Richmond leaders and members of St. Elizabeth’s Catholic Church are coming together to address the need for affordable housing.
On Sunday morning, construction began on Green Village, a new development that will provide 56 affordable units for people earning between 40% and 60% of the area median income. The units will be located in the church’s backyard.
“They have said ‘yes, we want families thriving in our backyard,’” Jay Brown, CEO of Commonwealth Catholic Charities, said.
The project has been in the works for nearly eight years, with St. Elizabeth’s partnering with Commonwealth Catholic Charities and several local nonprofits to make it happen.
“We will be partnering with the Richmond Redevelopment Housing Authority as well to provide some voucher units for the community’s lowest-income residents,” Brown said.
U.S. Sen. Tim Kaine and his wife, who have attended St. Elizabeth’s for more than four decades, said the church’s unused space has long been a subject of discussion.
“Go back twenty years, there was a school building here that people had a lot of good memories connected with it but it was closed. And then behind it, there was a space that had been a convent that burnt down in a fire in the 1970s and so the back two-thirds of this property have been sort of blighted, and we’ve looked for all kinds of uses,” Kaine said.
Now, that space is being transformed to support those who need it most. On Sunday, St. Elizabeth’s Catholic Church gave its blessing to the project, marking a new chapter for the community.
“I hope it does become a model for a lot of other faith communities who own land in our community, and not just faith communities but other entities, as well, because we do need to be really thoughtful about the precious land we have,” Richmond Mayor Danny Avula said.
The first units are expected to be completed by summer 2026.