4A Public Hearing 2014 1006 - Laserfiche WebLink

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Planning Commission Regular Meeting Minutes September 11, 2014 Page 8 of 11 12 to 15 months, the City’s been getting more calls and having more meetings with intere sted developers about opportunity sites, especially in the downtown TOD area. In reference to Action 56.06-A – Protection Strategy for At-Risk Units, Commissioner Collier said she’s familiar with the Golden Gate Apartments, where the BMR term is set to expire in 2015. She asked whether rehabilitation loan qualifications require bringing units up to code, because only one of the units is up to code. Mr. Miller said the units would have to be brought up to current applicable codes to obtain a loan to rehabilitate the units as affordable housing. He noted, too, that one benefit of the City regulating a project is the opportunity it provides to address tenant concerns with the landlord, particularly if they’re related to health and/or safety. Action 53.05-B – Downtown Housing Sites discusses two locations, one of which is the Town Hall Square area. Acting Chair Hernandez, describing it as a “legacy asset/problem/opportunity site” with issues that may never be resolved, questioned whether it should be included. Part of that land is occupied by a very profitable Chevron gas station and Union Bank, which he said has a favorable lease. Mr. Miller said the Downtown TOD Strategy in 2007 paid considerable attention to that area, but in the Working Draft the number of housing units has been discounted by half, reflecting what was indicated as Town Hall Square potential at that time. He said the numbers were cut down from the original 148 to 74 for the reasons Acting Chair Hernandez cited, and also because the zoning designation there allows commercial uses as well as residential. He also noted that a clarifying footnote will be added to Action 53.06. In the interest of getting a macro view of parking issues in the context of the Housing Element, Commissioner Hernandez asked whether the changes it envisions would relax parking standards. He mentioned Policy 59.02 – Parking Standards, which would encourage shared parking in mixed-use developments under certain circumstances, and Action 59.02-A, which calls for a number of parking requirement amendments. Mr. Miller said shared parking is currently allowed in certain parts of San Leandro, but incentives could be provided in some other places as well. Noting that San Leandro’s current standard requires 1.5 parking spaces for a studio unit in most parts of the City, he also said that might be more than necessary, and as Action 59.02-A suggests, a single space per unit would be acceptable instead. Commissioner Hernandez asked whether the Working Draft addresses the call for excess parking at the Downtown Tech Campus. Mr. Miller said no because parking would receive considerable attention in the Transportation Element of the General Plan, but not in the Housing Element. The question for the Housing Element, he emphasized, is, “To what extent do parking standards constrain the development of housing?” Acting Chair Hernandez opened the public hearing. Mike McGuire, Cherrywood Avenue, said that “affordable” tends to be a euphemism for “subsidized,” while “market rate” tends to be a euphemism for “nobody I know can afford it.” Thus, the private market isn’t necessarily producing housing the way the state guidelines would like, he said. A North End resident who is active in the Best Manor Homeowners Association (HOA) but not speaking on its behalf, Mr. McGuire stated that prior to a meeting on the Housing Element update, he feared a “mountain” of traffic stopped on East 14th Street due to carryover of some parts from the 2010 Housing Element, such as relaxing density restrictions. Although he prefers mass transit to driving, he warned that we’re seriously underestimating how much extra traffic transit-oriented development will create. TOD projects tend to cluster in what are already the most traffic-clogged parts of town, he said, emphasizing that if anyone living in a TOD area drives, unless the roads are widened and the buses and trains run more frequently, it will increase traffic and crowd the streets more.