On Noel St. in Midtown Jackson sits a bright yellow house with a child’s bike on the front porch. It’s newly constructed, with large open windows to let in the mid-morning sun. Kristi Hays moved in back in January, after months on the waitlist.
“We love it. Me and my kids live here, and so far we love it. It’s quiet,” she said. “So it’s something new and fresh for us. It’s a fresh start.”
At a ribbon cutting ceremony, the city and its partners unveiled the 27-unit apartment homes located just off of Mill St., with 60% of the properties designated for individuals with disabilities and adults 55 and older. The project was spearheaded by New Orleans-based low-income housing developer Gulf Coast Housing Partnership, along with Midtown Partners and the City of Jackson, Mississippi Home Corporation.
Hays, a Jackson native, said this was the opportunity of a lifetime for her. Previous homes that she moved into were older or had electrical issues.
“I couldn’t wait to move in. It has three bathrooms, and for me and my girls, it’s a plus for us,” she laughed.
The homes at Noel Place are newly constructed, complete with energy efficient dishwashers and in-unit washers and dryers. There’s a community space and a playground for children, as well as an outdoor gazebo for neighbors to connect socially.
“I’m blessed and grateful to be able to move into a new development that was built from the ground up,” Hays said. “I’ve never experienced anything like that to stay in a new house. It was always I moved into a house that someone else stayed in, versus something that me and my kids moved into first.”
She said it’s not easy raising four children on her own. Having a safe, affordable home to live in gives her the space to focus on her next big goal: buying her own house.
“It means a whole lot, with their dad being incarcerated, and me doing everything on my own, it means a lot. It’s a good deal,” Hays said. “It’s challenging but I make it do what it do. It gets hard sometimes, but I just pray about it.”
The Noel Place project took about five years and $12 million dollars in funding to complete. Jackson City Council approved providing $850,000 in HOME grants towards the construction and Midtown Partners helped the city with blight removal to get the property ready, WLBT reported.
“It’s an amazing project for multiple reasons, not only because this is an opportunity to revitalize this community,” Mayor Chokwe A. Lumumba said. “But it’s an amazing project because it speaks to the future we want for our city.”
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