Chris Dillmann/Vail Daily
At the start of April, Eagle County School District welcomed the final residents home to Miller Flats, its 37-unit apartment complex in Edwards. The project is the first employee housing development that the school district has built from the ground up.
“It just takes off a huge stressor, having a safe place to live,” said Brian Wood, the assistant principal of Red Canyon High School. “The price is definitely affordable comparatively. And to have something that’s secured, that we can rent for five years if we choose, is just fantastic. It improves every aspect of our lives; we can stay here and we can make ends meet.”
Wood was one of many district employees who won the district’s lottery and moved into the apartment complex next to Battle Mountain High School this month.
Wood and his wife, a retired school psychologist, moved to Eagle County from Castle Rock a few years ago. The couple sold their home on the Front Range and entered the tough rental market in Eagle County.
“I accepted a job without a place to live. So we had to find a place within a couple of months. And you know people end up finding places, but it’s hard to find affordable places to live,” Wood said. “Homeownership is obviously the goal, but that’s difficult up here and we were kind of forced into the rental market.”
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Wood and his wife were able to secure a rental in downtown Eagle where they’ve lived for the past few years.
“It was a very small space and the parking situation down there was kind of rough. We were paying more for a much smaller studio apartment, basically,” Wood said.
Moving into Miller Flats was an opportunity to move into a new, larger, clean unit with parking and in-unit laundry, he added.
“It’s just a great opportunity because it’s a rare opportunity,” Wood said. “Housing is the No. 1 challenge that people might face moving up here.”
Not only did Wood experience the housing crisis firsthand, but in his role as assistant principal he’s seen its impact on recruiting and retaining educators.
“It cannot be overstated how big of a deal this is to help keep good people in the school district and attract new and talented teachers from outside the valley because the valley is growing and we’re going to need teachers,” Wood said. “It’s really important to be able to provide this really as a magnet for people that might want to choose to live in this great place but can’t afford to do so.”
It’s a situation that Sara Rodriguez Hidalgo also knows well. Rodriguez Hidalgo works in the school district’s early childhood education department and was among the employees who moved into Miller Flats in April.
“I’m very grateful to the Eagle County School District for building these affordable housing for teachers and employees,” she said. “I think this is going to help a lot of us to make the decision to stay here because having challenges finding housing makes it hard to stay here.”
Rodriguez Hidalgo moved to Eagle County from Spain five years ago, starting her job with the district at the same time.
“When I first moved, I don’t think the housing crisis was so big. I didn’t have challenges finding housing, but definitely finding something cheap was difficult,” Rodriguez Hidalgo said.
At first, she moved into a basement unit in East Vail that she shared with four other people. When she decided to move out on her own during the pandemic, she realized just how expensive it was to do so. While she was able to find a studio in East Vail, when the Miller Flats lottery opened, she jumped at the opportunity.
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“It’s cheaper than what I was paying for my studio. And I was lucky to get a two-bedroom apartment for the same price of my studio,” she said.
Plus, the unit has amenities — like in-unit laundry — she didn’t have previously and brings her closer to her friends.
“Every time that I was in a situation that I need help, I found myself on my own here in Vail because nobody really lived there, because everybody lives downvalley because it’s more affordable,” she said. “Now in Edwards, I’m closer to my friends. I’m very excited to get to be part of the Edwards community.”
Building Miller Flats
Eagle County School District broke ground on Miller Flats in March 2022. Rather than use taxpayer dollars to fund the project, the district used certificates of participation to fund the project. These COPs will be paid back by the rental income generated by the project, with the expectation it will be paid off in less than 30 years.
In fall 2023, the district moved in employees to the first 10 units at Miller Flats. On April 1, the remaining 17 units were move-in ready.
The Edwards housing includes a unit mix of 19 one-bedroom units, 11 two-bedroom units and seven three-bedroom units ranging in size from 754 to 1,267 square feet.
To ensure affordability for its employees, the district tied its rental rates to employee salaries rather than the average median income, which is traditionally how rates are determined for employees and affordable housing. The rental rates were crafted using the take-home base salary for the district’s certified employees and the assumption that 40% of that salary would go toward rent.
This applies not only to Miller Flats but to all the rental units in the district’s inventory of employee housing.
As such, with the current base salary for certified staff of $50,500, the rental rates at Miller Flats are currently as follows:
- $1,260 a month for a one-bedroom
- $1,640 a month for a two-bedroom
- $2,130 a month for a three-bedroom
While Miller Flats was the first employee housing development built by the district, the district is working on various other projects to increase its supply of employee housing.
In addition to its acquisition of master leases, the district is also partnering with Habitat for Humanity on 12 homes for district employees in the Third Street neighborhood in Eagle.
In the fall, voters in the school district approved a $100 million bond, which will provide funding to support its various housing projects. This includes funding for future housing developments at Maloit Park in Minturn and at the IK Bar property in Gypsum. The funding from the bond will go toward infrastructure at both sites to get them development-ready.