Miami Jewish Health Systems and a partner won site plan approval for 410 apartments in Pembroke Pines with below-market rents for tenants 62 and older who have low or moderate income.
Not-for-profit Miami Jewish Health and San Francisco-based McDowell
Housing Partners won approval for Douglas Gardens IV and VI. The 14.2-acre development site is at 705 Southwest 88th Avenue in Pembroke Pines, south of Pines Boulevard and east of Douglas Road.
Pembroke Pines commissioners gave the green light to the project last week in an effort to increase affordable housing options for seniors with limited income.
“It addresses a real issue we’re having in Broward County,” Pembroke Pines commissioner Thomas Good Jr. said at the commissioners’ meeting last Wednesday night.
Douglas Gardens IV and VI would be the last two apartment buildings at the Douglas Gardens senior housing campus in Pembroke Pines, where four buildings with a total of 332 apartments have been built since 2006, according to a city staff report.
At Douglas Gardens IV and VI, 390 of the 410 apartments will be reserved for 62-and-older tenants with low income, or 50 percent to 80 percent of area median income. The developers will reserve the other 20 apartments for tenants with moderate income, or 80 percent to 120 percent of area median income.
Douglas Gardens IV and VI will have a combined total of 284 two-bedroom apartments, 121 one-bedrooms, and five studios.
The signature amenity of the Douglas Gardens campus is the 15,000-square-foot PACE Medical Center operated by Miami Jewish Health, offering primary medical care, physical and occupational therapy, mental health treatment, hearing aids and eyeglasses, among other health products and services.
Other amenities will include outdoor fitness stations, walking paths, a gym, and a café. On-site resident services will range from adult literacy lessons to help with laundry, housekeeping, and grocery shopping.
The two-building, 410-unit expansion of Douglas Gardens would have 40 more units than local zoning allows because the developers got a density bonus under a new Broward County ordinance to incentivize affordable housing development.
“Pembroke Pines is going to be the first city in the county to use this ordinance,” James Kahn of Keith and Associates, a consultant to the developers, said at the city commission meeting.