Fort Worth Housing Solutions
An artist's rendering of Hughes House development in Stop Six.
Block Companies has been selected general contractor for Hughes House, a mixed-use development that will add more than 200 residences in 2024 as part of the Stop Six Choice Neighborhood Initiative, the city announced this week.
Block was selected, a news release conveyed, “based on the company’s commitment to excellence, reputation for implementing sustainable building practices and experience in connecting with minority-owned subcontractors,” said Louis Bernardy, senior vice president of McCormack Baron Salazar, the initiative’s lead housing partner, and development director for Texas.
Hughes House will be a 210-unit, mixed-use, mixed-income complex at 4830 and 4908 E. Rosedale Street, east and west of Amanda Avenue, and on part of the former Cavile Place public housing project.
It is named for Robert Hughes Sr., the iconic Dunbar High School boys basketball coach who led the Flying Wildcats from 1973-2005. Prior to that, he led the basketball program at the historic I.M. Terrell High School from 1958-73, before the previously segregated campus closed. Over 47 years, Hughes’ teams posted a 1,333-265 record, five state championships and 35 district championships. He was inducted into the Naismith Memorial Basketball Hall of Fame in 2017.
“It’s uplifting to see our community moving forward with the second phase of new housing in one of Fort Worth’s most beloved neighborhoods,” Fort Worth Housing Solutions President Mary-Margaret Lemons said in a statement.
“These developments represent years of dreaming and planning on the part of Stop Six residents, community leaders and service providers who joined together to create a collaborative vision. We can’t wait to welcome residents back home.”
Fort Worth Housing Solutions has set significant participation goals to ensure that minority- and women-owned businesses, firms, and workers certified under the HUD Section 3 program have the opportunity to benefit from Choice Neighborhood Initiative construction.
Known as a leading affordable-housing builder in Texas, Georgia, and Louisiana, Block is also the general contractor on Cowan Place Senior Living, a 174-unit, mixed-income community designed for residents 62 and older under construction at East Rosedale Street and Stalcup Road. The company has headquarters in Houston and Baton Rouge.
Designs for Hughes House are being finalized.
Hughes House will include retail and commercial space facing East Rosedale Street with one-, two-, three-, and four-bedroom rental residences along Amanda Avenue, on part of the former Cavile Place public housing site.
The Stop Six Choice Neighborhood Initiative is a multiyear effort developed by residents, community leaders and stakeholders to transform a historic community in southeast Fort Worth into a vibrant, safe, and sustainable community with access to quality education, healthcare, services, and amenities — a “neighborhood of choice.”
The effort is guided by a 2019 Transformation Plan that calls for six phases of new, mixed-income housing, commercial space, neighborhood improvements and multipurpose community hub and aquatics center.
Hughes House is Phase II of that plan.
The U.S. Housing and Urban Development seeded the transformation with a $35 million Choice Neighborhood Implementation grant awarded to Fort Worth Housing Solutions and the City of Fort Worth in 2020. In all, the initial HUD grant is expected to trigger more than $345 million in investment and improvements for the Stop Six community.