86 Low-Income Families Get Until October 31 To Pack Up & Leave Or Get The Boot To Make Way For Construction Of 87 Townhomes Slated To Sell For Between $650K & $900K

In Bellevue, Washington, Bellevue Reporter.com reports:

• [Josefina Lara] has lived at Highland Village Apartments for 16 years, and now a developer is forcing her and 85 other families out so they can tear down the 76-unit "affordable housing" complex to build higher-priced townhomes.
  
  Multiple families share apartments so the exact number of residents is hard to track, but 85 children in the Bellevue School District call the apartment complex home. Very few speak English as a first language, most speaking Spanish but some speaking Somali and Russian. All are near or below the poverty level.
  
  The families at Highland Village don't stay out of a sense of loyalty or because they are afraid of a move. In fact, some of the housing units — including Lara's — are dilapidated, residents say.
  
  Hilda Sinfuentes's son has developed asthma, a fact she attributes to the mold growing from water damage in nearly every unit at the complex. Paulo Medina's windows don't lock, leaving his home at risk. Martha Lidia Lagos-Martinez said that if she uses a vacuum cleaner, the lights turn off because the breaker can't handle both at once.
  
  "We don't stay here because we love these apartments," Lara said. "We stay because we can't afford to live elsewhere."
  
  The families at the apartments have been given until Oct. 31 to find new places to live. The apartments are scheduled to officially close in November and a project to turn the 12-building complex into 87 townhomes is slated to begin shortly thereafter, with a completion date in late 2019.
  
  Intracorp, the developer behind the project (and previously of another controversial development in Newport Hills), is working well within legal bounds, but a forced eviction of low-income, working families leaves a sour taste in the mouths of many.
  
  Bellevue has no tenant laws that would apply in this situation. A landlord could theoretically give a renter 20 days and no financial assistance.
  
  Intracorp has offered each family $3,500 in relocation assistance and has given the residents several months to find new homes, even hiring a relocation specialist to help.
  
  Lis Soldano, a representative from Intracorp, said the issue stemmed from larger housing issues in Bellevue and on the Eastside.
  
  "The broader housing affordability issues facing Bellevue and our region are challenging — and it's why we've committed to voluntary financial assistance and retaining [relocation specialist Kerry Lynch] to help residents," she said. "Every step we're taking to help the families at Highland Village is voluntary. So, yes we definitely feel a personal responsibility to do our part."
  
  The Reporter attempted to contact the apartment complex's management, who hung up the phone without comment.
  
  The permit application for the Highland Village Townhomes states that the new units will more than double the square footage currently on the 4.48-acre property but will sell for between $650,000 and $900,000 each. This is billed as "middle-income" in the documents.

For more, see 86 low-income Bellevue families facing eviction scramble to find housing.