St. Luke's Hospital has been a landmark on Cleveland's East Side for over 80 years. Its brick façade, neoclassical pillars and white bell tower rise up from the corner of Shaker Boulevard and Martin Luther King, Jr. Drive, serving as a gateway to the Buckeye and Larchmere-Shaker Square neighborhoods of Cleveland.

Although it closed in 1999, its buildings remained intact. Now, 12 years later, plans to redevelop the building are finally coming to fruition. New Village Corporation (NVC) and Pennrose Properties will break ground tomorrow (April 29) on a project to renovate the building into 72 units of low-income senior housing.

St. Luke's Manor will not only rehabilitate the building and provide much-needed affordable housing, say developers, but will also contribute to large-scale neighborhood redevelopment. They cite the new Harvey Rice Elementary School and Rice Library, which opened their doors next to the hospital two years ago. Other investments include a $500,000 public pathway called the Mews and the planned $3.6 million redevelopment of the RTA rapid station at Shaker and E. 116th Street.

NVC also hopes that as the economy improves up to 80 new market-rate homes will be built on vacant residential lots around the former hospital. Only 22 homes have been built so far, as the project has languished in a slow housing market.

The $15.1 million St. Luke's Manor project will rehabilitate the hospital's central wing into senior apartments using Low-Income Housing Tax Credits as well as state and federal Historic Tax Credits. The project is considered Phase I of a larger redevelopment.

The developers will target senior households with incomes of up to 35 percent, 50 percent and 60 percent of Area Median Household Income (AMHI). The project will include studio, one-bedroom, and two-bedroom garden units with rents ranging from $281 to $678.

In total, over $80 million worth of redevelopment is planned on the former St. Luke's Hospital site. The community is also one of the first neighborhoods in the country to be certified as sustainable and environmentally responsible by the U.S. Green Building Council.

Pennrose Properties is a for-profit affordable housing developer based in Philadelphia. New Village Corporation is the nonprofit development arm of Neighborhood Progress, an intermediary that funds community development corporations. NVC acts as deal-maker and catalyst for projects that are too risky for private developers to accomplish on their own.

A public groundbreaking event will take place on Friday, April 29th at 1:30 pm at 11311 Shaker Boulevard.

Source: Neighborhood Progress
Writer: Lee Chilcote