Adoption of Resolution Approving Tentative Map Tract 8534 and Density Bonus Application PLN19-0448 to Subdivide a 1.29-Acre Property into Twelve Lots Located at 2607 to 2619 Santa Clara Avenue and 1514 to 1518 Broadway. (Planning, Building and Transportation 481001)
So yeah and you know for a forever the late Mr. Murphy was certainly concerned about measure a so I think having this project move forward, I would I would think that that he's probably looking down and saying finally. But, you know, that perspective on this project notwithstanding, I do have some concerns about this project. And the concern is this is that this this project is taking advantage of what's called the density bonus ordinance, which is understandable. But I think it's taking advantage of a density bonus ordinance in ways at least the way that the project is currently characterized is taking advantage of the density bonus ordinance in ways that don't meet. The reason why we have the density bonus ordinance in the first place and we have that in the first place, is because the the idea behind the density bonus law is that the building, the construction of affordable housing is so exorbitant such that in order to assist, in order to encourage the development of affordable housing and this project would have a to very low income housing housing in order to encourage that. State law and local law, which has accepted the state law, allows developers to build an additional amount of units on top of what non density local rules allow. So but, but when I look at this project though, there are not the way that is characterized right now. They're not building, they're not constructing very low income housing. What they're doing is they're saying because the Murphy area, the project area has 22 existing residential units right now there are 22 existing residential units. So what they're doing is saying is that two of the existing units will be designated as very low income housing units. And so they're not building two very low income housing units. They're rather designating two units that are already there. So there is no actual costs that are being borne by the by the the developer. Certainly they want to build nine market rate unit houses. So so I understand that. But in order to qualify from my reading of things, in order to qualify for the density bonus, they would have had to have experienced the triggering event that requires them to to, to, requires them to experience before having the getting the bonus and the triggering events is experiencing some kind of costs that's associated with the building of of affordable housing. But because they're not building affordable housing, rather the rather they're designating two units that already exist as very low income housing. I don't see how the project as currently characterized meets the density bonus. Now that's the first part of it, but if you do it in another way, you can actually do the project where you can still come out while my math is 11 actually. But, but let's just accept that nine you can still build nine units if you just simply have the two very low income units as part of the new construction. So two out of the nine oh could be very low income. They have to be newly constructed. My my math is that they're actually eligible for 11, but if they want to go for nine. Okay, that's fine. So if they went that route, I think I think the density bonus law would certainly kick out. So, Mr. Desai, I can remember dislike I, I can see why you pulled this. I'm thinking what might be useful to the entire council and the public who's trying to follow along is to get a brief staff report. I see that we have magically on screen have appeared are planning building and transportation director Andrew Thomas in the fabulous related Tampa Bay City Attorney's office have been working on this project. Let's have for the benefit of all of us that staff report it can be abbreviated and then we will come back to your clarifying questions and probably those of other council members in any public comments we have. But before you go too far into your concerns, I wanted to just have a chance to to allow staff to give their report. Yes. If I could just say for 10 seconds, though, and I also have apprized staff of my concerns also. So they're they're very well aware of how I'm framing my concerns. Thank you. That is only one of my concerns. But you've got nine more seconds. Go ahead, don't you, then? Very economical. You've got 5 seconds left now. We have more time of your clock. Okay, Mr. Thomas, may we hear from you and Ms.. Chan? Chime in whenever. Whenever you deem appropriate. So please. Thank you, Mayor. As the Ashcraft. Can you hear me? Yeah, that's. That's good. Here you go. It's a 1.29 acre parcel. It has 22 units already on the land occupied within 11 buildings under state density bonus. This project could actually get up to 35 units. In this case, they are only asking to build nine for a total of 31, the nine plus the 22 that already exist under state density bonus . If the developer makes two units available for very low income households. And what that means is a permanent deed restriction. So essentially what they're doing is council member they Saugus. Correct. They're taking two existing housing units that already exist but are market rate with no caps on on permissible rent. And they will be they will be deed restricted to be affordable to very low income households in perpetuity. And that will be managed and supervised by the Alameda Housing Authority. So they could actually do as Councilmember de Sau correctly pointed out, they could do more than nine units, but in this case, they've chosen only to do nine . So they do qualify for the density bonus and you don't have to build new units for those very low, you just have to make. The two units available to. Very well with that I'll. If I'm available to answer any questions I think Selena chan would like to add. Is Ms.. Chen. Just go ahead and mute. Thank you. See you. You as well. Good evening, Mayor. Council members. I just wanted to clarify. State law requires a deed restriction for the two units for a minimum of 55 years. Andrew, are you aware? I can't remember off the top of my head what our inclusionary ordinance requires. But if it's longer than 55 years, then obviously it would be that that longer term. But yeah, I just wanted to make that clarification. I can't. Hear. What was the clarification, Andrew? Is our city. So state law requires a 55 year? Yeah. Under state law, it's a 55 year deed restriction. The which of course, they will have. The way it works here in Alameda is that it's a rolls. So essentially when the when whenever it changes hands or the tenant changes, it goes for another 55 years. So essentially an Alameda ends up being sort of in perpetuity. Okay. I see how you're using in perpetuity. Okay. So so every time there's a new tenant, we just set the clock back. The. The. But in this case, I mean, the key point here just in response to Councilmember De Sox question, state law does not require that it be than two new units. It can be provision of just two units. Examples under state law, for example, you can get a density bonus under state law, even for a condominium conversion of an existing apartment building. So the concept of making existing units affordable to very low or low income households is something that's embedded in the state law itself. And I might observe that it is one of the most economical ways around to provide housing to very low income category because it doesn't require any construction. From from SAP's perspective, we also like this approach because it's to two units immediately into our affordable housing. Cool. We don't have to wait for them to be constructed. It's also in this case. So an effort was made to identify existing tenants who were already in the units who already qualified. So we will not be displacing anyone as what as well. So it's in this in this particular case, it's working out quite nicely. Will these units count toward our Rina requirements? Yes. All right. Thank you. Back to you, Councilmember De. So did you have further concerns? Okay. I'm sorry, what did you say? I just said let others matter. Okay. Very good. Okay. Does anyone, madam, click. Do we have any public comment? We have one speaker. When? Speaker. Okay, before we hear our public speaker, did we have any other clarifying questions from the council? Councilmember Spencer. Thank you. Dr. Thomas, could you clarify the two existing units where the tenants are going to carry through what those units are like? How old are they for? Are they one bedroom? Can you describe the two sustained units? Yes, I believe they're both one bedroom units. The final the way this the way that the entitlements are structured, the property developers and owners need to execute an affordable housing agreement with the city of Alameda before they do the final map or pull a building permit. So all the details have not been fully negotiated yet, which is standard at this stage of the game. But I believe and I can get confirmation on that during before hopefully somebody will text me the answer to that question. But I believe it's to single family homes. I mean, excuse me, two, one bedroom units that are being proposed. All right. And could you also speak to the parking of it's going to be at this development. Yeah. Founded the the the applicant in this case was eligible for. Yes. It's two one bedroom. I the magic of text just arrived. So there's two one bedroom units. In this case, the developers were eligible to waive the parking requirements under state density bonus, but they chose to provide two parking split and maintain existing parking for all the 22 units. The existing parking supply of the exists for the existing and then for the new nine units provide two spaces per unit. Okay. And were there any concerns from the neighbors, any letters from the neighbors or opposition from the neighbors? I believe we received at the planning board, we received a letter from one of the existing tenants who was concerned about the. Who is concerned about the loss of the tennis courts as far as areas for recreating the nine units are being built on basically on land that had been developed by the former property owners, the Murphys as well for two tennis courts and and a basketball court. So that's where the nine units are going there in the interior of the block. They're not facing the street, so they're behind the existing homes. And one of the tenants was concerned about the loss of those tennis courts. The planning board and the applicants work together to make the new common open space. There are some internal courtyards and and and common areas for tenants to to recreate and have outdoor space. And that space will be available to the tenants of the existing units as well. And do you know if any of the new units will have balconies or outside space for just their family? Yes, they will. Thank you. Okay. Any further? No. Okay. So if there are no further clarifying questions from council, we have one public speaker, is that correct? Ms. WEISBERGER. Now we have to. Now. We have two adjacent public speakers have to attend a bid of 3 minutes each. So let's have our first public speaker. Zach BOLLING. Good evening, Mr. BOLLING. I just quickly now, I followed this project through a planning board, and I like this proposal a little bit better than some of the earlier designs that were put up, and that. It's a great use of some underutilized space, these two. Tennis courts underutilized. And to put housing, there is a good boon for us, especially with our our arena allocation that we have to deal with, which is something that is staring us in the face that we have to deal with. These units are going to help in any way possible and the two affordable units will are greatly appreciated. And that's what I think. You and Speaker. Jay Garfinkel. Mr. Garfinkel. Hello. I would ask you to clarify. Are all of the existing units owned by a single party? Well, the they are. And so the developer doesn't have to specifically buy or pay for the two units that are going to be converted to low income. That's one question. The other is, will this count as nine market rate and too affordable for the Reno County? Thank you. Thank you. Chris, this is public comment, not Q&A. But I think the. Answer. Is, well, if you Mr. Thomas, if you wanted. Yeah. Just real quick. Yes, we will get for the arena. We'll get nine new units plus two new. Not they're not new units, but two affordable units which were not affordable prior to approving the project. So. And then the applicant all the all the the 22 existing units in the 11 existing buildings are all sitting on one large parcel. This is a tentative map. So what this is doing is it's creating 11 parcels for the 11 existing buildings and then a 12th parcel, which is the tennis courts parcel, which will be the nine. The nine townhomes will be on the 12th parcel. Thank you, Mr. Thomas. All right. We've had public comment. We've had, I think, council questions. Do we have a motion? Councilmember Knox. Slate I'm going to make a motion and I'm going to watch his head when he starts shaking his head. No, I'm going off. So I'm going to make one comment as I'm making my motion. My motion. My understanding is we are approving a tentative map of the density bonus application, and neither of these are tied to the development plan that was made that has been approved. And that actually we can't say we don't like what the project looks like in denying either one of these things that they are a separate thing. So given that this is almost ministerial, we just have to find that our staff, professional staff, legal and planning have reviewed the density bonus application correctly and come to the proper thing. I'm going to move approval to density bonus application and the tentative map as proposed by Salkeld. All right. We have a motion to have a second. Vice Mayor. Bill, I see your second. All right, we've had a motion, a second matter of May. We have a roll call vote, please. Councilmember de SAG. No. Not quite. Yes. Spencer. Do we get to discuss the motion after they make the motion? Oh, sure we do. Okay, let's. Yes, the motion is the same one that's been before as it hasn't been amended. But let's discuss. Why don't we start with you, council member Spencer. Thank you. Going back to Director Tallman, while I understand the motion. I just want it it sounds like there are already plans to add it to include some sort of balconies or outside areas per house. And as much as I appreciate that, that may not be enough. So so I'm I plan to support this if that is happening, because for me, here we are in a pandemic. I think it is important that people have some sort of private areas for their family. And I think it's so. So that's what I'm looking for. And then I do and I also appreciate the during the parking spaces and then that the neighbors seem to be supportive. Thank you, Councilor Spencer. Any further discussion? Okay. So hearing no further discussion and I'll just throw in I think this is a great project as well and it adds more well needed housing as has been noted. So I think that you got partway through the the roll call. Madam Clerk, I know you know where you are. Here, Spencer. Yes. Because that's where it is. Yeah. Bella. I may or as the Ashcroft I that carries by four eyes one now. Wonderful. Thank you, everyone. Okay. Thank you so much, Mr. Thomas. Mr. Chan, nice to see you. Okay, so moving on, we have we come to item five our. Final passage of ordinance authorizing the city manager to execute lease amendments for rent relief programs to Rockwall Winery and St George Spirits to the Loan Conversion Assistance Program for rent relief in response to the COVID 19 pandemic.