A housing facility for mentally disabled and low-income people could be approved at tonight's Lompoc Planning Commission meeting.

Planning commissioners are scheduled to vote on whether to approve a proposal to build a two-building complex with 19 studio apartments for mentally disabled people and 18 for other residents who make less than about $1,350 a month.

The commission meets at 6:30 p.m. in City Hall, 100 Civic Center Plaza.

A staff of about 10 people, including counselors to work with the mentally disabled and two on-site managers, also would live in the facility, proposed for the 500 block of North G Street.

The facility would be built by the Santa Barbara Housing Assistance Corp.

(SBHAC) and the tenant would be San Luis Obispo-based Transitions Mental Health Association. Those two organizations are asking for a conditional-use permit to run such a facility because the site is ready for development, after a hotel was originally planned for the land.

“It was approved as a hotel, but it didn't get built and we said, ‘If all the environmental work has been done (on the site), we should come in and change the concept,'” said Frank Thompson, a consultant for the SBHAC.

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Thompson described the facility as a step in Transitions' program that is designed to teach mentally disabled people how to live independently. The mentally disabled residents living there would have already completed part of Transitions' program, he said.

Mentally disabled people do much better living in communities where other people live because it teaches them to connect to others, Thompson added.

SBHAC's wants to have the Mediterranean-style buildings opened by January 2008.

The 360-square-foot units would be expected to rent for $396 to $453 a month. Each unit would have a full bathroom and kitchen. And the facility is designed to include a recreation room with tables and possibly exercise equipment and table games, such as billiards. The project also would include a multimedia room with computers and a television.

“We are trying to make it as homey as possible,” Thompson said.

Mark Abramson can be reached at 737-1057, or mabramson@lompocrecord.com.

March 13, 2006