TAMPA, Fla. --- Calling all community developers: the Community Real Estate Development (CRED) Professional Certificate program at the University of South Florida, a unique summer seminar course at USF's Collaborative for Children, Families and Communities that's guiding 26 participants through development of six projects with more than 120 affordable homes and apartments, has launched www.FloridaCred.org to provide an online learning resource and a forum for new community development concepts.

Former Bank of America training executive and HUD official Thomas M. Zuniga, left, told Miami Herald Business Monday editor Nancy Dahlberg last week, "We want to birth a new generation of community developers. It's no longer about being a do-gooder. Affordable housing is a major economic issue."

Zuniga, managing director of DSG Community Marketing Services, serves as Program Manager and Principal Instructor of the CRED Certificate Program.

Zuniga posted Launching FloridaCRED yesterday to mark the event.

Expanding the supply of housing that is affordable to and attainable by working families has become increasingly complex.  My wish is to expand our University of South Florida Community Real Estate Development classroom by using technology to create a "big tent" campaign for affordable housing through increased awareness and understanding of affordable housing issues.

I hope for our site to become a listening post for the many voices of affordable housing---a place where students and practitioners of community development can brainstorm possibilities, advance innovative ideas and recognize best practices.

I would like for us to use FloridaCred.org to establish a knowledge base on affordable housing and to that end, just like with our classroom, I promise to recruit local and regional experts who will weigh in on various topics through writings and interviews, and thereby foster dialogue.

The web-based project---privately funded through August, 2008---means to examine relevant affordable housing and community development issues, best practices, new concepts and new partnership, funding and development opportunities in an open, online symposium with an academic focus.

Quoth Zuniga:

I am inviting colleagues new and old to weigh in on the various topics that are relevant to our business.

This is the new "Journal of Community Development."

(Cross-posted from Florida Workforce Housing Network)

PALATKA, Fla. --- Palatka, Fla., and Putnam Co. plan to sell up to 12 publicly-owned home sites for $1 each and use $500,000 in U.S. Dept. of Agriculture grant funds to spur development of 12 new homes, half in the city and half in the county.

John Nelson, executive director of the Palatka Housing Authority, said his staff has already located four sites and are working to identify eight more to build 1,300-square-foot, three-bedroom two-bath homes.

Chris DeVitto at Palatka Daily News has the story:

Nelson said people need to recognize that these homes are not subsidized housing.

"This is not public housing," he said Wednesday. "The homes will cost $100,000 to $110,000 and part of that will be paid for with money from the grant."

Each family that qualifies will receive $35,000 to apply to the mortgage, and the rest will be financed by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, Nelson said.

"They will be responsible for the difference between the cost of the house and a $35,000 soft second mortgage," he said. "And if they live in the house for five years they will not have to repay the $35,000."

The hope is that building these homes on vacant lots will bring additional revenue into county and city coffers through property taxes and also provide affordable housing, he also said.