BELOIT — When Beloit City Council President Terry Monahan asked people supporting a public housing project to remain standing Monday night, dozens who turned out for the meeting sat down in unison.

The plan to build 35 public-housing units on Beloit’s far west side — a project funded largely by federal tax credits — has become a lightning rod for criticism among the people living in and around the neighborhood.

Council members took note of the discontent.

“I would say that there were about 50 people that stood, and no one supported the project,” Monahan said, adding that because “a development of this magnitude” is opposed by so many people living nearby, the council must proceed with caution.

“I think it was a bit rushed,” he said.

In order for the project’s developer, Gorman & Co. of Madison, to qualify for federal tax credits, an application must be filed by Feb. 1.

Seeking more time to gather input on the project, the council tabled the issue until Jan. 22.

“They certainly had more questions than we had answers,” Councilman Marty Densch said about opponents of the project. “Laying it over for two weeks will give staff time and the developers the time to talk to the neighborhood more, and maybe rework the plan.

“The people in the neighborhood deserve that much.”

Company representatives presented details of the project to the council Monday. Highlights include the sale of 15 existing single-family public-housing units throughout the city, and the construction of 35 more ranch-style and townhouse units on 5.49 acres of land owned by the city near Woodman’s Food Market.

The first phase of the project is estimated to cost approximately $5 million; some $4 million would come in the form of tax credits.

The proposed site — north of Burton Street, south of Staborn Drive and bordered on the east by the backyards of Meredith Drive residents — is ideal because the city already owns the land and it is conveniently located, said City Manager Larry Arft.

“The land has been sitting there for decades,” Arft said. “We own the land, it is within walking distance of shopping facilities, and there’s the bus line.”

Arft added that the sale of 15 public-housing units scattered throughout the city, all of which are worth at least $60,000, would help fund the project, possibly in addition to small grants from the federal Housing and Urban Development agency.

According to Assistant City Manager Steve Gregg, new housing would help make up for the deteriorating state of existing public housing in Beloit.

“They’ve become liabilities for us in terms of maintenance,” Gregg said, adding that negative attitudes toward public housing often are a reaction to the condition of the units.

“I think it has more to do with the buildings right now than the residents,” Gregg said. “The soul of the project is to develop housing that doesn’t look like public housing.”

That’s of no consolation to people living in the neighborhoods surrounding the site. Those at the meeting Monday said their main concern is damage to their property, which occurred when a company tried to build in the area in the early 1970s. Because there is limestone under the site, residents said that blasting during construction cracked the foundations and basement walls of their homes.

“I don’t know how the heck (the home-building company) got away with it,” said Diana Smith, a homeowner on Meredith Drive who still has problems with a crack in her basement wall. “Water gets in there when we get high water,” she said, pointing to a crack running from floor to ceiling.

Roger Allen, a homeowner on Staborn Drive, expressed similar sentiments.

“There’s a genuine concern about damage in the area,” Allen said, noting he was speaking on behalf of his neighbors. “A lot of people feel that we’re going to be collateral damage.”

According to Chris Laurent, president of the Wisconsin division of Gorman & Co., newer technologies should ensure that homes in the area are not damaged.

“I think we have technologies in place that will protect … existing houses,” Laurent said. “I think as the industries become more sophisticated, the blasts are able to be controlled.”

Gorman & Co., which specializes in revitalizing older buildings in urban settings, is spearheading Beloit’s Fairbanks Flats revitalization project. The company planned a 10:30 a.m. meeting Saturday (Jan. 12) at Sun Valley Presbyterian Church to meet with residents about the Burton Street project.

Some people also worried that the project will segregate lower-income public-housing residents.

“In Beloit, that’s a lot of public housing all in one place,” Anita Williams said at the Monday meeting. She also asked whether nearby “Converse (Elementary School) can absorb 90 more children?”

Said Allen, “Beloit is a town of diversity, not a town where one segment of people are pushed on the far edge of town.”

Arft sought to allay such concerns.

“There’s no hidden agenda,” he said. “Dispersion of public housing is essential. The city understands that.”

Beloit currently has 131 public-housing units. The new development would account for 25 percent of that number.

“But we wouldn’t cluster more than that,” Arft said.

Leslie Scherrer, a development associate with Gorman & Co., said at the meeting the company’s goal is to make sure the development integrates households with varying incomes. Families with larger incomes would be sought later, when owner-occupied units would be built.

“The goal, long-term, is for this to be a mixed-income village,” Scherrer said.

Laurent described the ideal demographic for the development as “a cross-section of people living in Beloit.” Ideally, he said, the project would have “a mix of incomes, a mix of people doing different things.”

For one Beloit citizen who currently lives in a public-housing unit, the project seems like a good idea.

“I know people have this notion of people in public housing — just a lot of negative connotations,” Chekretta Jackson said, adding her own views changed once she moved into such a unit.

“They (the Beloit Housing Authority) have truly, truly, truly increased the quality of my life,” she told council members.

She encouraged people to keep an open mind about the project.

“We’re good neighbors,” Jackson said. “We’re good people.”