Guest commentary: Riverview II is investment in the future
A letter to the editor published in the Aug. 26, 2026, issue of the Island Reporter raised questions about Riverview II that require a response. Community Housing & Resources (CHR) welcomes thoughtful public discussion about affordable housing. However, several conclusions presented in the letter require important context.
First, the Sanibel Plan’s 3% Below Market Rate Housing goal should not be interpreted as a base for affordable housing. Reaching 3% does not mean Sanibel suddenly has enough housing for its workforce or that we should stop planning for the future. It is a planning goal, not a declaration that at 3.01% our community’s housing need disappears.
The calculation presented in the letter also relies on applying a 2004 estimate that 40% of Sanibel residences were occupied by full-time residents to a post-Hurricane Ian housing-unit count more than 20 years later. That produces an estimate, not a current count of Sanibel’s full-time resident households. Our community has changed dramatically since 2004, and Hurricane Ian changed it again.
More importantly, affordable housing policy cannot be reduced to a single percentage.
The real question is: Who will live and work on Sanibel in the next 10, 20 and 30 years?
Who will work in our restaurants and hotels? Who will care for our aging residents? Who will work for our nonprofits, businesses and public institutions? Who will maintain our properties, repair our homes and serve the thousands of people who visit this island?
Those workers are part of Sanibel, even if many cannot currently afford to live here.
Riverview II is about addressing that reality.
It is also incorrect to conclude that one prospective applicant being told that housing may become available when Riverview I opens proves there is no demand for Riverview II. A waitlist is a snapshot of people who have already gone through an application process. It is not a housing needs study, nor does it measure the many workers who never apply because they know there is little or no housing available to them.
Building housing creates opportunity for people who have long assumed living on Sanibel is simply impossible.
CHR strongly supports prioritizing Sanibel’s workforce. In fact, CHR and the city are actively discussing how the Sanibel Plan can better reflect today’s workforce-housing needs. But CHR must also operate within applicable federal, state and local requirements when public funding is involved. Those requirements should not be characterized as opening Sanibel housing to “unemployed social welfare cases.” That terminology is unnecessarily divisive and does not reflect the dignity of the people affordable housing programs are intended to serve.
Affordable housing residents are members of our community.
They are servers, managers, administrative professionals, hospitality employees, nonprofit employees, healthcare workers, tradespeople, teachers, first responders and retirees. They are individuals and families who contribute to the economic and social fabric of this island.
And they bring something Sanibel increasingly needs: economic and generational diversity.
Sanibel cannot say that it values a diverse, vibrant and resilient community while creating no realistic pathway for working people to become part of that community.
Concerns have also been raised about concentrating affordable housing along Periwinkle Way. But we should be careful about the implication that affordable housing itself somehow diminishes a neighborhood. CHR housing is not an undesirable municipal facility. It is people’s homes.
Riverview II has gone through an extensive public process. The Sanibel Planning Commission reviewed the project and recommended approval, and city council subsequently approved it.
There are also questions about CHR’s financial capacity. CHR is not asking Sanibel taxpayers to write a blank check for Riverview II. This project has been assembled through a combination of significant outside grant funding, private philanthropy, CHR resources and bank financing. CHR has worked deliberately to leverage outside dollars to create a permanent community asset.
The opportunity before Sanibel is much larger than one building.
For decades, this community has recognized that maintaining affordable housing is essential to preserving the character and functionality of the island. Previous generations had the foresight to establish Sanibel’s affordable housing program when land was available and the challenge was considerably smaller.
Today’s leaders have the same responsibility.
We can debate whether 3% has technically been reached under one calculation or another. But percentages do not house people.
Homes do.
The question before Sanibel should not be, “Have we built enough affordable housing to satisfy a mathematical target?”
It should be: “Are we creating enough housing to sustain the community we want Sanibel to be?”
CHR believes the answer requires looking forward, not backward.
Riverview II represents 39 permanently affordable homes and an extraordinary opportunity to ensure that people who contribute to this island have a chance to be part of its future.
Affordable housing is not a threat to Sanibel’s character but a community in which the people who sustain it can no longer afford to live there is the greater threat.
Nicole Decker-McHale is executive director of Community Housing & Resources (CHR). CHR was formed in 1979 as a not-for-profit organization to address the growing need for affordable housing in the Sanibel and Captiva area. It also serves as the city of Sanibel’s housing foundation under the Affordable Housing Program established in 1983. CHR’s mission is to provides safe, quality, affordable housing for families and individuals who work in and serve our island communities. For more information, visit sancapchr.org.