Berkeleyside44%
South Berkeley church breaks ground on affordable housing 8%
By Hope Muñoz19%
7/31/2026, 3:04:20 PM
BS Summary: This article contains 14 faulty reasoning types, including Negativity Bias, Biased Writer Voice, and Confirmation Bias, with Framing Effect as the most egregious example at 9.2% saturation with 60 hits. Analysis detected 367 faulty-reasoning hits from 654 analyzed words, generating a BS Score of 19.6% and a BS Rank of 8% (23,976 of 26,004 articles). This article is better (less manipulative) than 92.20% of the article peer group.
Community members and local officials celebrated the ceremonial groundbreaking of an affordable housing project on the property of a historically Black church in South Berkeley on Thursday.
The seven-story, 50-unit development at 2024 Ashby Ave., called St.
Paul Terrace, will replace an annex building and parking lot at St.
Paul African Methodist Episcopal Church of Berkeley.
The units will range from studios to three-bedrooms with options for individuals and families earning no more than 60% of Berkeley’s area median income, which stands at just over $100,000 for an individual.
Thirteen of the units will be set aside for seniors who are experiencing or at risk of homelessness.
The building’s estimated completion date is April 2028, according to Darrylyn Swift, a representative for the project.
“This project is especially needed because it’s in South Berkeley, and the community has a long history of redlining, divestment, displacement,” said Briana Brown, director of community engagement for Alameda County Supervisor Nikki Fortunato Bas.
“Affordable housing like this helps to ensure the long-time residents can remain in the neighborhood they helped build.”
St.
Paul AME is one of two historically Black churches in South Berkeley that have been approved to build affordable housing on its properties.
Amid rising housing costs over the last half-century, Berkeley’s Black population fell by two-thirds from 1970 to 2020, according to Census data.
The other church, Ephesian Church of God in Christ on Alcatraz Avenue, plans to build a 79-unit apartment building for seniors who are considered low-income or very low-income.
The 100-year-old McGee Avenue Baptist Church also partnered with the Bay Area Community Land Trust to refurbish a dilapidated building on Stuart Street and create eight affordable units that opened in 2022.
It was the first project funded by Berkeley’s Small Sites Program, which the city council approved in 2018 to create more affordable housing and slow displacement.
The projects are examples of a new approach to creating affordable housing on church properties known as the “Yes In God’s Backyard,” or YIGBY, movement.
St.
Paul AME joined forces with the Community Housing Development Corporation, a Black-led, Richmond-based nonprofit housing developer, in 2022 to build the housing on its property.
That year, the city dedicated over $12 million from Measure O, a voter-approved bond to generate $135 million for affordable housing developments, to St.
Paul Terrace.
The project’s budget totals $69 million, Swift said.
Other funding sources include California Climate Investments, California Community Reinvestment Corporation, First Citizens Bank, Housing and Community Development and the National Equity Fund.
“South Berkeley was historically the busy epicenter of our city’s Black life, culture and commerce.
It is a neighborhood where people knew each other by name, where children played safely, and where our elders felt secure watching the next generation grow,” Larry Taylor, vice president of CHDC’s board of directors, said Thursday.
“But over the last few years, that beautiful picture has changed dramatically due to the devastating loss of affordable housing.”
The initiative is part of a concerted effort by the city to bring back displaced residents to South Berkeley.
A city policy puts descendants of people who lost their homes to BART construction, lived in redlined neighborhoods or experienced foreclosures first in line for affordable housing.
“No one can afford it,” Andre Anthony, an Oakland and Berkeley landlord, said, speaking of market-rate housing in Berkeley.
“Not a young person who didn’t get into tech early enough.
How the hell do you catch up?”
Speaking about the St.
Paul AME project, Hughes said: “The church’s job is to do ministry.
That’s what it’s really all about.
This is gonna last for years.
At least 100 years, if not more than that.”
Donald Gilmore, executive director of CDHC; Julie Sinai, Mayor Adena Ishii’s chief of policy; former Berkeley mayor and state Sen.
Jesse Arreguín; and South Berkeley Councilmember Ben Bartlett were among those in attendance at Thursday’s groundbreaking ceremony.
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