Supportive Housing Bridging Venice Canals Granted Planning Commission Approval in L.A.

A $75-million supportive housing complex slated for construction in L.A.'s Venice Beach has received approval from the city's planning commission. As Matthew Marani reports in the Architect's Newspaper, the complex is a "joint collaboration between the Venice Community Housing Corporation and the Hollywood Community Housing Corporation that will primarily house the formerly homeless and low-income tenants."

Some Venice residents oppose the project, calling it "unsightly and detrimental to the health and safety of the area." In online posts, one irate, anonymous resident wrote: "why should 200+ homeless transients live on the canals for free when I, as a local resident, could not afford the taxes let alone the purchase price??" The eclectic neighborhood has become a flashpoint in the debate over how to assist the unhoused population, which increased by 57% in 2020.

The development, which "will run abreast of Venice’s Grand Canal and replace existing surface parking lots," will create "140 apartments, approximately 7,400-square-feet of commercial space, and a 360-car parking garage for residents and visitors to the neighborhood," as well as a community room and performance space named for entertainer Gregory Hines. "Renderings released by Eric Owen Moss Architects also reveal substantial and publicly accessible landscaping along the canal, including new plantings, such as long grass and allees of trees, and stepped paving."