Choice Neighborhoods

Since the grant award in May 2021, The Choice Neighborhoods Implementation team has collaborated with Clement Kern Gardens and Greater Corktown residents to understand their needs and create a shared vision for their future housing and community.

Along with new housing and neighborhood improvements, the CNI grant helps fund supportive services for the current residents of Clement Kern Gardens. These services center on improving educational outcomes for children, helping households lead healthy lives, and connecting residents to job training and employment opportunities.

Through HUD's Choice Neighborhoods program (CN), cities leverage public and private dollars to develop strategies to address distressed public or HUD-assisted housing. The highly competitive grant program brings together residents, local leaders, and a vast array of other stakeholders to create and implement a neighborhood Transformation Plan that is focused on Housing, People, and Neighborhoods. The Detroit Implementation team is moving forward with the overall Greater Corktown transformation plan to create a successful, sustainable neighborhood in Corktown that is affordable to all families to live, work, and play.

The Greater Corktown CNI Area

The Housing Strategy is:

Building a neighborhood where high-quality, accessible, and diverse housing options are affordable to households of all incomes.
Protecting residents at Clement Kern Gardens and other affordable housing communities from future displacement through the preservation and expansion of affordable units
Creating new mixed-income housing development at Clement Kern Gardens and throughout Greater Corktown that will meet high standards for design, safety, sustainability, and accessibility.
Developing housing opportunities that will be affordable to households with incomes up to 30%, 60%, 80%, and 120% AMI and above.

The Neighborhood Strategy is implementing four Critical Community Improvements and additional neighborhood improvement projects in Greater Corktown that:

Enhance public spaces
Create safer and more accessible streets
Increase resident access to services and community supports
Position Corktown to become one of the City’s most sustainable and resilient neighborhoods.

The People Strategy is providing supportive services to the current residents of Clement Kern Gardens to improve educational outcomes, household health, and economic self-sufficiency. The Plan was developed in collaboration with residents, based on their expressed needs and aspirations, as well as in-depth resident surveys.

The goals of the People Strategy are that:

Households are economically stable and self-sufficient
All households will be connected to primary care providers and health insurance, and residents will gain access to the tools necessary to lead healthy, active lives
Providing access to quality early childcare to ensure children are kindergarten ready
Children are proficient in core academic subjects. Youth, including youth with disabilities, graduate from high school college- and career-ready

Through the Choice Neighborhoods Implementation Grant, Clement Kern Gardens residents will have dedicated Case Management to connect them with supportive services, offered by over 115 partners.

The City of Detroit’s Transformation Plan will include:

Housing

275 replacement units for returning CKG residents
65 Project Based Vouchers (PBV) replacement units for very low-income households committed by the Michigan State Housing Development Authority
278 Low-Income Housing Tax Credit affordable units
51 workforce units (affordable for 80%-120% AMI)
124 market rate units
40 affordable homeownership opportunities

Neighborhood

The Owen Economic Empowerment Center fulfills the neighborhood objective to expand and strengthen amenities and resident services
The Street Calming, Pedestrian Safety and Placemaking Improvements fulfill the neighborhood objective to ensure safe, healthy streets and improve pedestrian connectivity
The creation of the 10th St. Greenway and Wayfinding fulfills the neighborhood objective to create new and improved public spaces
Neighborhood Green Infrastructure and Resiliency fulfills the neighborhood objective to strengthen and ensure environmental resiliency

People

Health:

Connection to Primary Care Providers and other health services
Insurance navigation support
Dedicated fitness space and programming for youth & adults
Trained, paid Resident Champions to support peers in reaching health goals
Healthy food access & nutrition education
Mental and emotional health support

Education:

Academic Navigator support for all families with children to track enrollment and academic progress, from cradle to career
New Early Childhood Education Center with a blended funding model to serve all incomes
Wraparound early literacy services
Academic tutoring, enrichment & mentoring programs to support college and career readiness

Economic self-sufficiency:

Providing training and guidance to support the launch of residents' small businesses
Committed Job Specialist + slots in training programs for skilled trades, early childhood development and more
Workforce readiness, financial counseling, homeownership counseling and digital literacy support
Youth career development resources, including dedicated spots in Grow Detroit's Young Talent program

CNI Target Housing Site Clement Kern Gardens

The Clement Kern Gardens Affordable Housing Development is named in honor of Father Clement Kern, who served the local neighborhood parish, Most Holy Trinity, for 34 years. Due to his lifelong commitment as a community advocate for the Corktown neighborhood, he was immortalized with a statue that is located at Bagley St. and Trumbull Ave.

The affordable housing development was constructed in 1985 on residential land that was cleared and reserved for industrial development. In the 1950s during the era of Urban Renewal, the City Planning Commission condemned much of the Historic Corktown neighborhood as “slums.” The area of the neighborhood between Bagley St. and the Detroit Riverfront was cleared and renamed “Westside Industrial.” One of the first major projects constructed was the Holiday Inn Downtown, which is now named the Trumbull & Porter Hotel. While much of Westside Industrial project attracted new industrial development, the site directly north of the Holiday Inn laid vacant. This site was later developed into low income and senior housing and named Clement Kern Gardens.

The Westside Industrial project created “superblocks” which disrupted the historical street grid of the neighborhood. Clement Kern Gardens was constructed on one of these superblocks, featuring 87 housing units over 7 acres. This site plan limits pedestrian connectivity and neighborhood cohesion. Segregated by design, Clement Kern Gardens functions like an isolated gated community where the residents are disconnected from the Historic Corktown neighborhood.

It is important to the City of Detroit that the continued revitalization of Detroit include its lifetime residents. As part of the Greater Corktown Transformation Plan, the residents of Clement Kern Gardens were engaged to provide input on the City's CNI application through in-person meetings, door-to-door canvassing, phone interviews, mailings, and surveys.