San Benito County planning commissioners Wednesday unanimously
approved a recommendation to the board that supervisors halt a set
of low-income housing rules
– including a requirement to build 30 percent of homes in larger
developments with an affordable designation – due to a major shift
in the local market in recent years.
HOLLISTER
San Benito County planning commissioners Wednesday unanimously approved a recommendation to the board that supervisors halt a set of low-income housing rules – including a requirement to build 30 percent of homes in larger developments with an affordable designation – due to a major shift in the local market in recent years.
Commissioners were set to consider the planning staff’s recommendation to drop the 30 percent requirement to 20 percent while adding flexibility to several areas of the code section. The law is applicable to developments of more than 20 units. Those with three to 20 units, meanwhile, are required to pay an in-lieu fee.
Instead of following the staff’s recommendation, however, commissioners decided to advise dropping the ordinance altogether – at least until the economy picks up again – in light of severely lacking development in San Benito County since the law was established in early 2004 at the height of the housing boom.
The goal behind the decision is to once again entice developers’ interest in San Benito County – which has suffered once of the most drastic, per-capita foreclosure rates in California, a state that consistently has ranked among the worst in the country the past couple of years. With the foreclosure trend, home values have plummeted here.
In late 2003 when the board first adopted the ordinance, San Benito had been one of the fastest-growing counties in the state and the skyrocketing prices of real estate had been restricting a large segment of the population from buying homes.
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