Developers of Encore, a 30-acre urban redevelopment project located between downtown Tampa and Ybor City, believe they are on the fast track to getting up to $38 million in federal stimulus dollars to move construction forward.

Tampa city officials, the Tampa Housing Authority and Banc of America Community Development Corp. applied for money from the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's Neighborhood Stabilization Program 2 last month that would provide $28 million to Encore's infrastructure.

"We are in a great position to receive these funds,” said Leroy Moore senior vice president and chief operating officer of the Tampa Housing Authority, in a release. "Encore is shovel-ready, has the support of a strong public/private partnership, and will directly impact the local economy of the fourth largest city in the state.”

Banc of America CDC is financially backing Encore and has already developed similar downtown projects in Charlotte, N.C.; Miami, Jacksonville, Orlando, Baltimore and other cities.

The CDC has invested $3.4 million in pre-development and site preparation for Encore, according to development officials. The Housing Authority has invested $4.9 million in relocation, demolition, remediation and supportive services for the relocated families who lived in housing units that were razed in 2007.

The project, which was initially cited as costing $800 million, was originally supposed to include a five-story office building and a number of mixed-income residential structures, some as high as nine stories. Current plans are to construct apartments, offices, a hotel, grocery and other retail space, along with the inclusion of a middle school, a church, a park and an African-American history museum to be housed in a 90-year-old church within walking distances of a planned regional light rail terminal.

Original Central Park Village residents would have first shot at new units as long as they abide by the lease terms set forth through their Section 8 housing vouchers, officials said.

The project construction is expected to create more than 4,000 jobs, with 1,000 of them being permanent, officials said.

In January, Tampa Mayor Pam Iorio detailed 30 projects in the city that could use funding under the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 that would cost $695 million and create more than 5,300 jobs, including the Encore project.

"Though it is not a city of Tampa project and will not be constructed by our staff, it is important that we obtain funding for this needed infrastructure so that the project can move forward and we can offer affordable housing and positive redevelopment for the Central Park area of our city,” Iorio said in a letter to Congresswoman Kathy Castor, D-Tampa, at the time.