North Tulsa has seen a wave of new housing construction in recent years. Homes like those in the Flat Rock Ridge community and mixed-income apartments like 36N Phoenix Apartments have provided more housing options to the area.
Other development projects, like Green Country Habitat for Humanity’s Wilshire Trails, are not yet built. That project will include 31 three-bedroom homes across from Hawthorne Elementary in the Phoenix District.
While some see the new housing options as signs of progress, others question how the changing landscape might impact longtime north Tulsa residents.
Cameron Walker, CEO of the Green Country Habitat for Humanity, believes the northern part of the city is long overdue for more diverse housing options.
“The thing we heard over and over again was, ‘I can’t find the type of house I want, so I’m going to go to Owasso, I’m going to Broken Arrow,’” he said during a recent panel discussion at the People and Place Impact Conference at Langston University-Tulsa. “Absent the housing options, people are just naturally going to be unable to live in the community.”
The conference brought local and national leaders together for discussions on economic development, community building, health and wellness.
Reggie Ivey, executive director of nonprofit Northside Neighbors, moderated the panel, asking Walker and others about fears of gentrification and doing development in tandem with the community.
In the case of the Tulsa Housing Authority’s Envision Comanche redevelopment, apartments were offered first to former Comanche Park residents who wanted to stay in the area.
Meanwhile, a single-family home at Flat Rock Ridge starts right around $204,000. For Michael Sorrell, the chief revenue officer for developer Capital Homes, lot subsidies, down-payment assistance and closing-cost assistance are three tools that can help families.
“Those things are critical and can enable somebody to get into a home and without it, it becomes daunting to most people,” he said. He believes the residential project will “change the trajectory of individuals’ lives and families’ lives.”
Walker said the key to quelling fears about legacy residents being forced out is being engaged with the community early, especially in a place like north Tulsa that has “been given promises just to see them broken.”
In 2021, Green Country Habitat for Humanity pledged to create 250 new homes in north Tulsa over five years. He said the consistent community feedback was “do it with us, not do it to us.’”
“And so we have tried to really take that to heart,” he said. He told the crowd gathered for the housing panel that “a lot of the fear of gentrification is the unknown.”
“You have a developer come in, they quietly buy up property, then make a big plan and then they go to work,” Walker continued. “And by the time the community hears about a zoning action or something, you’re too deep into that project. And so it’s usually a foregone conclusion that it’s going to get done.”
Tracie Chandler, a longtime community advocate in the Phoenix District, challenged the panelists to “collaborate together so that we can get a full-fledged grocery store down on 36 Street North close to MLK.”
Nonprofit organization RG Foods opened their latest Grocery Box, a micro grocery store, on the ground level of the Phoenix 36N Apartments back in April.
A decade from now, Walker said the success of these projects will ultimately be measured by whether people who live in north Tulsa can get their basic needs met in their own community.
That statement drew applause from the audience.
He highlighted the community’s rich history, public schools and proximity to downtown and the airport.
“I think having those amenities, having those services in north Tulsa, that’s going to be a good plan,” Walker said.
