Birch Creek Apartments

O’Brien & Company worked with the King County Housing Authority (KCHA) on the major renovation of an entire development of income-qualified duplex and tri-plex residential units in Kent.  Amenities include a food bank, a youth center with recreation and youth programs, Head Start classes and a computer lab, and the Kent Family Center with a career development center, wellness education, ESL and citizenship classes.  O’Brien & Company provided green certification analysis to determine the potential challenges and benefits of certification of the project under ENERGY STAR, Green Communities, Built Green and LEED for Homes.  The firm also facilitated an eco-charrette to help KCHA set green project goals and objectives and to identify and gain support from the project team for appropriate green strategies to meet the various goals and objectives.  O’Brien & Company also ran multiple performance scenarios to determine the most effective strategies to achieve better-than-code building envelope performance and compare different heating strategies for long-term cost of ownership savings.