Affordable Housing

Creating a Great Place to Call Home

The availability of quality affordable housing to persons of all socio-economic levels is a critical component Homes of any successful community based economic development strategy and is available throughout Michigan's Great Southwest. Good quality homes result in healthy neighborhoods and a stable employee base for employers. For these reasons and many more, Cornerstone Alliance has undertaken numerous housing development activities ranging from the redevelopment of public housing, to the development of subdivisions and infill development strategies.

Some of current projects include:

HOPE VI: The Benton Harbor Housing Commission succeeded in winning funding of the HOPE VI federal grant. Cornerstone serves as co-developer with Star Development and Financial. Cornerstone will work with the Benton Harbor Housing Commission in executing the grant and bringing over 300 new homes to Benton Harbor. There are five phases to the project, much of the work on those phases is now complete with the remaining work to begin in Spring 2009.

Harbor Town: Harbor Town is the most ambitious land redevelopment and housing project in Cornerstone Alliance's history. The goal of the project is to create the highest-quality, integrated and diverse housing inside the City of Benton Harbor in order to create an anchor for redevelopment. Infrastructure is now in place for Phase 1 (26 homesites). The first two homes have been completed with additional units planned for construction in 2009.

Harbor Shores: Harbor Shores is a unique opportunity to revitalize the Benton Harbor and St. Joseph community and transform the area from a quaint Twin Cities area along Lake Michigan's waterfront to take its place among the premier vacation destinations in the Midwest. Housing planned for this area includes cottage style, single family, townhouses and condos. Much of the project is targeted to the second home owner.

Targeted Rehabilitation Projects: In addition to the larger projects, Cornerstone Alliance has also partnered with several organizations to rehab homes in targeted neighborhoods throughout the City of Benton Harbor in the hopes of improving the housing stock available.

Past housing projects that our organization has been a partner in include: The Woodridge Place subdivision in Benton Charter Township, the Morton Hill subdivision in the City of Benton Harbor and the Edgewater Dunes subdivision in St. Joseph.

To learn more about these various projects, please click here to view a Block by Block report of the various Cornerstone projects including housing. (Please note this is a large file.)