The Metro Council is stuck on how to address community concerns over the future of an East Nashville property.
The 212-unit Riverchase apartments is being demolished, and what will replace it is up in the air. During Tuesday night’s council meeting, the local body delayed voting on a request to rezone for the sixth time.
The developer CREA wants to build a mixed-use development, which currently include a minority of units for people earning below $30,000.
The land is within walking distance of where the city is considering building a new neighborhood along the eastern bank of the Cumberland River and a new, domed Titans stadium. The billion-dollar Oracle tech hub will be to the north of this land.
“I know there were a lot of folks who asked us to vote this down, but I do think this project has merit,” councilmember Sean Parker says. “I think there’s opportunity to look at some of the issues with the zoning specifically that were brought up as well as to meaningfully engage the residents who were displaced from this project.”
CREA has a contract with the civic group Urban League that addresses some of the city’s housing needs, even though it doesn’t go as far as some would like.
Former Riverchase residents and advocates oppose rezoning
“A lot of people still do not have permanent housing. There are people that have become homeless due to the property being sold,” former resident Virginia Holland says while explaining why she disagrees with the project moving forward. “Nobody has addressed that we need larger affordable housing for larger families — as far as four and five bedrooms.”
Holland has expressed to WPLN News she doesn’t plan to return to the future site because of this reason.
Other residents and advocates with different groups, including Stand Up Nashville, also spoke against the rezoning. The organization originally negotiated a community benefits agreement with the developer, but it fell through after SUN wasn’t able to get all of what it desired.
The core of the argument was that this was setting a precedent, that it should be one where former residents have a say and that the city should ensure Black, brown and working class people can have choices of where they live.
But state law stops the city from fulfilling that
Councilmember Robert Nash respects the desire for more community engagement, but thinks it’s time to make a move.
“This company, CREA, is a business,” he says. “I think, in many ways, they have gone above and beyond what any other developer has done here.”
Tennessee law prohibits cities from leveraging their rezoning power to get developers to do contracts that would meet community needs. A city attorney warned the council of voting based on a community benefits agreement happening for this reason.
But now the developer is threatening to ditch the original plan and build townhomes with no subsidies for lower prices.
On Air - 90.3 WPLN-FM