After a week's worth of unrest over a proposal of permanent supportive housing for the homeless along Greenville Avenue near Forest Lane, Dallas City Hall is back to square one.  City Manager T.C. Broadnax announced Friday night that he will scrap a search for developers interested in spending $20 million in 2017 bond money on affordable housing. 

In a memo sent to the Dallas City Council, Broadnax said city staffers didn't properly communicate the proposal to community members.  So he directed the Office of Homeless Solutions to cancel an ongoing search for developers interested in building around 100 units of affordable housing. 

Broadnax said community input is "an essential component" in the city's efforts to address homelessness. 

"It is clear that the process to receive community input did not meet my expectations," Broadnax wrote. " Therefore, it is my responsibility to take corrective action." 

Some residents of Lake Highlands will likely breathe a deep sigh of relief.  That includes Dallas' Deputy Mayor Pro Tem Adam McGough. 

McGough said Friday night he was "relieved" and thankful for Broadnax's memo. 

"For me, the reaction is twofold," he said. " First, there's gratitude that city leadership is actually listening to the community.  And second, it's a sign of hope we will do this the right way." 

Earlier this month, McGough blasted city staffers for moving forward with community input meetings about potential affordable housing sites without telling council members. 

His Facebook post, published a day before the meeting, said the decision to schedule the meetings was either "incompetent or intentional."  The post garnered attention from community members, many of whom jammed into the Audelia Road Branch Library last week to voice their displeasure. 

The three sites proposed were located on 12000 Greenville Ave.;  2009 and 2011 North Haskell Ave.;  and 1805 North Haskell and 4013 Roseland avenues.  The two sites on Haskell Avenue in District 14 would have required zoning changes, a long process that would have needed council approval. 

During a May 15 briefing on the subject, McGough said he was "very disappointed" by the selection of the Greenville site. 

McGough said this week he thought he made it clear to staff he wanted the Greenville location nixed from the conversation. 

But city staffers began a search for developer interest in June and recently extended the deadline to September.  And in recent weeks, city staffers briefed several other council members about that site. 

City Council member David Blewett, who represents District 14, on Friday night said he supports the city manager's decision and agrees that the city should slow down the process.  In May, Blewett's predecessor, Philip Kingston, said those Haskell sites were "definitely appropriate" for the kind of housing being proposed. 

"I definitely agree with engaging with the community more to make sure this is a good fit for that neighborhood and what we're trying to do," Blewett said. 

1 / 2The 12000 Greenville site has been used in recent weeks as a collection point for dead limbs collected from the June storms.  The site is owned by Dallas Water Utilities.(Courtesy NBC5) 2 / 2A closer look at the Greenville Avenue site(Courtesy NBC5)

On Wednesday, during a driving tour of the Greenville site, McGough reiterated what he'd said in May and again last week: There was no way he believes permanent supportive housing is appropriate on the site, a weed-strewn parking lot between a CubeSmart storage facility and a mid-rise office building.  The property currently belongs to Dallas Water Utilities and was most recently used as a dumping site for June storm debris. 

The Lake Highlands council member said the area is a crime hot spot, so much so the feds began to crack down on area convenience stores where drugs are sold and women are trafficked in the parking lot during daylight hours.  He pointed out an empty strip-mall anchor recently abandoned by the popular ASI Gymnastics and fretted about other nearby business owners concerned about encroaching crime. 

He also noted the 252-unit Dallas Housing Authority complex across the street, where all of the residents' rents are subsidized with federal housing vouchers. 

All those issues, and more, came up at last week's community meeting and again at this week's City Council meeting, held at the Lake Highlands North Recreation Center. 

Dozens of speakers on Wednesday lined up to protest the site.  Former council member and Dallas Citizens Council president Donna Halstead said the city had no business building housing of any kind and called the proposed project "absolutely inappropriate."  A young man named Ben Oppenheim told the council to find "a more diversified area," and that Lake Highlands was already "overburdened with certain elements of affordable housing." 

One lifelong Lake Highlands resident, Lynn Davenport, said she and her neighbors objected to the project not because it was in their district. 

"We're saying not in our backyard without discussion and without ample discussion," she said. 

McGough later said he isn't opposed to sharing the city's burden of sheltering the homeless.  But building one 100-unit complex in a troubled location, he said, is not a workable solution. 

"I am constantly looking for options, inside and outside the district, to help alleviate our affordable housing issues," he said. 

That included a trip to Bonton Farms on Thursday to look at the self-proclaimed "safe and dignified shelter system" offered by Pallet — aluminum-made, stripped-down tiny homes, essentially, with fold-up beds and shelving units.  Some of the Pallet shelters can sleep up to six people.  The downside is they have no running water and would necessitate communal bathrooms and kitchens. 

On his Facebook page, Sam Merten, McGough's outgoing appointee to the Citizen Homelessness Commission, said such a housing solution would get all of Dallas' 1,452 unsheltered residents off the streets at a total cost of $10.9 million — even if the city bought one unit for every person. 

"Compare that to the city's plan of spending $20 million in bond funds to build 100 units," said Merten, formerly the chief operating officer at The Bridge homeless recovery center, "and you don't have to be a math whiz to know which option makes more sense." 

McGough also repeated Friday night that the bond funds should be used for innovative, "transformational" projects that have been proven to work. 

Ideally, council members have said in recent months, the city would take that $20 million in bond money set aside for homeless housing and use it to help fill out the capital stacks of other mixed-use and mixed-income developments.  City Council member Jennifer Staubach Gates said she'd like to see the city partner with nonprofits and the county, as it did at the $6 million St. Jude Center in her Northwest Dallas district. 

There, on Forest Lane near Josey Lane, Catholic Charities Dallas rehabbed an old senior-living facility with $2 million contributions from the city and $1 million from Dallas County.  Council members want the city to do more of that — bring in outsiders who can adaptively reuse existing facilities. 

Dallas City Council member Adam McGough (Michael Ainsworth / Staff Photographer)

John Siburt, president and CEO of nonprofit CitySquare, said innovative partnerships with other entities and better communication are key if the city truly wants to end homelessness. 

Siburt said he doesn't believe that the city's decision to restart this project will be a major setback.  Rather, he said the city's lack of "collective" commitment to end homelessness has been one of the biggest obstacles. 

"I think the concern about overly concentrating the homeless [in one area] is legitimate," Siburt said. " But there's no other option until the city develops a collective will to embrace our homeless neighbors throughout the city." 

Staffers in the city's Office of Homeless Solutions also want more of those projects.  They said this week that the Greenville site became a front-runner solely because it's owned by the city and needs no rezoning.  And, it's near transit lines and grocery stores and other amenities. 

Monica Hardman, director of the office, said there had been some interest from developers in all three locations, but no one had yet submitted a proposal.  And even if some did come in, they first had to be vetted by OHS, then approved by council — which wasn't likely, given McGough's position, best described as intractable. 

Hardman couldn't be reached for comment Friday night.  But Nadia Chandler-Hardy, the assistant city manager who oversees the Office of Homeless Solutions, said restarting the process was in everyone's best interest.  She said it will give the city an opportunity to look at other properties in other neighborhoods that might want "the opportunity to get involved." 

"At first glance it feels like we're being delayed — and we are," she said. " But in the end, I want to make sure not only do we present good recommendations, but the public also feels like they had a real opportunity to give their input.  And for me, after listening [to Lake Highlands residents], it didn't sit well with me.  We want to be fair."