Housing Authority looking at grant to buy Stallion Park

Units would be made available as affordable housing

The Gunnison County Housing Authority is looking for funds to buy the Stallion Park Condos in the Buckhorn Ranch subdivision south of Crested Butte. The 22-unit building would become part of the County’s affordable housing inventory if the plan is successful. 

Housing Authority Director KT Gazunis says she started to pursue the project in the wake of the County’s Housing Needs Assessment that was released earlier this year and showed significant deficiencies in affordable rental housing in the north end of the Gunnison Valley.
So to raise $2 million of the undisclosed purchase amount, Gazunis is going to the Colorado Division of Housing with an application for grant money that is set aside to buy existing housing to be made available to low-income families.
With Stallion Park already largely empty and slated as affordable housing, the condo complex made a perfect fit for the project. Gazunis said there is no one that she knows of living in the condos that would be displaced by the plan. The lone condo owner in Stallion Park would be left alone.
“For the people who have lease situations, all leases have to be recognized. If anyone has any concern they can come to the public hearing,” Gazunis said. “It is not the intent to cause displacement from any existing housing; however, if persons are displaced from their existing residences reasonable housing alternatives will be offered.”
Stallion Park also has two unfinished condo complexes next door to the existing building that haven’t made it past the foundation stage and sit on the property unfinished, which concerns Gazunis.
She said the open foundations would be capped, the area fenced off and the county will “wait until market demand indicates what needs to be done.”
Before application is submitted to the state, the Housing Authority invites anyone interested in the plan to attend a public hearing on Tuesday, April 6, 2010 at 4:25 p.m. at the Commissioners Hearing Room in the Gunnison County Courthouse.