Residents claim Three Oaks hoax

For months, officials have been involved in often-heated debates with residents of Southern Estates Subdivision in Gray, where Mississippi-based developer Coastal Phoenix is looking to build more than 300 affordable housing units that would neighbor the existing community.

Many residents have raised allegations claiming the developer is unreliable and likely to ditch the original game plan. Some are also concerned the affordable units will overpopulate the area, increasing the chances of crime and mischief.

The intricacies and complex situations caused council members from Terrebonne Parish to consider transferring control of the project to the state, a move that was made official at the board’s routine council meeting last Wednesday.

Officials said their resources in dealing with the various issues are limited; claiming the state is better equipped to manage projects of greater magnitude.

“They’ve already got legal staff. They’ve already got consultants on board, they’ve already done these projects,” explained Terrebonne House and Human Services Director Daryl Waire. “They already have things in place that we’d have to go in and develop, or secure services for, which they can do probably at a more cost effective way than we could at this point.”

However, the scope of the project could be changing in rapid fashion.

Jennifer Goulas, a resident of Southern Estates, claimed that since the project was introduced, designs have changed tremendously. Now, single-family homes, commercial complexes and even a golf course have been eliminated. In their place are 335 apartments, she noted.

Goulas presented a series of architectural drawings to the council that showed the transformation.

But things look much different for local officials who have been following the project.

“There has never been a contention in how many units,” said Waire during the meeting. “That’s what it has been all along and that’s what we’re looking for.”

Outside of the number of units, the design was plausible to change during the approval process, he noted.

Although the parish has stepped down from the pedestal, local officials will still have some responsibilities, which will likely be dictated after an agreement is made between the state and the parish.

While an invitation to state officials from the Office of Community Development was extended, no one from that group was in attendance Wednesday.

Financially, the parish will have a stake in the heart of the project, as Coastal Phoenix will receive $10 million in local hurricane-recovery funds. But in order to make the project successful, the developer will also be tapping into a variety of other funding sources, which ensures the work will get done, urged officials.

The amount of money the parish would have received for overseeing the project also dropped from $500,000 to $50,000 – or 5 percent to one-half percent. “[That] changes the picture a lot,” noted Waire.