City Council Approves Development Bringing 3,500 Homes to Southwest Boise
According to KTVB, the southwest Boise development will bring more than 3,500 homes to the area with 94,000 square feet dedicated to commercial space. The development — located along the New York Canal, east of Maple Grove Road and west of Cole Road — will have a variety of housing arrangement for renters and buyers, including single-family homes, attached single-family homes like duplexes and multi-family housing such as apartments. A public school and a number of parks and green spaces in the community are also slated to arrive as part of the development’s plan. The project is scheduled to be constructed through a multi-phase plan spanning 20 years.
Boise City Council’s decision approved the annexation of the development’s land, which will incorporate what was previously unincorporated Ada County into the city limits.
After formulating multiple analyses of the development over the summer, Boise’s planning departments remained skeptical of its ability to be financially viable.
The city’s finance staff concluded that “annexation is hard to justify financially” following the Idaho Legislature passing a 10% reduction in property taxes statewide that has been compounded by rising costs from when the development was initially modeled in 2021, Mike Sherack, Boise’s senior budget analyst, said.
Citing the losses expected with the development — which Sherack said would lessen the city’s ability to make investments into servicing and developing existing parts of the city — the city’s planning team and the Planning and Zoning Commission recommended denial of the annexation Tuesday.
