Gilroy Sobrato

After several successful projects together, South County Housing, a non-profit community development corporation, partnered with BGS to take their sustainable building practices to the next level. The Gilroy Sobrato apartment complex was designed to permanently accommodate chronically homeless and disabled individuals. Designed by the Dahlin Group and built by South County Community Builders, the property includes recreational areas and on-site case management services assisting residents with daily activities like housekeeping, cooking, and medical issues. Sometimes it is the small details that really elevate a project, and in this case the construction team built a beautiful Gazebo for the residents to enjoy, out of FSC certified local redwood.

We find it especially rewarding to work with nonprofits like South County Housing whose mission is to promote viable neighborhoods that enhance healthy, sustainable communities and provide housing and neighborhood services through its development and property management services. For all of our clients we offer a top to bottom service, from the first rough plans until the grand opening. For our affordable housing developers we are a single point of contact to make sure all of their sustainability and energy goals are met. For Gilroy Sobrato, we provided comprehensive energy and sustainability services to the project team, from preliminary funding applications to verifying the performance of the Solar Photovoltaic system for rebate purposes. During the design process, we advised on how to minimize energy use including modeling a rooftop solar thermal hot water system. Our consulting services assisted Gilroy Sobrato Apartments in achieving a building energy performance that exceeds Title 24 by 71.3%

“We have found that all of these features not only save energy and increase ourenergy efficiency ratings, but also provide the very comfortable living space forour residents. Many of these building practices actually do not cost more toinstall than more traditional inefficient building materials and practices.” —John Van Dyke, South County Housing/Vaquero Construction

The results at Gilroy Sobrato are clear: the property only uses ⅓ the energy of a typical building and won the California Multi Family New Homes award for most efficient building. Our team was able to provide comprehensive residential energy design and sustainability consulting, top to bottom, resulting in the first LEED for Homes Platinum project in Southern Santa Clara county.