Port Huron to invest $20.6 million to revitalize its ‘healthcare and college district’

By Jim Bloch

The city of Port Huron is planning to invest $20.6 million over the next year to create new housing and reconstruct several roads in its so-called healthcare and college district.

City Manager James Freed illustrated the investments with a PowerPoint presentation at the regular meeting of the city council March 10.

“About a year-and-a-half or two years ago, during a goal setting session, we declared that the Erie Street corridor – the health care and college district – was going to be a focus area for the city of Port Huron,” said Freed, as heard on the recording of the meeting posted on the city’s website. “Today, after several years of planning, we’re ready to take action.”

Freed called the investment one of the largest by the city in the last decade.

“It’s really going to help transform that corridor,” Freed said. “It’s critically important because it’s between McLaren (Hospital), one of our largest employers, and St. Clair County Community College, which I think is the crown jewel of Port Huron.”

The area is bounded by Washington Street on the north side of the McLaren campus, Pine Grove Avenue from Washington southeast to Erie Street, Erie south to the Black River, the Black River northwest to 10th Street, and 10th Street north to Washington.

The Lincoln Lofts

The first component of the project is the Lincoln Lofts on the northwest corner of Erie Street and Lincoln, which serves as the southern border of the hospital campus.

The Michigan State Housing Development Authority recently awarded the city $16.5 million in tax credit funds, which is equal to the cost of the project. The lofts will feature 40 units — three of which are existing – including 19 new one-bedroom apartments and 18 new two-bedroom apartments. Fourteen units will be dedicated to supported housing to serve those who are housing insecure. Freed noted that 147 students in Port Huron Area Schools are homeless; 14 children are living in hotels.

“I couldn’t imagine raising my kids in a hotel room because I didn’t have access to housing,” Freed said.

He called the homelessness in the city “a crisis” and promised “to work like hell” to solve it.

“The project will break ground this fall,” Freed said. “What’s really interesting is that we bought a home on Erie Street for $60,000 three years ago with the long-term goal of onboarding more housing. The developer has purchased the home from the city of Port Huron and is rehabbing that into a single-family home.”

A brick mixed-use commercial building stands on the corner of Rollins Street and Erie.

“They’re going to re-do two units on the second floor and are going to make a commercial space on the first floor – a coffee house or something that can cater to college kids,” Freed said. “It will be really nice and walkable between the college and (the hospital).”

Local roads

The city is proposing $4,145,300 worth of local roadwork in the district, which contains some of the worst streets in the city, which were not repaired during the city’s massive sewer separation project in the early 2000s. The streets sit atop water lines built in the 1890s.

Kearney Street, two streets south of Washington, and Willow, two streets west of Erie, are in bad shape, Freed said. Along with Elk Street, they will be reconstructed, with new water and sewer lines, new lead-free water connections to existing homes, new sidewalks, ADA curbs and tree plantings.

The city will partner with SC4 to remove Stone Street from Glenwood, the northern boundary of the college, to River Street, creating more green space. The former headquarters of the fire department sits on Stone, inside the campus, but will be demolished in May or June. The new Station No. 1 opened south of the Black River last summer. The college is contributing $50,000 to the street removal.

After Freed’s presentation, the city council awarded Raymond Engineering, of Marysville, the $4,145,330 contract for the Hospital Area Road Reconstruction and Utility Replacement, Phase I. Raymond underbid hometown company Boddy Construction by more than $1.1 million. The project was budgeted, and the funds will come from the city’s Street, Water, Wastewater Funds.

Raymond will rebuild more than a half mile roadway on Kearny, Elk and Willow streets and remove the concrete on .12 miles of Stone.

Jim Bloch is a freelance writer based in St. Clair, Michigan. Contact him at bloch.jim@gmail.com.