Posted on: April 30, 2025
Source: The Press Democrat; Author: Paulina Pineda
Officials said the 75 units, part of a larger project on Sebastopol Road, would be transformational for the community.
Sonoma County Supervisor Chris Coursey looked out at a crowd of regional and state partners, housing officials and Roseland community members who gathered Friday to celebrate the groundbreaking of 75 affordable apartments in southwest Santa Rosa.
They’d stood there about a year earlier to commemorate first turning over dirt at the property as work got underway on underground infrastructure.
Attendees, Coursey joked, might be wondering why they’d been invited back.
But when a project has inched along for as long as the Tierra de Rosas development has, every milestone is worth marking, he said.
“We’re going to keep celebrating every chance we can,” he said.
Conceived more than two decades ago as a mixed-use hub, the project will help transform a stretch of Sebastopol Road and bring long-promised public investments to Roseland, a predominately Latino neighborhood folded into Santa Rosa city limits in 2017.
In addition to the affordable units, known as Casa Roseland, the redevelopment project also calls for 100 market-rate apartments, a one-acre community plaza, a mercado and a civic building.
Matthew O. Franklin, president and CEO of MidPen Housing, which is developing the affordable units, described the project as a “very bold, ambitious plan” that would provide not just needed housing units in the city but would foster a sense of community for future residents.
He said the project was a labor of love that took determination and political will to navigate the challenging development process and funding hurdles over the years.
“Can you believe it? We are here. We are going out of the ground,” Franklin said. “The thing I’m so proud of is the perseverance we’ve all been able to hold onto.”
Wood framing at Casa Roseland began going up in January.
The project will feature a mix of one- to three-bedroom units in a four-story building.
Units will be available to households earning between 30% and 60% of the area median income and monthly rents will range from $689 to $1,999 depending on the size of the unit and household income.
Resident amenities include a community room, teen room and an outdoor courtyard with grills and a children’s play area. Bike storage and an on-site laundry facility also are planned.
Adult education, skill-building classes and health classes will be offered to residents at the apartments.
A rendering of Casa Roseland, a 75-unit affordable housing project being developed by MidPen Housing in Roseland. (Van Meter Williams Pollack courtesy of MidPen Housing)
MidPen, one of the largest affordable housing developers in Northern California, was selected to build the project in 2016.
Franklin said providing stable housing for families will help lead to long-term changes, bolstering family well-being, health, educational achievement, and financial mobility.
The vision for Roseland Village — later renamed Tierra de Rosas — came out of a 2007 urban planning document that called for a neighborhood center with a mix of commercial, personal services and residential uses.
Roseland residents weighed in on three development proposals for the site a decade later but progress since then has been slow.
The Sonoma County Community Development Commission, which purchased the 7.4-acre property for about $3.5 million in 2010, is overseeing the project though Santa Rosa has since annexed the site.
Some of the last remaining structures were demolished in late 2023, nearly a decade after the old Albertsons grocery store and Continental Lanes bowling center were torn down.
Infrastructure work got underway last May and workers over the last year have cleared the site, graded the land and installed underground utilities and sidewalks.
Senate President Mike McGuire, D-Healdsburg, on Friday acknowledged the slow pace of the project, which came before the Board of Supervisors during his four-year tenure there starting in 2011.
Despite all the snags, county leaders and their partners didn’t give up, he said, a testament to Sonoma County and what can be accomplished when people come together.
He said the project would be transformational for the community and would make good on long-promised investments in Roseland.
“Let’s be honest, this has been an incredibly tough year and it’s only April. But today is a day of celebration,” he said. “For far too long, Roseland has been an afterthought but that changes today.”
For Santa Rosa Vice Mayor Eddie Alvarez, whose district includes Roseland, the project in his own backyard is personal.
Once complete, he said, it will herald a renaissance for the neighborhood.
The estimated construction cost is $48 million and is being paid through a mix of local and state funds and private dollars, including a final $2.5 million McGuire announced Friday he’d secured in the state budget.
Construction on the affordable apartments is expected to be completed in summer 2026.
Work on the market-rate housing, civic building and commercial center will occur in future phases. The total cost of the infrastructure work and public plaza is $40 million.
Read the full article, here.
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