Despite attempts by Collier County, affordable housing remains elusive

Having a roof over your head is a necessity for everyone. But in Collier County that doesn’t come cheap. The county calls affordable rent for a two bedroom apartment about $1,350 a month, which is hard to find.

Jury Paulson is a young professional living in North Naples. He said it is nearly impossible for him and his friends to afford housing in Collier County.

“It is something you think of every day,” Paulson said. “You have to budget for certain items and sometimes you have to forgo certain things you would like to have so that you can pay the rent, buy groceries, visit the doctor and things like that. It’s very stressful.”

County commissioners approved a plan to tackle the issue. It is an effort to encourage developers to build more affordable housing. Paulson was there voicing his support.

“Some of the people closest to me in my life live paycheck to paycheck and are paying an extreme amounts of money to live where they were Collier County,” Paulson said.

Commissioners upped the number of apartments a builder can put on an acre from 12 units to 16 units. But to get this incentive, at least 10 percent of the property must be affordable housing, which means more money for builders and more options for people.

“Seeing decisions being made that are going to positively affect us all, being able to live where we work that’s huge,” Paulson said. “We’re going to be talking about it around the water cooler.”

Everyone in this room supported the measure except for Commissioner Donna Fiala. She is afraid of traffic concerns and over-filling our schools.

“I have seen so many houses that in February available on the market,” Fiala said. “I don’t know why we’re rushing to build more and more and more when it doesn’t seem it’s accomplishing anything.”

But Amanda Beights, who works with the Greater Naples Chamber of Commerce, said we should not let those fears affect growth.

“We’re all considered unwanted growth at some point,” Beights said. “It’s hard for us to close the gate at any time in our growth to say no more this is where we stop.”

“It’s better to be participating in solutions that we can actually work with versus just saying nay,” Paulson said.