funding, Suny Lay Chang, LINC Housing chief operating officer, said in an email.
The development will utilize tax credits along with conventional debt and a construction loan, Chang wrote. LINC Housing also will apply for project-based rental assistance.
The library, 14433 Leffingwell Road, closed when a new $13 million, 14,411-square-foot library — more than double the original’s size — opened in November 2016.
Rio Hondo College has 30 students who self-identified as housing insecure last fall, but the number could be larger, Ruthie Retana, college spokeswoman said by email. Retana added that many students who experience housing insecurity do not always come forth.
“Eliminating anxieties about where to find housing will help our housing insecure students to focus on their coursework and draw one step closer to their educational goals,” she wrote.
Retana also said the housing project compliments a variety of other initiatives of the college, including its on-campus Food Pantry; Rio Source Referrals which provides connections with local government agencies and nonprofits for social services; the finals hot food program which gives out hot meals to students during finals week on campus; and GO RIO, which provides transportation services.
LINC Housing has built two low-income housing projects in Whittier, including Seasons at the Hoover, a senior housing project, and Mosaic Gardens,
“They all have been very good projects,” Whittier City Manager Jeff Collier said. “They’ve done a good job.”
