Eagle Star Housing, DePaul plan for 100-unit housing complex in Watertown

Eagle Star Housing’s executive director Zach Fuller said the plan is to build a 100-unit apartment complex, with space set aside for 30 homeless veterans.

“We’re working to build about 100 total apartments in a tax credit affordable housing project,” he said. “Thirty of them will be designated specifically for homeless veterans, and we’ll be the operator.”

Mr. Fuller said Eagle Star Housing is planning to work with DePaul, a nonprofit developer based in Rochester that focuses on low-income and needs-focused developments. DePaul has been involved in recent construction projects in many counties across upstate New York, including Oswego County’s recent Lock 7 affordable housing development. He said DePaul would own the building, and Eagle Star Housing would serve as property managers.

“We provide the services for the homeless veteran basically, housing and housing subsidy, on-site support, management teams, service plan, the whole nine yards,” he said.

He said the group has been in touch with local groups and agencies to find out how best to maximize their impact and determine the best place to build the facility, as well as what other needs the community has.

“We also do shelter housing, more transitional 60-day type housing, and we have three of those in operation right now,” he said. “We’re just starting the exploratory nature of what that would look like in Watertown, if we could open a shelter there in conjunction with the permanent supportive housing.”

He said there are still many details that need to be hashed out for the project, and he expects more information will be available by the springtime.

“We’re very excited to get into that area, and we’re looking to garner support from the community as we start moving forward,” he said. “But we have to go through a full process. We hope to have a full project plan ready to go to start the approval process sometime next year.”

Jefferson County’s first emergency shelter has grown to host more than 30 displaced and homeless people since opening the weekend of Nov. 18, when a lake-effect storm covered much of the region in feet of snow.

The impromptu shelter on Main Avenue, in the building that once housed DealMaker Auto Group’s body shop, has heat, cots, running water and functioning bathrooms. Many people staying there had been living in tents in the Joseph M. Butler Sr. Pavilion in the J.B. Wise parking lot. County Legislator Scott A. Gray, R-Watertown, has been coordinating the shelter with the building’s owner, P.J. Simao, volunteers and various agencies.

Billy, a veteran originally from Canton, told the Times at the shelter last week that he has been trying to get assistance through the Department of Veterans Affairs for years for his health problems, which make it difficult to work physical jobs. He’s been through rehabilitation programs for addiction, and said this is his first time in a shelter, after years of programs and renting his own apartments.

“I’ve got money, just not enough for rent at an apartment now,” he said. “They’ve gotten so expensive, I can’t afford it.”

Transitional Living Services of Northern New York has completed units in the former Angel’s Inn at 518 Pine St., but staffing the site has been a challenge.

The Watertown Salvation Army is also planning to open a warming center at its State Street building.

A Jefferson County homelessness task force includes representatives from the Children’s Home of Jefferson County, CREDO, the county administration, the county’s community services and social services departments, the North Country Family Health Center, the Northern Regional Center for Independent Living, Transitional Living Services of Northern New York, the United Way of Northern New York and the Watertown Urban Mission.