By the end of Tuesday’s nearly 3½-hour hearing on the Average Unit-Size Density Incentive Program, one of the few points of agreement between the entire Santa Barbara City Council was that the discussion had been a productive one.
On the agenda was whether and how the city should place restrictions on applications for the contentious housing program, which is meant to encourage the development of smaller, more-affordable workforce housing that is close to public transit, commercial services and parks in a city with a dearth of rental housing and a high cost of living.
The ordinance’s complexity, scope and the neighborhood-compatibility concerns raised by neighbors of proposed developments have all caused the program to be discussed often by the City Council, which initiated a task force in December to collect and analyze data and study how the program can be tweaked to allow it to better adhere to its goals.
Despite the flood of AUD development applications, which add up to over 1,000 units in the development pipeline, the program isn’t indefinite.
Its trial period ends once 250 units in two of its categories — high-density residential and priority housing overlay areas — have received their certificates of occupancy.
City staff expect the 250 mark to be reached sometime between 18 months and two years from now.
State rules bar cities from placing a simple moratorium on housing applications, meaning implementing any restrictions or slow-downs would require a degree of creativity, like shortening the AUD Program’s trial period or referring all AUD applications to the Planning Commission for comments.
With council members Randy Rowse, Gregg Hart and Cathy Murillo dissenting, the council voted 4-3 to ask city staff to prepare an ordinance for the council’s consideration that would cap the number of net new units at 100 per year.
The council, however, would have to muster five yes votes to enact it — something that appeared unlikely Tuesday night.
The stream of residents, developers and city review-board members during the hour and a half of public forum covered the full spectrum of AUD opinions.
Opponents of the program argue that the new developments further aggravate the parking crunch in many neighborhoods, and that AUD residents are unlikely to give up their cars despite proximity to public transit.
Neighborhood compatibility concerns — stemming in large part from the size, bulk and scale of many of the proposed projects — are another chief worry, as is whether the program is actually creating incentives for the development of affordable workforce housing.
The Marc at 3885 State St., the first large-scale AUD project to be completed, straddles the line of what the AUD Program considers affordable.
Greg Reitz of REthink Development, one of the firms behind The Marc, told the council that the 89-unit apartment complex was an unfortunate project to go first; with all the amenities that come with such a big development, he said, its rents would naturally be higher, which in turn gives the impression that other AUD projects would follow suit with their rents.
With so few projects constructed, city planning staff have said that there’s not enough data available to determine whether the program will supply housing for the local workforce.
Several speakers Tuesday contended that the target income range — households earning 120 percent to 200 percent of the area’s median income — is simply too high to achieve that objective.
Another concern, echoed by several of the council members, was that some developers might opt to convert AUD units into short-term rental units.
Councilman Jason Dominguez, the program’s greatest skeptic on the council, said the program was not building affordable housing — a conclusion disputed by some of his colleagues and developers.
Continuing to build during the task force’s work fills in the city with the wrong type of housing, he argued.
“I think there’s a certain segment of the community that feels (a pause) is really urgent,” he said. “That their quality of life, their standard of living is really being threatened by these buildings.”
At the heart of proponents’ arguments is that the program is building much-needed rental housing — even if tweaks are needed.
The program can’t be evaluated if it’s not given the time to construct the units that would be evaluated, several public commenters said.
The housing task force is made up of council members Dominguez, Murillo and Bendy White, along with three planning commissioners and a Housing Authority of Santa Barbara commissioner.
It has been examining AUD changes such as increasing the number of required parking spots for a project, lowering the target income and promoting employer-sponsored condominiums.
Murillo and Hart were insistent that the task force be allowed to collect evidence and conduct its work before any restrictive action is taken.
“There have been different statements of fact in the room tonight that really require us to be sober and responsible and pragmatic,” Hart said. “We have a housing task force, and they’re doing their work. … This is not simple and easy to fix. … It’s not going to be solved tomorrow.”
Assessment fees for Downtown and Old Town business improvement districts
The council also renewed the annual assessment fees levied on businesses within the city’s Downtown and Old Town business-improvement districts.
The fees are collected by the city and remitted to Downtown Santa Barbara, a nonprofit that manages the districts and provides marketing and promotional services for them.
The fees are based on a merchant’s type of business, its location and its business license fee. They generate around $280,000 a year, said Nina Johnson, senior assistant to the city administrator.
Letters were sent out to nearly 1,500 businesses asking if they object to the fee renewal. The council would have to re-evaluate the fees if the protests they receive back constitute a “majority protest” — objections received from business owners who account for at least half of the assessments to be levied.
Johnson said just under 100 did respond with objections, most of whom were in the professional services.
The reasons behind their objections did not have to be submitted, though a couple business owners told the council that the notable number of retail vacancies on State Street meant their own fees might be stretched to cover the marketing and promotional costs.
— Noozhawk staff writer Sam Goldman can be reached at sgoldman@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.