Members of the Jamestown City Council held a moment of silence in honor of the more than 3000 lives lost during the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, preceding the councils working meeting Monday. P-J Photo by Christopher Blakeslee

Jamestown could soon see some additional options for housing individuals and improving the current housing stock quality.

During a Jamestown City Council Housing Committee meeting, Monday, members were briefed about an upcoming opportunity to add more quality housing options in the city, which can include housing homeless individuals temporarily.

“We are also working on, and we’ve been in conversations with the company Module, which is a modular home builder, a smaller footprint house,” said Crystal Surdyk, Jamestown’s director of development. “The average size of homes by Module is 1,200 square feet.”

Moreover, City Councilwomen Marie T. Carrubba, D-Ward 4, added, “Have you seen shipping containers that can be turned into tiny homes? You can even stack them on top of each other to save space.”

Furthermore, the current stock of homes, while plentiful, is not always desirable or kept in the best shape and will require more oversight.

“There’s plenty of housing in the city, but not “great quality housing stock,” said Surdyk. “There’s a lot of work that needs to be done on what we have. Which, we know that and are working on things, different programs and projects, to address those. But, that said, we are also working on, and we’ve been in conversations with the company Module, which is a modular home builder, a smaller footprint house.”

Also, during the same briefing, Surdyk stated that “more than 60 city houses had their roofs repaired using ARPA funds (American Rescue Plan Act of 2021). “We still have about 30 more roofs to go, but it’s moving fast.”

State legislators are working on changing the current housing code to reflect the use and authorizations to make modular-style homes legal and assessable.