By Christine Breen
Ask anyone almost anywhere in California to name one of the
primary challenges facing their community, and you are bound to
hear a variation on the same response: Affordable housing.
Ask anyone almost anywhere in California to name one of the primary challenges facing their community, and you are bound to hear a variation on the same response: Affordable housing.
California is in the midst of a housing crisis. Housing prices continue to rise at a far greater rate than income levels, and constitute the single greatest expense for most California households. California has the fourth lowest home ownership rate in the country.
San Benito County has been deeply affected by the affordable housing shortage.
In defining “affordability,” local governments and public agencies utilize a numerical standard. Under this standard, a family’s monthly housing costs should not exceed 30 percent of its monthly net income, recognizing the family has other essential monthly expenses, including food, health care, childcare and transportation.
In 2001, the area median income for a family of four in San Benito County was $58,400.
Any family earning less than $46,700 (80 percent of the median) would be considered “low income” under state and federal standards, and an affordable monthly housing expense would not exceed $1,168.
For “very low income” families, who earned less than $29,200 annually (50 percent of the median), an affordable monthly housing expense would not exceed $730.
This numerical formula helps illustrate the disparity between the “affordable” ideal, and what has become the reality in San Benito County.
But the formula does not speak to what is truly affordable – or unaffordable – to most county residents.
Last month, the county’s median home price was $589,000. Home ownership has become unattainable even at moderate and middle-income levels.
Earlier this month, the Board of Supervisors undertook an important first step in addressing the affordable housing crisis in the county by convening a workshop to address the issue and hear from the public.
It is not that the county had not previously addressed the affordable housing issue. In 2005, the Board of Supervisors enacted an aggressive inclusionary housing provision, which required residential developments of 21 or more units to designate 30 percent of the proposed units as “affordable” to low- and very low-income households.
The objectives of the county’s inclusionary housing element were laudable. However, it became clear over time that the provisions of the ordinance, coupled with a slow, overburdened planning process, rendered most development in the county’s purview financially unfeasible.
The state now requires jurisdictions to formulate housing elements as part of their general planning process. In undertaking this task, local governments must balance housing needs of the community with financial feasibility, and do so in way that is consistent with the community’s long-term vision.
As San Benito County undertakes revisions to its general plan, it makes sense for it to re-examine its housing element, and revise it to better serve the county’s objectives.
Reduction of the inclusionary unit requirement will not, in and of itself, remedy the problems with the county’s housing element.
The county must require some percentage of affordable housing. Ten to 20 percent is the normal range in the state.
But the county must also consider a range of options for meeting the affordability requirement, including in-lieu fees, public land trusts, public-private partnerships, and streamlining of the development approval process for projects that meet affordability objectives.
In the meantime, the City of Hollister needs to address its housing obligations. Hollister’s new general plan proposes 20 percent affordability in developments with seven or more units.
This element has yet to be enacted, and other aspects of the city’s affordability program have not been specified.
The city must also consider program flexibility and incentives, and work closely with the county, if we are to realize housing that is truly affordable, and that enhances the community.
How do we get there?
The county will reconvene its inclusionary housing workshop on March 13. Prior to that time, community leaders and workshop participants should consider some key principles of inclusionary housing, as set forth in a 2005 Joint Policy Brief by the Home Builders Association of Northern California and the Non-Profit Housing Association of Northern California.
Those principles include:
– Recognizing provision of adequate housing is a societal responsibility.
– Contributing tangible and substantial resources to spread the cost of providing affordable housing across the community.
– Implementing policies that maximize resources and result in more housing opportunities or deeper levels of affordability.
– Recognizing that requiring “like-for-like” units in market-rate developments are often not effective or efficient means of providing affordable housing; and
– Implementing programs that provide flexibility and allow for a range of alternative methods of providing affordable units.
If we can identify common objectives, we will be more likely to arrive at a collective vision that addresses the present lack of affordable housing and formulates solutions that will result in housing that is truly affordable.
We should take advantage of this opportunity.
Hollister resident Christine Breen is a member of the Free Lance Editorial Board.
