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Years after former Santa Clara County Supervisor Joe Simitian began spearheading the project, Palo Alto’s first teacher housing complex opened this summer at 231 Grant Ave. and is still accepting applications from teachers who work across the south Bay Area.
The 110-unit building, called The Acacia, offers a mix of studios, one-bedroom and two-bedroom apartments alongside community gathering spaces like offices and multiple courtyards.
Based on proximity and priority, there are 29 dedicated units for the Palo Alto Unified School District, 24 for the Los Altos School District, 12 for the Foothill-De Anza Community College District and 12 for the Mountain View Whisman School District. The building also offers 32 units for San Mateo County teachers in the Ravenswood and Menlo Park city school districts, Las Lomitas School District, Menlo-Atherton High School, TIDE Academy, East Palo Alto Academy and the Sequoia District Adult School.
“The properties are currently at approximately 50% occupancy, and we’re in the middle of actively leasing,” said Kelly Hollywood, associate director of Mercy Housing, one of the developers who helped build The Acacia.
In order to qualify for a unit, school employees must make between 60% and 140% of the area median income. Rent is dependent on the number of residents, the unit size and their total income but ranges from approximately $1,800 to $3,100 per month.
Each unit is equipped with a full kitchen, bathroom and living area. The studio and one-bedroom units are 376 and 535 square feet, respectively, and do not come with washer/dryer hookups. Instead, there are laundry rooms on the second, third and fourth floors.
The two-bedroom units are 814 square feet, offering laundry hookups and slightly bigger living rooms.
All apartments come with a parking spot, organized by “parking stackers,” an elevator system used to store cars more efficiently. First-floor units offer an outdoor patio space.
Outside of the living spaces, there are three large courtyards on the second floor – one equipped with barbeque pits and meant to be more social, another with a playground, active space and a dog-run, and a third is a “passive” courtyard, which will serve as a more relaxing space with gardening plots.
There is also a retail space on the ground floor that does not yet have a merchant occupying it, Hollywood said.
“The building is beautiful,” she said. “We have put a lot of time and energy trying to design spaces that are both beautiful and connecting to the sense of home.”
State education representatives called the project unique, said California Department of Education representative Richard Barrera in a past interview with this publication, for its cross-county collaboration and diverse funding methods, including school districts, the city of Palo Alto and the tech company Meta, which pitched in $25 million for south San Mateo County school districts.
In order to apply, educators can call Mercy Housing at 650-606-5725, email 231grant@mercyhousing.org or visit their website at acacia.liveinhope.org.
It’s difficult to analyze whether this is “worth it” as it’s complicated – who pays for administrative duties (we Palo Alto taxpayers?) and are decisions monitored?
It seems like low rent for a brand new apartment.
IS it really needed and are the beneficiaries appropriate/deserving?
I fail to understand why teachers from another county should be given this benefit.
I also knew Palo Alto teachers who easily/happily commuted short distances from other cities. None complained at all. Some used an incredible benefit: to have their children K-12 attend Palo Alto schools without paying our high property taxes, bonds. This practice will obviously continue here (AND now with teachers who teach elsewhere!) if someone has one child (in a two bedroom unit). That’s quite a benefit…quite a savings for them on multiple levels.
50% vacant says it all, the SQ footage is extremely small and consistent with “new” apartments. They don’t even have built in laundry machines for a new apartment except the upper end apts. If they have a spouse they are likely over the threshold, same happened in MV for their teacher complex. They ended up having to keep lowering he rent and opened it up to city employees, and its still substantially vacant. It would have been better in both cases to simply hand out vouchers and let the teachers live wherever. But no these districts want to be “cutting edge” and buy/build overpriced properties. Then manage a 50% vacancy, and run them at a substantial running loss. You have to admire the inefficiency in their use of taxpayer funds. Well I guess after they burn through more school money, they’ll have to cry more for funding. Its for the kids, for STEM, for ….
San Mateo County probably put money into the project. That’s why their teachers get spots.
Dave, your kids’ teachers didn’t complain to you about Palo Alto’s lousy housing policies because it would be unprofessional. Everyone knows that you can’t live in Palo Alto on a teacher’s salary. I went to high school in Irvine 25 years ago. A bunch of the kids drove nicer cars than the teachers. And Palo Alto today is far richer (and more expensive) than Irvine was then. Also, the 50% vacancy rate just means that it takes time to sign leases and move people in.
A voucher system would allow the teachers more options; I doubt all teachers want to live where they work. If you run an apartment consistently at 15% or more vacancy, then you are highly likely running at a loss, that money is coming from somewhere. Instead of it being used for teachers, classrooms, or students as would be the reasonable intention, its being used for managing properties off campus at a loss. This vacancy level (more than 15%) will go on for years.
As for salaries, California in general have school districts extremely small in student population and on the decline, usually around 5K students, but they have the staff overhead of other state school districts that have 30-40,000 students. In MV, they have so many officers and directors its shocking, all making well over the highest paid teacher, this is a significant portion of school funding.
What students drive vs. teachers have no correlation to wealth. In general its a bad idea to have a nice car if you live in an apartment complex. Its going to be door dinged, scratched up by maintenance staff carrying stuff/leaf blowing, or bumped by residents who are just learning how to drive since they took away drivers ed in schools.