The biggest recent change in plans for Steel City Terrace’s proposed redevelopment is that construction will begin on the site instead of in the surrounding neighborhood.

That means residents of Steel City, Farrell, will have to be moved much sooner than anticipated.

The project calls for demolishing the Steel City public housing units and building new public housing units, market-rate rental apartments and homes for sale on Steel City property and lots bought in the neighborhood.

The authority had hoped to build off-site first, but property could not be acquired quickly enough to meet Friday’s deadline for applications to the Pennsylvania Housing Finance Agency. The agency is being asked to provide a large chunk of first-phase financing.

The new plan is to have 45 apartments open on the site at any one time, said Mercer County Hope 6 coordinator Frank Gargiulo. Just how many people will have to be relocated will be known later on.

Eighty-five apartments are occupied at Steel City and no more are being rented.

Of the 85 families, 70 include school-aged children. The authority likely will give families a preference to stay in Farrell during construction, said Executive Director L. DeWitt Boosel.

About 25 families will have to be moved from Steel City for the first phase, although not all at once.

The school district wants to retain as many students as it can and many residents have said they want their children to stay in Farrell schools.

There are 150 school-age children in Steel City, and losing them would take a large bite out of an enrollment of less than 1,200.

Boosel said the authority has had an ongoing dialogue with the school district, but no specifics have been settled.

While some apartments in other authority developments in Farrell will be able to absorb a small number of those displaced by construction -- there are four vacancies -- most of the residents will receive Section 8 vouchers that give them federal subsidies to live in buildings owned by private landlords.

The federal government will give the authority 70 new Section 8 vouchers, Gargiulo said.

With Section 8 vouchers, residents will be able to move anywhere in the United States into apartments that meet federal guidelines.

Some apartments owned by the 66 landlords in Farrell who accept Section 8 vouchers may open up, and the authority will try to recruit more landlords, Boosel said.

"I don’t think it’s going to be as severe as some people are expecting," Boosel said of relocation.

Boosel said finishing the plan and the hiring of a support services coordinator, who will meet with each resident and assess their relocation needs, could both occur in January.

Once the relocation plan is in place, the authority will pay to move residents.

Even though construction would begin in the fall at the earliest, Duane Hampton encouraged Gargiulo to move people out as soon as possible, so that suitable arrangements can be made without the wrecking ball looming overhead. Hampton is property manager of Hope 6 apartments in the Manchester section of Pittsburgh.