Menlo Park

The Menlo Park city council convened to discuss whether or not to issue an RFQ for building affordable housing on their parking lots, as they committed to in their housing element. It was a very long and contentious meeting, with almost exactly equal commenters for and against. The main opposition are the local business owners downtown, who were upset at the loss of parking, after the construction and during construction.

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The Council decided to release the RFQ, but not declare the parking lots as surplus. We are not sure what this means exactly, but we will be watching closely.

HCD told them that they didn't do their re-zoning correctly, but only required small changes. They should get re-certified soon.

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County grand jury has recently found that ADU-heavy housing-element strategies are bad. TBD whether the grand jury finding will matter to HCD.

Three general policy changes were discussed:

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1. Rezoning: previous draft relied on rezoning primarily in the North Fair Oaks to meet the county's RHNA affordable quota. Housing advocates provided public comment urging the board to expand rezoning to also include higher opportunity neigborhoods. Supervisor started the conversation in firm support for this effort, and Pine and Corzo backed him up. Mueller suggested the Board not weigh in on the issues and essentially let the planning department work it out, which was met with criticism

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1. Tenant protections: Corzo and Pine have been working on a tenant protection ordinance to strengthen just cause standards and explore options of a rental registry, etc. Advocates called on the county to incorporate these updates into the housing element. The county attorney provided clarification to the board that the housing element would have supremacy over an ordinance, and any future ordinance would need to comply with the element. The board generally agreed that since the ordinance is already in the works, there was no need to further slow down the element drafting process by incorporating tenant protections

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Housing for special needs: Board discussed a number of options that would strengthen the element's language regarding supportive/accessible housing. One such revision they seemed in favor of regarding lowering minimum parking requirements for housing for disabled individuals. The board agreed that that policy "made sense." 

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The Board ultimately pushed final decisions on these measures to the next meeting. The Board also discussed how the supervisors intended to allocate their Measure K money, but I didn't stick around for that. 

https://sanmateocounty.legistar.com/View.ashx?M=A&ID=998929&GUID=0D46FA6C-A477-4001-8780-87E9B4ED1E73&G=1088EC25-A43A-408F-A57C-73C0A70269AB

It was a general public study session where feedback was provided to support more affordable housing in our city in support of state laws

William Gibson - presented on (reduced) constraints, concerns from community re housing, HE goals, # of pipeline projects and ADUS. Commissioner comments. Inappropriate parcels should be identified directly to him. 

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Comments by Green Foothills, community members, including advocate for senior housing and advocates against sprawl. Commenters focused on the numbers being high and incorrect assumptions (e.g. ADUs = housing and all vacant SFH lots will be built out).

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Commission voted to submit as-is to the Board of Supervisors (did not respond to any of the public comments). 

Staff reviewed the housing element draft with housing and planning commission. Draft was released just last week and was over 700 pages. Mostly the comments were positive from commissioners, asking to elaborate or strengthen certain strategies, however not much commitment was made by staff besides coming up with a master calendar of all of the policies/strategies and timelines so that it would be easier to re-prioritize the list. Some commissioners wanted to accelerate displacement assistance, for example. Some commissioners expressed skepticism over the use of office parking lots as sites but staff did not seem inclined to amend any of the sites zoning or strengthen any policy in particular. Expecting more of a lively discussion at city council (ETA 5/31) where folks will have had more time to digest the report. 

One commissioner asked for an alternative with less parking. Otherwise it was just clarifying questions.

On the negative side, commissioner Barnes asked if the EIR could analyze negative impacts on schools (answer was no).  Commissioner Riggs thinks we should only plan for people who already live in Menlo Park, and although he didn't say so, he meant people in Menlo Park who already have housing stability.  On the positive side, the most notable comment was from Commissioner DeCardy, who said he would not vote to approve an EIR that does not study the alternative of  "massively reduced parking" because "parking is a disaster for housing; it's a disaster for the embedded carbon in concrete."   In addition, commissioner Harris asked about the positive environmental impact of infill housing (response was that CEQA doesn't recognize positive impacts). She also objected to the EIR consultant referring to the maximum number of units they are studying as a "worst case" scenario.

Here's a summary. 

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 Council approved the HE (which targets the rhna number plus a 30% buffer but also heavily relies on Mullin densities) 

 Plus some additional density and mixed use incentives. 

 Looking into increasing BMR to 20%,they say studies show it's supported and that's what other cities in the area are doing. 

 Did not consider reducing parking minimums or ministerial approval :( (this was recommended in the staff report)

 Also voted to study downzoning D1 and adding the capacity elsewhere. This is coming from an equity perspective since previous council upzoned D1 and not the other neighborhoods, therefore giant high rise apt buildings are going up near Facebook and Belle Haven. I am ambivalent about this because the only way this seems doable given HE deadlines is they want to squeeze the downzoned units (die to sb330) into what's already in the HE. no additional units otherwise it's a significant revision of HE and city risks missing deadline.

 Also voted to consider buying or zoning 10 acres of usgs for a school. Separate from HE. 2 acres of USGS already zoned for housing per HE and that did not change. 

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https://www.almanacnews.com/news/2021/12/10/menlo-park-council-leaning-toward-cutting-housing-in-district-1-and-zoning-usgs-property-for-a-school?utmsource=express-2021-12-10&utmmedium=email&utm_campaign=express

I didn't go, but sent this letter:

To Karen Grove and the Menlo Park Housing Commission

Via email

Housing Leadership Council of San Mateo County works with communities and their leaders of creating and preserving quality affordable homes. 

First, we would like to thank staff for all of their hard work on the Housing Element so far. It is clearly a huge effort. 

We agree with all of the policies that staff recommend with a few changes and some additions. In general, we would like to see the programs and policies tailored  to overcome specific constraints that might prevent new housing development, especially deeply affordable homes, and work to prevent homelessness by keeping people housed.

On the jobs/housing linkage fee, we encourage the city to not just increase the fee, a very good idea, but also look at Redwood City’s approach of requiring partnerships between office developers and affordable housing developers. It is a very successful program and allows the city to not just create new housing but also preserve apartment buildings that are at risk of displacement.

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We are interested in the conversation about the overlay zone. Was it effective in the past? Can it be improved to be more useful? Do we need to look at different geographies? 

In addition to programs that help create new homes, the Housing Element should include policies and programs to preserve existing housing and prevent homelessness. We recommend:

·      Adopting a red tag ordinance similar to the City of San Mateo’s that provides multiple months of fair market rent to people that lose their housing because the owner did not maintain the property or a natural disaster made the property uninhabitable.

·      Continue to provide rental and utilities assistance to people that are at risk of losing their home.

·      Provide financial support to Legal Aid, Stanford Legal Clinic, and/or Community Legal Services of East Palo Alto so low-income tenants have access to the best information.

·      Create a rental registry and track rent increases and vacancies.

·      Tax vacant homes, especially if you are relying on ADU’s to meet a portion of your housing need.

·      Pass fair standards for evictions and rent increases.

M-Group gave a presentation on land use and site strategy options to meet RHNA. Topics included:

Housing location criteria:

-         0.5 acres to 10 acres

-         30 dwelling units per acre

-         Distribution throughout city

-         Realistic development potential

-         Proximity transit, schools, and other services

-         Proximity to available infrastructure and utility

Projects in the pipeline:

-         487 affordable units / 3243 units, within council district 1

-         Rest of the units will be distributed within districts 2-5 - 1597 new units needed there

Sites with expressed interest: 

-         335 pierce rd (12)

-         333 ravenswood (4000)

-         Veterans affairs (61)

-         320 sheridan (78)

-         USGS (225)

Community feedback from 9/23

-         Most preferred: downtown/el camino real

o 47% ECR

o  36% City parking lots

-         2nd most preferred: city-owned parking ltos

-         3rd: commercial areas

-         Least preferred:

o  Single-family areas

o  Religious facilities

o  Multi-family areas

-         Community support for more density in Sharon heights and downtown

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Land use strategies

-         Option A: moderate upzoning throughout the city

-         Option B: mixed-use development focused on middlefield/willow

-         Option C: mixed used development focused on downtown/ECR

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Commissioners pressed M-Group on the realistic development capacity of these sites, how to increase outreach to underrepresented communities, what was required to incentivize low-income housing, and how community feedback took into account displaced/marginalized groups. I wasn't able to discern clear answers to these questions. 

Good study session with housing commission. Many commented that high-density housing developments have been concentrated in Belle Haven (D1). Commissioners pushed for affordable housing on public surface parking lots downtown. Focus on improving community outreach, including Ken from HLC who commented about a letter they sent with PILP and Public Advocates stressing the need for inclusive public outreach. Commissioners said we need to improve ELI housing production and anti-displacement policies.