New downtown Los Angeles high-rise building to house homeless in $600,000 units

DOWNTOWN LOS ANGELES (KABC) -- A grand opening ceremony was held Wednesday for a high-rise building in downtown Los Angeles that will house homeless individuals.

There are 278 units in the 19-story development known as the Weingart Tower. It's intended to help people currently without shelter on Skid Row and it will be L.A.'s largest permanent support housing project.

"Skid Row is a community," said Mayor Karen Bass during Wednesday's event. "It's not just throw-away people. It is a community, and to bring that community together in beautiful housing like this is what everybody deserves."

The building will have an entire floor of offices for case workers, in addition to a list of impressive amenities: a gym, art room, music room, computer room and library. Residents will enjoy six common balconies and a café.

It's considered affordable housing, but the cost to build this type of project still adds up. Each unit costs nearly $600,000 and it's being funded by taxpayers.

The $165 million project is receiving permanent financing from Proposition HHH, which voters overwhelmingly passed in 2016. The new tower is also receiving state housing funds and $56 million in state tax credits.

Kevin Murray, the president and CEO of the Weingart Center, said the goal is to keep the tenants engaged.

"As many things that we can put inside the building so that you don't have the chaos that you sometimes see outside the building where people are moving to and from so, you can do just about anything you want within this building, and it's a regular apartment."

Future residents who attended Wednesday's opening were able to see their new home for the first time.

"I really never had nothing really given to me besides stuff and family," said Shannon Gresham. "When I was homeless, I was looking at it like, 'There's nobody out there,' it was like a little dark hole, like, it was just me. I went from being in that hole to coming out the hole like, 'It's a lot of support and love out here,' so I'm so speechless right now, I'm happy. I want to see my unit."

All of the units have been matched with homeless individuals and now that the certificate of eligibility has been signed, those tenants can move in as soon as Thursday.