New Boca development may open doors to affordable housing

A new development of homes on Broken Sound Boulevard in Boca Raton will offer the city something no other plat has done before.

The developer of the 172-unit residential complex, Stiles Development Corp. of Fort Lauderdale, will be the first to put some cash – specifically, $3 million -- into the city’s Affordable Housing Land Trust fund.City officials have been working long and hard for at least three years to come up with a method of providing affordable housing to middle income residents. To date, an ordinance is in the works, but it has never seen the light of a public hearing.Since 2004, the Greater Boca Raton Chamber of Commerce has been pushing for an affordable housing ordinance – and has even drafted a model for the city to adopt. The planning staff is currently reviewing it.A land trust, combined with an ordinance explaining how it can be used, could solve Boca’s problem of finding an equitable solution to the affordable housing issue