The City of Orange recognizes that it has an obligation to provide decent and adequate housing for all persons. Further, the City has an obligation to expand the supply of housing for Low and Moderate Income households. Through the Orange Redevelopment Agency, the City has an active and aggressive affordable housing program that has been very successful over the past 15 years in significantly increasing the number of income-restricted units in Orange. Both the City’s 2000-2005 Housing Element and the Agency’s 2004-2009 Five Year Implementation Plan serve as guides to the types of programs the City and Agency use to increase the number of income-restricted units.

One Agency goal is to facilitate the construction of new affordable multi-family housing units. Although the Agency has been successful in facilitating the development of more than 100 Low and Moderate Income deed-restricted units, there are many obstacles that hinder such development, most notably the lack of financial resources and the lack of available vacant land.

A far more effective way for the Agency to increase the number of affordable units has been through the acquisition, rehabilitation and deed-restriction of substandard rental multi-family housing. For the past 15 years, the Agency has been instrumental in the rehabilitation of approximately 430 apartment units in Orange. In exchange for providing financial assistance for the acquisition and rehabilitation projects to for-profit and non-profit housing developers, the Agency has been able to secure long-term deed restrictions to ensure the apartment units remain available to Low and Moderate Income households.