HLC Housing Agenda Blog

Threshold 2008 releases findings from countywide assembly on housing

The Threshold 2008 civic engagement organization has issued a press release on its findings from the San Mateo County-wide assembly on housing choices, held the weekend of March 15-16. The findings are very encouraging. Here’s the top-level statement:

An unprecedented scientific random sample of 238 San Mateo County residents deliberated for two days on housing solutions at Threshold 2008’s Countywide Assembly on Housing Choices. More than two-thirds of the participants believe that more housing needs to be created in the county.

As an observer of the assembly, and a speaker on one of the panels, I can attest that the participants were highly engaged. Above all, they appreciated being asked their opinion, having a chance to engage in dialogue with fellow residents, and to participate in the “Deliberative Polling” process.

We’ll continue to report on the results as we have a chance to review them in more detail. Maybe we’ll even give our own answers to some of the questions asked of the expert panels by the small breakout groups at the assembly. Finally, we’ll also publicize the upcoming online dialogue sponsored by Threshold.

– Chris Mohr

Posted in News, Threshold | No Comments »

Regions tiff over Prop. 1C bond funds

California voters approved the Prop. 1C housing bond measure in November 2006. The State of California’s Housing and Community Development Department (HCD) is gradually rolling out funding. Details are available on their website at http://www.hcd.ca.gov/fa/bonds.html.

Today the Los Angeles Times reports that Southern California officials are feeling left out in the funding awards. Funds have not been distributed geographically in the same proportion as population.

Advocates for affordable housing in Northern California said their area has its own housing crisis.
“There needs to be more funding in all parts of the state,” said Paul Peninger, policy director of the Non-Profit Housing Assn. of Northern California. He said the state should evaluate the funding formulas after the first rounds of funding to see if any portion of the state was shorted.
There clearly is not enough money to go around. For the $95 million in transit-oriented projects, for example, applications totaled $544 million, including $247 million from Southern California and $297 million from Northern California.

The full story is online here.

Meanwhile, the State Housing and Community Development Director, Lynn Jacobs, has embarked on a series of statewide consultation meetings to explore ideas for a permanent source of state funding for housing. The HCD website has a section dedicated to the topic of a dedicated revenue source: http://www.hcd.ca.gov/permsource/. Stay tuned for locally relevant meeting information.

Posted in Housing finance, News | No Comments »

News from the south

News from Santa Clara County, that is — The Mercury News today reports, “Developers drop plan for San Jose’s Coyote Valley.” Joshua Molina writes, “After spending five years and $17 million, developers who dreamed of building 25,000 homes in San Jose’s pristine Coyote Valley have abruptly abandoned their controversial venture.”

Here’s the full article.

Posted in News | No Comments »

Threshold III: Strategies

Sunday afternoon the Threshold 2008 countywide assembly on housing issues concluded with a panel discussion of four possible strategies:

1. Streamline the development process
2. Inclusionary housing
3. Dedicated public funding
4. Process for public consultation

I was on the panel that answered the following questions from the small groups. Note that the questions were clustered around themes, so they were taken out of order. The numbers indicate which small group asked the question; participants stayed in the same group throughout the weekend.

Last note: KGO-TV7 was there with a reporter and camera, so they may have it on the news. I’ll post a link if I find one.

SUNDAY AFTERNOON PLENARY QUESTIONS
Panelists:Duane Bay, Chris Wuthmann, Robert Sherrard, Debbi Jones-Thomas, Pete Peterson, Chris Mohr

6. How will the aging population impact housing policy?
22. What about options such as rent control, co-ops or shared housing, in-law apartments, nontraditional entities?
1. How do limitations on zoning affect price and affordability?
8. What are the pros and cons of inclusionary housing in different cities?
25. If permitting were streamlined, could more than 15% of the units be below-market rate?
15. When there is inclusionary housing, why isn’t it part of the development?
4. How realistic are the following sources: surcharge on public transportation or the diamond lane, car dealers, oil subsidies?
9. Are there local, state, or federal financing opportunities for individuals to get tax credits, like the old tax credits?
19. How can we organize to create dedicated funds to go to nonprofits to help build senior and disabled housing?
11. What possibilities are there for a public or private partnership for a housing land trust like POST? And what can be done to educate the public about the housing issue in accessible ways?
17. Could we use the interest from renters security deposits? (No.)
16. Where is the funding coming from now?
14. Are homeowners association costs adjusted for the below-market rate units? How are maintenance costs adjusted?
10. How can we improve the permit approval process and add more “peer review” from the public?
23. Are only homeowners receiving notice? (Yes, though some cities send to “occupant” as well.)
15. Regarding public involvement, they post notices at city hall, put notices in the paper, or send to a mailing list. How can the process of participation and notice be improved?
18. What are some other ways to engage the public in ways they can have an effect?
2. How’s the public process? In what concrete ways can these be enhanced?
12. What are the ways to increase public consultation given limited funds?
5. How can we build a permanent process with informed consultation? And what is the effect of the collapse of the housing market on affordable housing?
3. What are the costs of engagement, and could community colleges and universities help bring people together?
29. What are the long-term costs of consultation?
23. Could we use commercial space that is not currently occupied?
14. Which of the four strategies (streamline the process, inclusionary housing, dedicated public revenue, public consultation) are in use and how are they working?
__. How can we be sure this results in the kind of housing we want to see?
__. All four strategies are required, with special attention to public consultation.
20. How can we create a regional economic organization with the ability to coordinate planning across counties?
26. How can we be sure the proposals we make will be heard?
21. The experts seem generally satisfied with the process. What incentives do the experts have to change what’s happening?

Posted in News, Threshold | No Comments »

Threshold continues: Questions from Saturday afternoon plenary

Following up from my previous post about the Threshold civic engagement process:

SATURDAY AFTERNOON PLENARY
Panelists: Peter Ingram, Fran Wagstaff, Audrey Rust, Don Weden, Gary Patton, Duane Bay

I missed the first part because I got interviewed by the filmmaker who’s shooting the weekend.

• What are the state directives for affordable housing?
• How can average citizens get involved in this complicated issue and bring a human, non-lobbyist view into the process?
• If we can judge a society by how it treats its young and its elders, what would that say about us?
• Since a growing part of the population is seniors, what’s being done to accommodate them?
• How severe is the water problem? And if it’s that severe, isn’t this discussion academic?
• How feasible is it to distribute the growth outside the 101/El Camino corridor?
• Since high ownership rates correlate with better maintenance and lower crime, how can you be sure that concentrating affordable housing on the corridor won’t lead to classism and other disparities?
• How are existing affordable housing developments doing? What’s working?
• Have studies shown if San Mateo County workers who live elsewhere would want to live in high-density housing?
• If we increase transit, and increase units to make transit more effective, how do we educate people about the money-saving benefits of transit?
• There’s an endless cycle of job growth chasing housing growth and so on. What are the most aggressive incentives and disincentives that we could apply to reach whatever balance we want?
• Why bring in workers from other counties? What’s the difference between wages here and the income of residents? Can we provide incentives to live here and work here?
• What incentives are there to hire local residents?
• What different kinds of jobs will be created between now and 2025? What kinds of jobs are leaving the county?
• How do we equitably resolve rights of property owners and the larger community?
• How feasible is it to develop underused land? Public land?
• Corporations pay a lower rate for property tax; what if they had to pay the differential for affordable housing?
• How can we incentivize affordable housing?
• Any chance we could buy some of the vacant housing for affordable housing?
• If different types of households have different needs, what’s the impact on housing vs. commercial development?
• How does high-density development affect the environment? Schools?
• Is there an optimal mix of housing for San Mateo County? Eg rental, townhome, condo, single family.
• How do we better educate people about the importance of this issue?
• How can this group learn what’s going on and when?

Don Weden suggested contacting City Hall by phone or email to find out when Housing Element hearings will be. Excellent suggestion!

My personal suggestion: Check back on the HLC website at www.hlcsmc.org! And subscribe to this blog’s news feed.

Posted in News, Threshold | No Comments »

We have liftoff: Threshold 2008 assembly is under way

Today the Threshold 2008 civic engagement process got under way, with the launch of the two-day countywide assembly at Canada College. We’ve blogged it before; and the Almanac News website carried a brief item about it from the local wire service today.

Lenore Wilkas scooped us today with her post, San Mateo County Has Opened the Dialogue About Affordable Housing. Read it! It’s a great summary of the first day’s events.

Since Lenore already outlined the day, I decided to type up my notes from the questions posed by the small groups to the plenary panels of experts. There were 26 groups the first time around, and almost as many in the second plenary. So I’ll split them across two posts.

THRESHOLD SATURDAY MORNING PLENARY

Panelists: Peter Ingram, Karyl Eldridge, Marisa Espinosa, Lennie Roberts, Bruce Liedstrand, Paul Powers

1. Why not convert existing unused commerical buildings and hotels to housing?

2. What are realistic options for improving transportation? What are the challenges?

3. To create a vibrant community, resources are needed. Do we have what’s needed?

4. By rezoning areas as high-density without building in the open space, can we meet the need?

5. Some don’t buy the basic premise. Why do we assume new housing development is inevitable?

6. What’s a reasonable square footage and lot size? How does California compare with other areas?

7. What would help us convert existing vacant land to affordable housing?

8. What constitutes affordable housing?

9. Since it has an economic role, why is agricultural land even mentioned?

10. Who would pay for the land? Who would decide? Where will it be?

11. When is enough enough? What’s the carrying capacity of the county? What does sustainable growth look like?

12. How can San Mateo County control growth and improve the current standard of living?

13. What is “undeveloped land”? Can it reasonably be used for housing?

14. How do state, local, and county governments work together on this?

15. What are the consequences and opportunities we need to address to balance jobs and housing?

16. How can we supply the infrastructure and services needed for affordable housing and maintain quality of life? Where else have they done this?

17. Transportation is key to smart housing growth. What type of collaborative transportation projets are planned with other counties?

18. Has anyone ever tried countywide zoning?

19. What philanthropic organizations are working to acquire land for housing?

20. There is poor transit away from the local transit corridors. Can we connect better to them, as well as to the Central and Salinas Valleys?

21. Who would enforce the affordable housing so it goes to the people who need it?

22. How do we define open space? If it’s preserved, how can we even talk about it?

23. Who pays for the infrastructure?

24. Where are the open spaces that are available and efficient to develop?

25. What fraction of commuters from the East Bay would move to San Mateo County if they could afford it?

26. If we could build more housing, what’s the plan for people who earn $30,000 to $50,000 a year to buy a house?

Posted in News, Threshold | No Comments »

Rents increasing, even as home prices falling

Which way is the housing market headed?

It all depends on your city, the type of home, and whether you rent or own.

A story last month by Carolyn Said in the San Francisco Chronicle covered a study by Zillow that illustrated ZIP code illustrated the housing market with a “heat chart” that shows southern San Mateo County continuing to appreciate, with the market cooling off toward the north.

Today the Examiner has a story by Katie Worth on Low-wage earners being forced out of county. The fact is that home sales have slowed with the increasing difficulty faced by borrowers to get financing. As a result, rents have gone up as more people stay in the rental market and compete for the limited supply:

“Bruce Hamilton, executive director of the nonprofit HIP Housing [and president of HLC’s Board of Directors], said his program is finding that low-wage earners are getting hit hard.”

HLC advocates for the creation of homes at all affordability levels. A more balanced market would provide opportunities for homes that people who work and grow up in San Mateo County can afford to own or rent at various stages of life, from just starting out through raising a family to retirement.

Posted in Housing need, News | No Comments »

Threshold civic engagement project in the news again

Today the San Mateo Daily News highlighted the upcoming countywide assembly on housing issues, organized by the Threshold 2008 civic engagement project:
Citizens debate housing crunch by Will Oremus.

In the interest of full disclosure, Threshold’s executive director, Greg Greenway, is a member of the HLC board of directors. (We’ll have more news about the HLC board soon, by the way!)

Posted in About HLC, News, Threshold | No Comments »

Threshold 2008 civic engagement effort in the news

Today the Examiner ran a story previewing the Threshold 2008 civic engagement effort. It kicks off this coming weekend with a two-day “countywide assembly” for 400 people, chosen to represent a statistically valid sample of San Mateo County’s demographics.

When Damien Frank went home shopping in 2005, his needs were simple: a modest house where he and his wife could raise their three children and where he could be near the Redwood City-based job he loves.

“I want to spend my career working for the county, but I don’t want to spend the rest of my career commuting, because the traffic is only going to get worse,” he said….

An effort called Threshold 2008 is getting under way this month to get the voices of ordinary people heard in the county’s housing decisions.

You can read the is full article here, complete with quotes from HLC.

Posted in News, Threshold | No Comments »

Seminar on affordable homes in Millbrae

Tonight you can learn about purchasing a below-market rate home in the 88 South Broadway development in Millbrae. That’s the big new development on El Camino Real, nearly kitty corner from the BART/CalTrain station. The seminar is at the Community Center, 477 Lincoln Circle, Millbrae, 7:30-8:30 pm.

Here’s the event announcement:

88 South Broadway Informational Workshop

Sponsored by HomeBricks, an affiliate of BRIDGE Housing, and the City of Millbrae.

Posted in Events | No Comments »