By a unanimous 7-0 vote Monday night, the Falls Church City Council approved a historic measure ensuring that over 10 percent of all the 339 residential rental units to be built at the just-approved Broad and Washington mixed use project will be offered at subsidized, affordable rates.
Never before in the City or the region has such a high percentage of total units in a major project been designated as available “affordably,” which is to say at rates affordable to individuals or households earning between 40 and 80 percent of the annual median income for the region.
It marks the first concrete step to provide such housing in over a decade in Falls Church since the defeat of a measure to build a multiple-unit affordable housing project failed to win a critical Council vote in 2010.
Last night’s novel unanimous vote was capped by a move to add a single additional unit, at the initiative of Councilman Phil Duncan, to push the number of affordable units from 33 to 34, bringing them officially over 10 percent of the 339 total units planned for the project.
Funding to cover the cost will come for the Insight Property developers of the overall project as part of its voluntary concessions offered in exchange for the Council’s approval of zoning and other modifications required to get the project OK’d.
