After more than a decade of planning, many revisions and several changes in local government, The Towbes Group Inc. is one step closer to getting its Sumida Gardens project on the ground near Old Town Goleta.
“We’re thrilled,” Towbes Group president Craig Zimmerman said after the Goleta City Council voted 4-1 to approve the workforce rental housing project Monday night. “There are going to be 200 units out there.”
Sumida Gardens, located at 5505-5585 Overpass Road, is the largest workforce housing project to advance in the housing-crunched community in decades.
The apartment complex, to be located on a roughly 10-acre lot northwest of the intersection of Patterson and Hollister avenues, is in the city’s Redevelopment Project Area. Eight two-story buildings and one three-story building will accommodate the 200 units, 34 of which are earmarked for very low-, low- and moderate-income households. All units would be subject to a 55-year moratorium on condo conversions. The project also includes passive and active recreation areas, and Overpass Road, which winds along the north and west side of the property, would be extended to connect with Hollister, with a signal light installed at the intersection.
The project received strong community support, including from workforce housing advocates and business leaders who said the added housing would give commuters a chance to live where they worked while helping local businesses retain workers who might otherwise leave because of the high cost and scarcity of housing.
“Our biggest challenge is recruitment and retention of staff related to the cost of housing in this community,” said Diane Wisby, vice president of Goleta Valley Cottage Hospital. “I know the council is committed to having a hospital in their city and we can only do that if we have staff who live and work here.”
Even neighbors of the proposed project were happy to see the plans advance.
“I guess that you could call us an IMBY,” commented a representative of St. Raphael’s Church, playing on the “Not In My Backyard” attitude that often accompanies local development projects. Although the extension of Overpass Road would directly affect traffic patterns into and out of the church and school property, church officials were willing to work with the developers to address safety and security concerns.
Plans to put apartments on the site go back to the 1990s, and have changed and cleared hurdles ever since. The original plan approved by the county was to build 176 units, all affordable, but that proposal failed for lack of zoning clearances. Seven years later, the number of planned units rose to 200, but the number of affordably priced units fell to 100 — 50 percent of the total number of units.
This year, a General Plan amendment request — since withdrawn — made by Towbes Group to eliminate any inclusionary housing for rentals could have taken any affordable housing out of the project. That action was prevented by state law that requires at least 15 percent of housing units in a project in a redevelopment area to be affordable. Increases in construction costs made a larger inclusionary rate less feasible, Zimmerman said.
Not everyone was completely satisfied with the outcome of the evening, however.
“My problem is that I’m just not certain that we’re receiving the proper benefit in terms of the number of affordable units for the (subsidies) that we’re giving,” said Councilwoman Jonny Wallis, the lone vote of dissent on the council. The city is kicking in about $6.8 million to subsidize the development, roughly half of which comes from developer fees and funds designated for housing. About $3.7 million will come from tax increment rebates over the next 20 to 26 years, during which time, said Wallis, the Redevelopment Agency would have a significantly weaker position from which to leverage funds for other projects.
Added to that, she said, would be interest paid on the $3.7 million debt assumed by the city that would add another $4 million in the long run, bringing the total obligation of the city to about $11 million.
The Goleta City Council/Planning Agency continued the public hearing to Nov. 19 when it will make its redevelopment funding decision for the project. If all goes smoothly for Towbes Group, construction could begin by the end of the year.