The city has issued permits for site-clearing and construction for nonprofit homeless services provider Sulzbacher’s Enterprise Village, a multibuilding expansion in Northwest Jacksonville to serve homeless men.
The city approved a permit March 31 for Summit Contracting Group Inc. of Jacksonville to clear the 16.8-acre site at 4785 Walgreen Road at a project cost of $4 million.
It followed up April 15 with a permit for Summit Contracting to build a 100-unit, four-story, 66,579-square-foot workforce-housing, affordable apartment building at a project cost of $14.43 million project. That building will be on almost 7 acres of the larger site.
The proposed $46 million, three-phase Enterprise Village is in development west of Interstate 95 and east of Brentwood Golf Course. It will serve homeless men.
Sulzbacher President and CEO Cindy Funkhouser said construction is planned to start in early summer.
“There will be a couple months of site work but the construction of the 100 units should take about 12 months,” she said by email April 7.
Sulzbacher Enterprise Housing Ltd. and I.M. Sulzbacher Center for the Homeless Inc. intends to move from Downtown, where it has been since 1995.
I.M. Sulzbacher Center for the Homeless paid $845,000 for the Walgreen Road property in November 2022.
The first phase of Enterprise Village is housing, comprising 100 studio and one-bedroom units.
Plans show the second as buildings for human services; a kitchen/cafe/dining/training facility; health residential; and a pharmacy and clinic.
The third is an on-site manufacturing facility for the people Sulzbacher serves.
The expansion will provide resources to people and families with limited access to health care, housing, social services, job training and education.
Sulzbacher operates Downtown at 611 E. Adams St., where it provides 80 emergency beds for men, along with services such as meals and medical and behavioral health care.
Sulzbacher’s lease expires with the city in 2029.
Its first step in relocating from Downtown was the $21 million Sulzbacher Village, which opened in Brentwood in 2022.
That community is at 5455 Springfield Blvd., where the organization provides transitional housing and services to women and families experiencing homelessness. Funkhouser said work will start on the next two phases as soon as the funding stack has been finalized.
Upon the move, Funkhouser said none of its services will remain Downtown.
“We are looking to partner with another organization to take the Urban Rest Stop and community meals (lunch and dinner),” she said.
“We will continue to support those efforts.”
