Patricia Anderson is excited. She’s getting ready for a party. You could call it a homecoming and for her, as this is her first real home.

She’s been in and out of shelters since getting shot over 30 years ago due to a dispute over $5. And though the injury left her paralyzed from the waist down, she's maintained her positive outlook on life.

  • New affordable housing project offers opportunity for struggling seniors
  • Project was created in partnership with L.A. County
  • Amenities include gym, library, computer center, and community area

“I'm so happy. I’m so blessed to be here in this building right now at my apartment, everything,” said Anderson. 

Today, she couldn’t be happier.

“I can’t express myself no more. I’m gonna cry because I’m so happy!” she said.

Anderson is one of the new residents at The Gateway, a brand new affordable housing development with 105 units serving seniors over 62, prioritizing those with medical needs.

Twenty of the units are reserved for formerly homeless occupants. Anderson checks all the boxes.

She counts her lucky stars. About 3,000 people applied to live in The Gateway and Anderson acknowledges she wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for a chance encounter with a friend that encouraged her to fill out an application.

Before The Gateway, she was living in a recuperative care center for a year, as she recovered from surgery.

“There's a serious homeless epidemic in Los Angeles right now,” says Jordan Pynes, President of Thomas Safran & Associates, the private developer behind The Gateway. “We created an amazing public-private very rare partnership where the L.A. County and L.A. CDC contributed to help build this property.”

The Gateway marks the first time Los Angeles County partnered with the private sector to create affordable housing. Costing $44M over four years, The Gateway includes an outdoor community area, gym, computer center and a county library.

So how can a building that cost almost $400,000 per unit be affordable? 

“So what makes it affordable is that we agreed to keep the rent restricted under a certain amount which is 60 percent of median income for the next 55 years,” explains Pynes.

And that’s one step towards a more humane city.