The high cost of creating a mini-village of tiny homes for the homeless in Broward County already has one high-profile critic: Fort Lauderdale Mayor Dean Trantalis.
Broward County is in talks with the United Way of Broward County to possibly run a new tiny home community program and provide communal meals. United Way officials are interested in partnering with Fort Lauderdale to make the program a reality, Acting Assistant City Manager Chris Cooper told the commission last week.
So far, Broward County has allocated $250,000 to build a dozen or so homes — commonly known as “pallet” shelters — and $500,000 to operate them, Cooper said. The easy-to-build homes would serve as transitional housing for anywhere from 60 to 90 days and would be used over and over again by different homeless individuals.
Trantalis drilled down on the numbers, asking how much it would cost to build each tiny home. The answer: $20,000 each.
“If it’s $20,000 per unit, maybe you’re looking at 12 units,” Trantalis said. “And they want to spend a half-a-million dollars to operate 12 units? What kind of crazy operation is that? Where is the logic there?”