A nearly 650-unit apartment project received the green light from the city of Mission.

The Mission City Council last week cleared the way for a three-building, 646-unit apartment project at 5665 Foxridge Drive and 5700 Broadmoor St., a Block Real Estate proposal known as the Foxridge Apartments.

Despite continued resident pushback this month and last, the city council approved the preliminary development plan — which brings the 2023 project from 307-units to nearly 650 units across three buildings — in a 6-1 vote. Councilmember Debbie Kring cast the dissenting vote, and Councilmember Cheryl-Carpenter Davis was absent.

How they voted

• Councilmember Josepha Haden Chomphosy: Yes

• Councilmember Wanda Vaughn: Yes

• Councilmember Mary Ryherd: Yes

• Councilmember Sam Komosa: Yes

• Councilmember Debbie Kring: No

• Councilmember Brian Schmid: Yes

• Councilmember Cheryl Carpenter-Davis: Absent

• Councilmember Ben Chociej: Yes

This comes a month after the city council remanded the preliminary development plan to the Mission Planning Commission, which recommended denial of the plan in August due to traffic concerns and deviations from materials and mixed-use requirements.

After taking another look at the project, following the city council’s remand, the planning commission on Sept. 28 recommended in a 4-3 vote that the city council approve the nearly 650-unit plan.

The project features a 307-unit building at the original project site of 5665 Foxridge, alongside a retrofitted Broadmoor Tower with 176 units and a third seven-story building with 163 units next to that tower.

Watch the city council’s entire discussion in the embedded video below starting at 6:17.

How we got here

In 2022, developers proposed a roughly 300-unit, four-story apartment building on top of a one-story parking garage at 5665 Foxridge Drive, the old JCPenney call center.

That original $114 million project did receive approval for up to $14.8 million in public incentives depending on sustainability elements developers included in that project.

Those incentives and that price point were for the previous plan and not the plan the city council approved on Wednesday. Governing body members alluded to future public incentives discussions for this project if that is desired by the developers.

The lot sat untouched until last year, when developers demolished the JCPenney call center.

Months later, Block returned to the city council with an updated proposal: more apartments to make the project’s finances, specifically with lenders, pencil out.

That updated proposal called for the redevelopment of Broadmoor Tower, an office tower at 5700 Broadmoor St.

The discovery of cell equipment on top of the office building led developers to propose a plan to retrofit the 10-story tower rather than to demolish it.

Still, in August 2026 the planning commission recommended denial of the preliminary development plan for the nearly 650-unit project due to incomplete traffic information and a lack of mixed-use elements.

With updated traffic information and a request to look at the spirit of the project, the city council on Sept. 16 remanded the preliminary development plan to the planning commission for reconsideration.

The planning commission on Sept. 28 in a 4-3 vote pushed forward a recommendation for approval by the city council for the project.

Commissioners who voted in favor of it did so based on the updated information related to traffic and building materials, as well as the project capturing the spirit of the comprehensive plan as it pertains to the mixed-use requirement.

The deviations for the plan are the use of a specific building material that is typically not allowed on structures this tall, and for no mixed-use elements as part of the project itself.

The developer hasn’t indicated how much the monthly rent will be for the apartment units.

Residents still push back

On Wednesday during public comment, eight Mission residents shared opposition to the apartment project plan. No resident shared comments supporting the project that night.

For some like Dylon Sease, the opposition is, in part, because it could impact Mission Gateway’s future. (A Johnson County judge recently cleared the way for the foreclosure sale of Mission Gateway to move forward, and a local developer wants to acquire the site, which has been stalled with false starts for two decades).

Sease said he is worried that approving the Foxridge project, approved without a mixed-use element and under the argument that “retail won’t work,” will set a precedent for developers across the city.

The developer previously argued that the retail along the Johnson Drive corridor captures the spirit of the mixed-use requirement in the city comprehensive plan.

“The next developer won’t need a new argument; they’ll use this one and cite tonight’s vote,” Sease said.

For others like Janet Baggett and Amie O’Connor, who live nearby, the concern is more about the type of development itself.

Baggett said she’s worried about “residential turnover” at the apartments, as well as how the increase in residents will impact public safety and the number of dogs who are taken to Broadmoor Park.

O’Connor, who has lived in Mission for 15 years, said the city’s small town community has “started to evolve to feel less like home” over the past few years.

O’Connor points to apartments as part of that reasoning.

“We don’t need more apartments,” O’Connor said. “People want to put roots down, and people moving into apartments isn’t putting roots down. That’s a temporary housing situation. Most people rent and then move on.”

Council OKs new plan

The city council ultimately approved the preliminary development plan in a 6-1 vote, with Kring casting the dissenting vote.

For Ryherd, she said she wants the community to “be really careful” with conversations regarding people who live in apartments.

“Folks here go to school here, they live here, they vote here, and they have just as much representation and worth of this community,” Ryherd said.

For Haden Chomphosy, a vote approving the preliminary development plan makes no guarantees about exceptions for other project proposals down the road.

Haden Chomphosy said the lack of mixed-use “is honestly not a deal breaker for me,” pointing to the city being “over-retailed.”

Additionally, Haden Chomphosy said she also rejects the ideas that apartment dwellers are “less worthy” or are “more dangerous” than homeowners, as well as the idea that they “don’t want community.”

For Kring, who has been vocally concerned about apartments in the past, her vote against the project is due to the deviations and exemptions related to traffic, the design and the back of the building facing the community.

More than that, Kring said she’s concerned about the residents who are worried about additional people in the area. Kring also questioned where the idea that Mission needs more density comes from.

“I’ve been on here 27 years, we’ve never had a problem with the people who currently live here, I kind of represent them,” Kring said. “Nothing against apartments, but the deviations and the exemptions … one thing after another tells me this is not the right project for Mission, and I will stand my ground. These people (the city council) I respect and I love them, but I’m not voting for this.”

A 5- to 7-year construction timeline

• The developers still need to submit a final development plan to the planning commission for approval, though that will not come back before the city council.
• Developers have said the construction of the entire project is expected to last between five and seven years. No start or finish dates have been announced.

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