Merry Christmas from my hometown!

Love this photo of Downtown Dallas, published in the latest issue of American Infrastructure Magazine, largely due to the fact that CitySquare's building at 511 N. Akard Street can be seen nestled in the middle of the scene just to the left of the Bank of America tower (orangeish/pinkish building!)

 Merry Christmas!!!

CityWalk witness

Affordable Downtown Dallas: “I Believe in This Project,” Says CityWalk @ Akard Penthouse Owner

by Joanna England
 

 Editor’s note: This story has been updated to reflect new developments.

When Andrew Foster bought his 15th floor penthouse at 511 N. Akard, he began the 7 month process of completely gutting the former commercial space. The building, which is the one of the few affordable apartment buildings in downtown Dallas,  includes permanent supportive housing for the formerly homeless. It was built in 1958 to house the headquarters of the Relief and Annuity Board of the Baptist General Convention, but today it has been transformed into something much more vibrant and useful.

“I love the space and I love downtown,” Foster said. “Downtown is a really exciting place to be right now.”

Read more.
 

Organizing a community

On Thursday, May 16, the CityWalk@Akard community enjoyed a full-on crime watch organizing event on the 3rd floor patio.

Master of all things BBQue, Edd Eason, provided the foundation for a great meal, and many CitySquare team members pitched in to help with the rest of the meal, serving the meal and making everything inviting and conducive to real progress on safety in the building.

Dallas police officers helped with the meeting.  They left very impressed with the participation, the planning and the program.  The residents of CityWalk are taking responsibility for the viability of their own community.

Way to go to everyone involved, and especially the residents who were so interested and involved!

This is a signal that a healthy community is emerging at 511 N. Akard in Downtown Dallas!

Patrick

What follows is an email exchange between Janet Morrison, Director of the Community Life Team at CityWalk and one of our residents whom we'll call "Patrick."  The honesty and the struggle are very clear.  The difficulty of recovery and the opportunity to achieve it continue on display every day here inside the housing community offered at 511 N. Akard Street in Downtown Dallas. 

After all that has gone on at CitySquare, emails like the one I'm about to share with you are awesome to receive. Patrick is a CityWalk resident who moved in a few months ago. When I did his initial Outcomes Star, I had a feeling he would have some challenges. I had asked George to try to work closely with him.

Patrick first agreed to meet with George, then started sending angry emails to me saying it was wrong that we force him to meet. He said he knew he had struggled in the past but he had his life under control and didn't need someone telling him what to do. He demanded to meet with Dallas Housing Authority (DHA) staff and myself. I went ahead and tried to set that up with DHA.

While that was happening, I saw him on the elevator. He, evidently, didn't remember who I was and was asking others in the elevator if they had to meet with this "Community Life team," to which one of the residents smiled and eagerly said, "Yes! I do...and she (pointing at me) is the one who met with me!"

Patrick asked who I was. When I told him, he put the name with the person he had been emailing and looked a little surprised, then got off the elevator. I talked to George and I imagine he talked with Patrick again.

I got this email about a week later:

Janet,

I have decided to cancel the meeting with you and DHA. I will meet with George on 1/18/12 to discuss my goals. Sorry about all the confusion I have created. What you are witnessing is my self-destruct mode that I resort to and for what reason I don't know. I guess I feel that I can always live on the streets when something isn't going the way I think it should. I've learned how to make it on the streets and have a tendency to resort back to those ways. Is this insanity or what? I need to accept success and change my homeless ways of thinking.

Also, when I allow someone to counsel me or talk to me about my goals, is like saying I don't know how to manage my own life. I do know how to manage my own life. I grant you that in the past I haven't done a very good job of it, but that has been because I didn't care to manage my own life, I just wanted to continue with my addiction. I must learn to humble myself and allow someone else into my life. Am I making any sense with all this? Do you understand what I am relating to you?

Again, cancel the meeting and I will meet with George on the date I mentioned above. My sincere apologies to you and George.

Patrick

I periodically see Patrick on the elevator and ask how he is doing. He periodically responds to different opportunities I send out via email. Here is the latest:

Hello Janet,

During my time of addiction and homelessness, I was never truly a happy person. Help came in many forms and fashions. Most of them I cared nothing about. Today, I have the best help I could ever ask for in my arrangement with CityWalk. It is what I looked for for a long time. I found out about CityWalk from a Lady at The Heights Church in Richardson. I admit though that what works for me might not be right for the next person. Since I have been at CityWalk I have accomplished some things, but could have done more. That's my fault. Did you know that attempting to bring an addict or homeless person into recovery or such is almost like trying to cage a wild tiger in alot of cases. The tiger is "stuck" (Outcome Star: User Guide) and wants to scratch anybody that comes close. In a way I still fit this model. I'm working on becoming more of a civilized tiger though! I know what's going on in the mind of an addict and/or a homeless person since I can very much relate. In some instances when I come in contact with an addict or homeless person I see the way I have been and actually don't like what I see in that person. I want to see in me and that person what God ordained before the foundation of the world in that person and myself. This requires relinquishing (surrender) control of myself and giving it to God. This can be scary since I have always wanted to be in control. It's kind of like losing me. But, I know that is best to lose the old self and give God a chance.

Regarding the Action Plan, I am making progress. I have a plan for getting a job, but I have to do this in the right order so as not to compromise what I now have. I have started attending Celebrate Recovery and have a plan for the senior center. If you have a prayer list, please put me on there. I thank God for bringing you, George and CityWalk into my life. Thanks for your friendship and the same to George!!

It helps me just to talk with you via email, so hope you don't mind me rambling on about all this stuff.

See you in the elevator!  LOL

Blessings,

Patrick

These are the things that help me know that the struggles and frustrations have an end result. Our job is a roller coaster. We may run into something else with Patrick tomorrow that takes us back a couple of steps...but receiving emails like these every once in a while help us know we are making progress and moving forward.

CityWalk@Akard. . .it's what we do

My office is located in a 15-story building first built in 1958 to house offices for the Southern Baptist Convention's Annuity Board. 

Between 2006 and 2010, after sitting vacant for over 20 years, the building was transformed via a complete "gut rehab." 

The finished product?  A mixed income, mixed use multifamily/retail-office development on the Arts District side of Downtown Dallas.  Frankly, the building, the financial strategy that made its renewal possible, the partners who office with us and the approximately 240 men, women and children who call the place home make CityWalk@ Akard an amazing place to say the very least.

Of course, the people make the place tick, better, hum!

Artists, musicians, formerly homeless, persons on the verge of becoming homeless, dishwashers, waiters, construction workers, the disabled and the discarded all call this place home. 

7-11 provides energy on the ground floor.  Enterprise Partners occupy about half of the second floor.  The administrative, development, and law offices of CitySquare, along with the owner/developer of the building, the Central Dallas Community Development Corporation, fill the third floor.  Other tenants are discussing occupying the open spaces on levels one and two. 

Floors four through fourteen offer 200 units of affordable housing for our residents.  Half of the units are set aside for the formerly homeless (when you get a home you are no longer in the category!) and those in danger of becoming homeless.  Half of the units are "means tested" by the tax credit rules, meaning that a person may earn up to about $27,000 and still live in the building.  Those earning above that ceiling are not eligible to live with us.

The top floor is divided into 6 condo spaces that are for sale at market rates to more affluent residents.  Two units have sold.  Four remain on the market. 

The place is a "real trip."  People find themselves in various states of weakness, vulnerability and distress.  Folks are glad to be there.  Folks battled addiction, memories and wounds from tough lives on the streets. 

We are present to direct the much broader, overall work of CitySquare, but also to love the people, to organize the people and to work at building a viable community of health and redemption. 

It is hard.

It is joyous.

It is what we do.

Jammin' at CityWalk!

Dwight Johnson, aka Demetrius, can lay down a tune through his sax but right from his heart! I caught him practicing in the Glaze Community Room at CityWalk, our mixed-use, Downtown housing development, one evening recently.

I love to hear him play!

As a matter of fact, he's agreed to play for us this coming Wednesday during our "Lunch and Learn" luncheon during which I'll share an update on our progress and plans at CitySquare.  For details call 214.303-2128.

CityWalk Snow in Dallas!

Photos taken out the 3rd floor window, on the 3rd floor patio and from the street.

Snow in Dallas!

Lies and truth, two guys on a sidewalk

We had met about 6 months ago on the sidewalk outside the downtown YMCA. 

He approached me on that occasion with a fist full of papers, including an unused bus ticket to El Paso.  He told me he had just been released from the hospital, but had missed his bus.  He would need a small amount of cash to reschedule his trip on the same ticket.  I provided him what he said it would take to use the ticket.

About a month later I encountered him again at the same spot on the sidewalk.  He held in his hand the same documents.  He told me the same story, complete with tears and desperation. 

When I told him that he needed a new "play," he looked at me with bewilderment.  I reminded him that he had used the ploy on me already.  I chided him a bit by suggesting that at least he take  his game to a new street corner.  That last encounter sent him away up the sidewalk. 

Only two or three weeks later, I observed him running his scam on some other person at the same spot. 

Last Tuesday evening as I left the YMCA to head home with a growing case of the flu, he appeared again. 

This time he was limping. 

He had a stack of paperwork indicating that he had been bitten by a dog and had received treatment at a local hospital. 

At first I was very unwelcoming. 

"Don't game me, man," I told him without hesitation in a self-righteous tone.  "We've had this conversation now three times," I reminded him. 

I explained to him that I could hear anything, but I wouldn't stand still for some concocted story. 

He showed me his leg.  He made me read the papers.  Clearly both his condition and his dismissal papers were legit. 

He also shared with me that he had applied to live "in the building across the street," CityWalk, our downtown housing  development.  He was on our waiting list to get an apartment.

His request was simple:  he needed $7.00 to spend the night in a local, downtown area shelter. 

I handed him a $10 bill.

He continued to cry.

Then, he grabbed my arm, looked me in the eye and said, "I need to tell you something, sir."

"Okay," I replied.

He struggled to get the words out.  After several minutes of effort to battle past his embarrassment and shame, he chocked out his confession, "Sir, the reason I do this, the reason I lied to you before, is, well, I have a terrible heroine addiction.  I'm hooked bad and I can't find no treatment." 

He told me of his attempts to escape the hell his life had become.  He cried.  I tried to reassure him that we would try to help him in as many ways as we could.

As we parted, he on the way to the nearby night shelter that has sadly become the permanent housing for far too many, me to the safety of my home to fight off the impending flu, I thought about how different our lives were and how much the same.  Our needs were fundamentally the same.  Our opportunities and assets quite different. 

He lied to me on the sidewalk. 

He told me the truth on the same sidewalk square.

I expect we'll meet again.  The story is not finished.

Children dance at CityWalk!

Here is a part of the program from the CityWalk@Akard Christmas party last week.

Aren't children wonderful?

Thanks to Rachel Lamb, our intern from Perkins School of Theology at SMU, for organizing the ongoing dance classes for these special children who live in the building.

Enjoy!

Love the new Downtown? Live Downtown!

Want to live in booming, exciting, increasingly active Downtown Dallas? 
But, afraid you can't afford it?

Living on wages under $30,000 annually?  Feel like you're limited to the 'burbs?

Not so fast!

Drop what you are doing and call 214.303-2119. 

Talk to Keith.  He can tell you how to get in on a great move-in deal at CityWalk!

Press Release: Love Downtown? Live Downtown!

City Walk @ Akard Offers Opportunity for High Quality, Affordable Housing


Apartments in the heart of downtown, conveniently located near transportation, business, and entertainment are now available, offering a unique opportunity to live downtown, where residents can enjoy high rise living without the high prices.

Dallas, TX., September 21, 2010 --- City Walk @Akard is more than a recently renovated 15-story apartment building. It is a unique opportunity – an opportunity for moderate income wage earners to have a convenient, new apartment home set in the heart of downtown – an opportunity to live in a historic building that offers many of the same amenities found in upscale, urban high-rises but at a range of affordable prices.

Marble lobbies welcome residents and guests. A 24-hour doorman and on-site management provide worry-free living. City Walk @ Akard provides fun with an on-site activity director and a community room complete with organized youth activities, a fitness center, library, computer room, game room and music sound room.

Available now, loft-style apartments are being offered by Central Dallas Community Development Corporation, Central Dallas Ministries’ nonprofit, housing developer. “Central Dallas CDC's goal is to bring beautiful, sustainable design to housing for people at any income level,” explained John Greenan, Executive Director at City Walk. Units come furnished with appliances, stainless steel lighting fixtures, painted accent walls, cabinets, and polished floors, plus free WiFi access and on-site laundry facilities. Electricity, Heat/ & Air conditioning are included in rent. Most apartments have spectacular views of the Dallas skyline!

City Walk @ Akard has easy access to all major thoroughfares and is a short walk to the DART Rail and all public transportation. According to Andrew Fortunato, executive consultant to City Walk, “affordable housing is an asset to residents and our community.” Residents can enjoy downtown shopping, dining and entertainment all right outside their “front door”. For those individuals who work downtown or who are looking to live close to transportation, City Walk offers convenience and affordability.

City Walk is more than an opportunity to live in a beautiful high-rise building. It is an opportunity to “move-up”! To learn more about all that City Walk has to offer, go to www.citywalkatakard.com or call 214.468-8826.

# # # #

For more information on contents of this release, please contact: Lou Ann York 214.343.1599 or lapub@sbcglobal.net

Reflections from CityWalk@Akard

We've been in our new offices on the 3rd floor at the CityWalk @Akard development in Downtown Dallas since mid-January.  If you are interested in more details about the project, use the search tool on this page and you can read previous posts about the building and its development. 

Now that we're in the building with the 140 or so tenants who live in it, the experience has turned out to be better and more encouraging than I had imagined.  It is the sort of place that forces one into reflection, almost on a constant basis. 

Developing quality, affordable, supportive housing for the poorest people in Dallas is anything but easy.  CityWalk required (to be more accurate, still requires) every ounce of creative energy all of us can drudge up.  Whether you consider cost, funding for cost, design, marketing, politics, public-private realities, or lease-up challenges abound!  One thing is for sure:  almost nothing about the project has been routine, boring or expected!

Given the basic nature of the development deal, it might seem easy to overlook or to look past all of the human implications of the development.  But, it's not. 

The people who live here and who want to live here provide a constant stream of human stories--stories that move, shape, inspire and just "break you down." 

One of our residents is a screen writer.  He's shared his concept papers for two different shows, one about being homeless, another about a local high school football team torn apart by the involvement of some of the players in serious criminal activity.  Brilliant guy. . .who has been homeless.

Another plays the saxophone like crazy!  Carries it with him lots of the time, and stopped by my office last week to play for me, but I was out of the office and missed him. 

Last week we hosted an orientation session for potential new members for our Board of Directors.  Seven of those who attended were residents of the building.  One young man asked us, "You mean that this meeting with us is to see if we want to be on your Board of Directors?" 

When I confirmed that we were doing just that, he seemed taken back, like he couldn't imagine our wanting low-income folks on our leadership board.  He was energized by the idea and said he wanted to pursue the process. 

Another woman told us that she had always wanted to do something like this, but added, "It's taken me all this time to just get to here.  I grew up in Oak Cliff, was abused by my parents, abandoned, half-starved to death, all on my own."  Tears flowed as her voice broke.  I assured her that she was exactly the sort of person we needed on our board to inform our work at every turn. 

Others of the tenants told us they had no idea that CDM did all the things that we do.

"My, my, the hand of the Lord is all over this place," one older woman almost shouted to me after the meeting broke up.

Then, there are the children, about 40 of them in the building.  They bring laughter, smiles, energy and joy to the 15-story, vertical community/neighborhood!

As I toured the building with an interested supporter last week, I was overwhelmed by all of the good that is going on.  For all of the difficulty and challenge, for all of the headaches, the deal was more than worth it!

Yes, indeed, much more than worth it.

[More reflections to come!] 

Providing housing cheaper in most cities

The evidence is mounting. 

In city after city where the research is complete, we now know that providing homeless persons permanent supportive housing is no more expensive, and in most cities it is less expensive to the public, than allowing people to remain on the streets. 

The National Alliance to End Homelessness provides examples of this research.  Here's the explanation of one batch of research posted on the organization's website: 

The Homelessness Research Institute used the results of several studies (cited below) of expenditure reductions through permanent supportive housing to create an interactive stacked bar chart that illustrates the relative costs of permanent supportive housing and homelessness (prior to supportive housing) in four cities (Portland, ME; New York, NY; Portland, OR, and Denver, CO) and one state (Rhode Island). The chart illustrates the fact that the cost of permanent supportive housing is offset in most instances by reductions in emergency shelter costs and health care (physical and behavioral) costs.

To view the revealing data click here. 

Providing housing is not only the right thing to do, it is smart public policy as well. 

Sojo and Dallas

The Dallas Justice Revival was featured prominently in the June 2010 issue of Sojourners magazine.  Check out Catherine Cuellar's essay, "Now the Work Begins":

Sharon Tillis had every comfort of a “good Christian wife”: a home, a car, a job, and children. In her 40s she also faced some challenges other Christians hadn’t—bipolar disorder, domestic violence, and shame about surviving incest. Deciding whether to stay in an unhealthy marriage or get divorced and risk homelessness, she chose the latter.



“God was with me every step of the way,” Tillis says now of her journey. After two years of counseling, time spent sleeping in her car and on the couches of friends and family members, and 18 months in and out of shelters, Tillis finally has a home to call her own again. CityWalk@Akard, a mixed-use high rise developed over the past five years by the nonprofit Central Dallas Ministries (whose chair, Larry James, served on Justice Revival’s leadership team) includes 200 affordable apartments. Of these, 50 have been designated as permanent supportive housing for formerly homeless residents like Tillis. CityWalk’s expected completion in spring 2010 is in the context of a Greater Dallas Justice Revival goal of developing a total of 700 new units.


“I could go to church and stay at members’ houses a couple of months or so. The church can provide me, I guess, with gas money or whatever I need, food. But to provide me housing—that’s a miracle.” Tillis says. “I feel independent, self-sufficient. I feel like I can do anything now. I have peace of mind. I don’t have to worry about where I’m going to lay my head. It gave me all of that. It gave me hope.”


To read the entire essay click here.

Affirmation of Permanent Supportive Housing

Yesterday, I enjoyed the honor of speaking to a senior adult luncheon at Wilshire Baptist Church here in Dallas.  My dear friend, Dr. George Mason serves the church as pastor, a position he has held for over two decades.  I really respect the church and George.  Wilshire is a great place and I always enjoy being there.

At the end of my presentation, during a short Q & A period, a woman stood up and, with tears in her voice, she told the group that her 41-year-old son, who had been homeless of several years, was now living in our housing at CityWalk@ Akard.  She shared a bit of his struggle and her enduring concern for him.  She told about how stable his life had become since moving into our housing.  She informed the group that he was enrolled in community college and was training to be a paralegal.  She was so grateful and her soul beamed through her words. 

After we dismissed, a man approached me with tears in his eyes.  He shared that he had lost his job, experienced health issues and became homeless over a period of time.  He told me that he lived at CityWalk too.  I was amazed to find people so close to us at this event. 

I left feeling so good about our housing efforts.  I also had another experience to share about the power, effectiveness and hope that accompanies the development of and access to Permanent Supportive Housing.  The people who live in our building demonstrate what can happen when in lives when given a simple chance to begin again. 

I pray the day will come when our city and its various neighborhoods come to understand the truth of what we're experiencing every day.

Dallas Observer reports on Grand Opening. . .

Check out the report from The Dallas Observer today. . .

Great media coverage of CityWalk Grand Opening!

We enjoyed great media coverage on last evening's "grand opening" at CityWalk!

Check it out. . .

here. . .

and here.

Possibly more later!  Thanks to all who supported us through this entire process!

Check out article in The Dallas Morning News today about CityWalk@Akard!

Great story by Kim Horner in this morning's edition of The Dallas Morning News concerning our CityWalk development!

Here's how it begins:

Low-income development is changing minds in downtown Dallas

By KIM HORNER / The Dallas Morning News
khorner@dallasnews.com

Skeptics envisioned a skid row when developers first proposed 200 downtown apartments for low-income and formerly homeless residents.

Sharon Denise Tillis, who used to live in a shelter, was among the first to move into CityWalk@Akard, a new low-income housing development. The waiting list has 300 people on it.

But so far, the project, CityWalk@Akard, has not lived up to those fears.

The 15-story apartment building opened just three months ago, and only 10 residents have moved in so far. But neighboring property owners say the project has already improved, rather than hurt, the neighborhood.

To read the full report click here.

CityWalk@Akard: Photos

To get a glimpse of our newly restored, Downtown office tower, know at CityWalk@ Akard, click here.

The project is mixed-use: office and retail. . .

Mixed-income: 200 units of affordable housing with 50 units reserved for formerly homeless persons and 6 market rate, for sale condos.

Our grand opening will be Thursday, March 25 from 4:30 to 7:00 p.m.

CityWalk@Akard Grand Opening

Speaking of Permanent Supportive Housing. . .check out information regarding the Grand Opening for our CityWalk@ Akard project right here.