OMAHA — In the making for five years, the first phase of the “affordable” Bluestem Prairie neighborhood has wrapped up, and Habitat for Humanity of Omaha on Tuesday celebrated what it calls a “milestone” occasion.

Nonprofit Habitat said its $29 million Bluestem Prairie — built on the site of the former and notoriously troubled Wintergreen apartments — is the largest development in its 40-year history. Typically a builder of 10 or fewer home clusters, Habitat believes the venture to be the largest nonprofit affordable homeownership project in Nebraska’s largest city.The first wave of newly constructed homes at the roughly 15-acre North Omaha site near 52nd Street and Sorenson Parkway connects 85 families to homeownership. Another 15 homes in the area were renovated.

Ground preparation and infrastructure for the second Bluestem phase is underway. Construction of those 64 homes is expected to begin next year. Habitat CEO Amanda Brewer said it’s widely known that homeownership makes a difference in a family’s quality of life, health and education. She said it was unimaginable early on that a homeownership project of that scale could materialize.

“This land that was out of commission for so long, vacant, abandoned and overrun with weeds, trees and dumping — it seemed impossible,” she said. “But what seemed impossible, not just difficult but impossible, happened. It gives you renewed faith.”

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