ST. JOHNS COUNTY, Fla. – A new dog park and some workforce housing could be coming soon to St. Johns County.
Najla Meyer and her husband embarked on a project aimed at enhancing local amenities in St. Johns County. Initially, their plan was to develop a dog park and sports complex.
“That was our original vision,” Meyer recalled. “A dog park and with a sports complex connected to it, which we thought was a great continuation to the Calhoun center.”
The site is found along the east side of Duval Street and both sides of South Nassau Street, between County Road 214 (King Street) and State Road 207.
The development is part of a larger piece of land that includes existing plated lots along West 14th and West 15th Streets. More simply, it is next to the Solomon Calhoun Community Center.
Najla Meyer took News4JAX to the piece of land and spoke about what has now developed into an entirely different project.
“I think at this point, getting the housing done would be more of a reward than the dog park,” she said.
Meyer said as they engaged with their neighbors and listened to the community’s needs, she and her husband realized the need for workforce housing.
The project, called The Dog & Bog project, now involves rezoning approximately 5.56 acres of land to accommodate a maximum of 12 residential dwelling units. This development is part of a larger 31.75-acre property that she said in the past was supposed to be a larger development.
“It was originally going to be a larger workforce housing development, but due to finances, they [developer] had to withdraw,” she said. “We kind of stand at a spot where now we are trying to work with the St. Johns housing community and the St. Johns the nonprofit group, to try and figure out a way that we can go ahead and develop this workforce housing to be able to give back to the community without being a loss to us or our family, while still meeting those needs that are needed, and give as many houses as possible to them that we can.”
Meyer said she and her husband don’t want to make any money on the housing, they just don’t want to lose money. She said the cost of water and housing materials has proved to be expensive.
“I know that they said that just the road originally is going to be close to a million dollars to get it through and that doesn’t include any in the housing,” she said.
Last month, the family went to front of the county commission to discuss the plans and will be going back sometime in the coming months to figure out a way to get the job done. She said a large part of that is the funding.
“We’re trying to look through some HUD support and or some local community. Support and then through any of the nonprofit agencies that do it, we’re looking at an opportunity to maybe if we can donate the land so that they can develop it through the nonprofit if that will work, but we have to see if we can legally do that with the way the land is owned, or we do it through just straight money, gifting and donations from people,” she said.