Years after the City of Dallas purchased the 35,000-square-foot Miramar Hotel, officials are moving forward with a plan to redevelop the property into permanent supportive housing for the homeless.
The city acquired the hotel at 1950 Fort Worth Ave. in 2020 and has eligible grant funds from the American Rescue Plan Act to cover $3.6 million of the $5.95 million project. About $2.3 million will come out of the city’s Homeless Assistance Fund.
The Dallas City Council has contemplated a similar project to redevelop a Lake Highlands extended-stay hotel into voucher-based housing in conjunction with Volunteers of America. That project is tentatively scheduled to go before the council next month.
A request for offers on the Miramar was issued in January and city officials agreed this week to enter a development agreement with Dallas-based UCR Development, according to a resolution adopted during Wednesday’s Dallas City Council meeting.
A rezoning application approved in late 2021 showed the property had 73 rooms and would be converted into 40 dwelling units.
Budget Appropriations
The resolution almost wasn’t approved because the restrictive ARPA funds first had to be reallocated, something council members weren’t ready to do in one fell swoop.
The council was slated to authorize budget transfers and appropriation adjustments Wednesday, but Councilwoman Cara Mendelsohn asked that the item be scheduled for a full council briefing May 3, with a vote scheduled the following week. Mendelsohn chairs the council’s Government Performance and Financial Management committee.
“This is not an unusual process, but what is unusual about this item is the dollars involved,” Mendelsohn said. “We have a very large increase in sales tax that we’re going to allocate, which is typical, but what’s not typical is the ARPA money. The city manager is just rebalancing that, but it’s a lot of money … We really felt like all the members of the council should have that information and have an opportunity to ask questions. In fairness, we asked for this to be delayed to a full briefing.”
About $13 million was slated for ARPA funding reallocations, said Budget Director Janette Weedon.
“We assumed back in 2021, for COVID, about $10 million [was needed] for testing and vaccination,” Weedon said. “We spent about $2.2 million, so we’re reallocating the balance of that to projects that need to move forward.”
One such project that qualifies for those ARPA funds is the redevelopment of the Miramar Hotel. Although the council will be briefed on the reallocations next week, with a vote the following week, council members decided to move forward with the Miramar Hotel project.
Miramar Hotel Redevelopment Moves Forward
Councilman Chad West made the motion Wednesday to authorize City Manager T.C. Broadnax to reallocate $3.6 million of ARPA appropriations to the Office of Homeless Solutions for the Miramar project.
“My understanding is because of the [budget transfers previously discussed], there are a few items that do need to move forward even though we are going to hold a lot of the funding back to have further discussions,” West said. “This is one of those items [that needs to move forward].”
The council also voted to rescind a $3.2 million contract with CitySquare for property management, renovations, and permanent supportive housing for the homeless at that site.
Director of the Office of Homeless Solutions Christine Crossley said the city parted ways with CitySquare because their CEO left and the nonprofit went back to its core mission, “which did not include this building.”
“We were both sad about [that], but it allowed us to move forward and re-procure for something that by that point was stale,” Crossley said.
UCR Development is described on its website as a commercial real estate developer. Senior vice president Greg McGahey told daltxrealestate.com his team is excited about the project and looks forward to finalizing contracts with the city over the next couple of weeks.
