Edina scuttles plans for affordable housing on deed-restricted property

An effort by Edina to build affordable single-family houses — a daunting task in a city where new homes average $1.46 million — has been quashed by a decades-old deed restriction intended to keep the parcel as parkland.

City officials and the nonprofit Edina Housing Foundation had hoped to build two single-family homes on the city-owned property called Duggan Plaza, a 13,700-square-foot parcel near Hwy. 100 and W. 70th Street in the Brookview Heights neighborhood.

But the City Council on Tuesday withdrew its proposal to sell the land to the foundation after a real estate agent and local resident discovered the deed restriction, which dates to 1963.

"The neighborhood through the years was promised it would stay as a park-slash-green space," said Wade Thommen, a 23-year Edina resident who works for Coldwell Banker.

"Most people in the neighborhood are supportive of affordable housing, but not at the cost of taking a neighborhood asset."

Mayor Jim Hovland said that abandoning the housing plans was a matter of "promises made, promises to be kept."

City Manager Scott Neal said in an interview that the city legally could sell the property for housing, since the restriction expired in 2010 when a district court put a 30-year limit on covenants. But that wouldn't work from a "moral standpoint," he said, and would break trust with the neighborhood.

"Residents … have relied on this original intention for more than 50 years."

The report also directs city staffers to formally list Duggan Plaza as a city park.

Edina has had "a lot of success stories" in creating new, multifamily rental housing recently, Neal said. But when it comes to single-family homes, he said, "We've not been able to crack that nut very well."

Cities occasionally take stock of their own property to see if any holdings can be put to better use.

When Edina officials began looking for housing sites a year ago, the parcel at Abercrombie Drive and Danens Drive seemed ideal, Neal said.

The homes planned there were intended for buyers making up to 120% of Hennepin County's median income of $124,000 for a family of four, at a likely price of $250,000 to $425,000, city staffers said.

But more than 100 residents signed a petition to keep the swath open and green, a place to walk dogs and play ball, Thommen said.

Neighbor Marta Karwowski cited environmental concerns as a reason not to build on the lot.

And Peter Tselepis, who lives south of the property, agreed it was "an issue of green space" but said there were other objections. "It was really about the way the city executed," he said.

Tselepis said he was one of four neighbors to get a letter about the affordable housing plans just 10 days before city officials planned to act.

"There's so much more bang for the buck," he said.

Council Member Mike Fischer said he objected to some residents' suggestions that the city's affordable housing plans were "social engineering."

In fact, he said, American suburbs were the result of social engineering, since the process restricted where people of color and the less affluent could live.

"It's a tiny, tiny little step to create … more opportunity for more people in our community," he said of Edina's efforts.

City officials pledged to re-examine the list of city property in search of the elusive parcel that's suitable for inexpensive, or at least less expensive, single-family homes.

"It's one in Edina that's hard to achieve."