The City Council today unanimously authorized the San Diego Housing Commission to acquire a 130-room downtown hotel to be preserved as affordable housing for low-income seniors.
The San Diego Housing Commission will purchase the Sandford Hotel, at 1301 Fifth Ave., for about $6.8 million and spend an estimated $5.3 million on renovations.
"It makes sense to preserve much-needed affordable housing for low-income seniors in our urban core, where there is public transit as well as access to health care and other social services," said Richard Gentry, head of the Housing Commission.
The Centre City Development Corp., San Diego's downtown redevelopment arm, will lend $6 million to the Housing Commission to purchase the building.
Rehabilitating the Sandford, which was built in 1914, will take about nine months, according to the Housing Commission. The project will include a seismic retrofit, repairs to exterior walls and windows and new carpet, paint and bathroom fixtures inside the single-room occupancy hotel.
