Affordable housing program makes grants for new, existing projects

Over $9 million more is headed to affordable housing projects throughout Richmond. 

On Tuesday, the city announced the latest awards from the Affordable Housing Trust Fund, a pool of money that was set up in 2004 to provide both for-profit and nonprofit developers with extra funds to build affordable units. 

This year, $7 million is going toward eight housing projects throughout the city that if completed would add 580 affordable units to Richmond’s stock. An additional $2.2 million would go to the city’s Healthy Homes Rehabilitation Program, which covers repairs for low-income households that are intended to allow residents to remain in their houses. 

Mayor Danny Avula described the awards as “a thoughtful combination” of efforts to develop new housing and preserve what already exists. 

“Our city needs new affordable units to accommodate a growing population, but it also needs to protect the people and the homes that are already here,” he said in a statement accompanying the announcement. 

Projects receiving funding include the Maggie Walker Community Land Trust’s portion of the next phase of the Highland Grove project in Northside, the 246-unit Semmes Flats being built near the Belvidere Bridge on Southside and an affordable housing component of the Diamond District.

Several of the projects have also been awarded funding through the city’s Affordable Housing Performance Grant program, which offers long-term tax reductions to developers in exchange for building and maintaining affordable units. 

The eight winners were chosen from a pool of 20 by the Affordable Housing Trust Fund Board, with recommendations from the city’s Department of Housing and Community Development. Criteria included “readiness, location, target population, and developer experience and capacity.” 

Board Chair Ellen Robertson, who represents Richmond’s 6th District in City Council, called the funding “a small, but important, way that we can start to address [housing] concerns and show our residents that we are not only creating new housing units but working to protect the units that are here.” 

Since 2023, Richmond has been putting $10 million annually into the trust fund, initially using funds from the American Rescue Plan Act and now relying on general obligation bonds.

Michael Hinkle, a spokesperson for the city, said the trust fund currently contains $3,785,974 left over from the fiscal year 2025 bonds as well as an additional $10 million that came from the 2026 bonds. 

How revenue should flow into the trust fund has been a point of contention in recent years, including during this spring’s budget hearings. 

This April, several dozen members of a coalition of faith community members known as Richmonders Involved to Strengthen Our Communities, or RISC, came before City Council to complain that the city isn’t complying with a 2021 ordinance that calls for all revenues from an expiring property tax abatement program to be deposited into the trust fund. 

Richmond’s city auditor is currently working on an audit focused on that issue and is also planning to conduct a broader review of the program this fiscal year. 

Contact Reporter Sarah Vogelsong at svogelsong@richmonder.org