Jackson Street redevelopment sees new construction ongoing
May 8—TUPELO — With home prices and materials costs shooting up, one of the city's most intensive efforts to spur residential construction has seen fresh activity in recent months.
Since 2013, the city of Tupelo has spent at least $3.2 million in public dollars to redevelop the Jackson Street corridor, according to Chief Finance Officer Kim Hanna.
That includes $1.8 million that was transferred to the Community Development Foundation, and then in turn used by the nonprofit Neighborhood Development Corporation. NDC purchased properties, razed some homes, and sold those lots to developers. Other homes were retained and sold to renovators.
The city spent an additional $1.4 million purchasing property, including blighted homes, and upgrading and installing infrastructure.
New home construction is underway within the redevelopment zone right now. The areas of development up to now have been near the intersection of Jacket Street and Joyner Avenue, with small, compact subdivisions dubbed Ingram Drive and Cicada Cove the site of residential construction.
The process has moved slower than many anticipated, and the homes have come to market at higher prices than originally projected. However, the original concerns over housing access and affordability that first launched the project remain very much present.
The Tupelo City Council first agreed to the ambitious plan to transform the West Jackson Street corridor in 2013, setting a budget at the time of around $2.4 million.
"In so many ways, it's the right thing to do and the right time to do it before it gets any worse," said then-Mayor Jack Reed at the time.
The project hit some roadblocks over the years, including council concerns about the involvement of NDC, as well as the escalating cost of the project.
Restrictive covenants require the homes to be owner-occupied rather than rentals, and officials once said that these homes would be targeted toward middle-income and lower-income buyers.
NDC chairman Duke Loden said in 2016 that Tupelo has few available homes priced between $110,000 and $150,000 and that the new Jackson Street homes would fall into that price range.
However, many of the new homes in the area have come to market well outside that range. The new construction has, however, increased the city's inventory of newly constructed homes. Tupelo's aging housing stock has long been of concern to local officials.
Public officials have also cited the redevelopment project's positive impact on home values in the nearby Joyner neighborhood as a reason to count the effort a success.
"Joyner had to be protected, and that's a fundamental understanding of the Jackson Street project," Tupelo's former Development Services Director Shane Hooper said in 2018. "The blight and deterioration that was on Jackson had started to impact the Joyner neighborhood in a negative way."
