Kilgore City Council approves rezoning for new housing

KILGORE, Texas (KLTV) - Badly needed new housing could be on the way to an East Texas city.

Several sections of Kilgore are already marked for, or already underway with new housing construction, and for good reason.

“Kilgore Economic Development Corporation has brought in hundreds and hundreds of jobs. And we’ve had no place for people to live. We’ve had a real shortage of housing here,” says Bill Woodall with the City of Kilgore.

The plan: Open up tracts for development.

“Right now we have either under construction or on the drawing board, about 300 new housing units,” Woodall says.

City council approved re-platting and rezoning of areas, for new housing.

“We’ve got some single-family homes going on, we’ve got duplexes going up,” says Bill.

The old Kilgore bus station is being renovated for retail on the bottom and apartments upstairs.

Longview and Lantrip streets were re-platted for planned duplexes.

Birdsong Street and Stone Road rezoned for housing.

“We have plans for a 192 unit apartment complex. Our infrastructure is in great shape. We’re ready for 300 new housing units,” says Woodall.

New housing good news for business owners.

“When there’s new homes being built in our town we see business booming,” says Kilgore Mercantile owner Vivian Gebhardt.

And good news for the city.

“I would call it a boom. For a town this size, population 15.000, to have 300 new units is a phenomenal number,” Bill says.

Though new home construction nationwide fell by two percent last month, three Texas cities are among the top ten in new home construction: Dallas, Houston, and Austin.

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