The Knoxville City Council approved an amended development agreement between the City of Knoxville and Origin Homes in the Veterans District at their meeting Monday night.

In the spring, the city council approved five new homes to be built by Origin in the Veterans District so they could apply for workforce housing tax credits. Origin already has five homes in the new development, but the council included in the agreement in the spring that the homes had to be diverse, as the current ones all look similar. Origin will build three different styles. The council approved back then that two of the homes must be two-story, but on Monday, they moved forward with Origin’s request that only one of the five homes needs to meet that requirement.

This received some backlash at the meeting from council member Megan Day, who argued that Origin should’ve stuck with what they had originally planned with two of the two-story homes and that she wants more diversity in the Veterans District with what houses look like. The amended agreement ultimately passed in a 4-1 split vote, but Knoxville City Manager Heather Ussery says the city wants to modify the frontage of one of the floor plans. 

“Given the market and Origin’s feedback they were hesitant to go forward with two of those two-story homes. The request of the amended agreement was to do one two-story home and two other floor plans. It was a lengthy discussion. I think it was an overall good conversation and council overall approved the amended agreement, but they want to modify the frontage of one of the floor plans that was provided.”

Last month, Origin and the city learned they had secured the workforce housing tax credits to build the five new homes. Four of the current five properties  in the Veterans District have sold.