In 2007 if you wanted to unify the residents of Davis, the best bet was to raise the topic of how and how much Davis will accommodate the demand for additional housing. Thus far, January 2008 is following the same pattern, with
· The City Council voting on Tuesday night to bring back for discussion the Resolution Regarding Annual Growth Parameter passed by the Council on March 8, 2005 . . . also known as the One Percent (1%) Growth Guideline, the text of which can be read here and
· The Housing Elements Steering Committee (HESC) coming to final decisions about the Community Workshop scheduled for Thursday, January 24th from 7:00 to 9:30 PM at the Holmes Junior High School Multi-purpose Room. The HESC has conducted 24 public meetings since February 8, 2007, and the second Community Workshop is intended to:
1) Share with the public an explanation of how Davis will meet the RHNA allocation,
2) Show HESC’s ranking of 37 future potential sites for housing,
3) Show the Principles and Tradeoffs HESC has used to ranking potential housing sites
4) Get feedback from the public on the above three items, including changes to the ranking of the 37 future potential housing sites, and
5) Get feedback from the public on what directions Housing in the Davis Community should take in the years to come. Some of the feedback questions the HESC will be asking are:
a) Housing Density and Intensity Near Downtown and Neighborhood Nodes – Which of the following strategies for developing housing sites, if any, would you support or suggest?
¨ Locate new housing as near as possible to downtown
¨ Avoid infill housing that is developed at higher densities than the surrounding area
¨ Allow for increased densities above existing densities for housing development near the downtown or neighborhood centers, when the site offers flexibility to address potential neighborhood impacts.
¨ Disperse higher density housing throughout the City
¨ Other
b) Housing Development Within the City as Compared to Peripheral Sites – Which of the following strategies would you support or suggest?
¨ Maximize “infill” development within the current City limits.
¨ Protect agricultural lands as much as possible.
¨ Expand City boundaries to all development of peripheral sites where services and facilities can easily be extended consistent with community housing needs.
¨ Other
c) Variety of Housing Types – Which of the following strategies would you support or suggest?
¨ Strive to maintain the current mix of housing types and tenure, including an adequate supply of affordable and workforce housing.
¨ Place greater emphasis on rental housing
¨ Place greater emphasis on ownership (for-sale) housing
¨ Place greater emphasis on ownership (for-sale) moderate income housing
¨ Place greater emphasis on senior (age-restricted) housing
¨ Place greater emphasis on attached housing and smaller housing units
¨ Place greater emphasis on single family detached housing
¨ Other
The HESC and Planning Department Staff have produced an excellent comparative growth map that shows visually the impact of density and growth rate decisions.
Neither of these two events transpired without significant disagreement, and all Davis residents should take the opportunity to participate in the next steps the Council and HESC take in the coming weeks.
Some of you may be asking yourselves, why does Davis need to grow at all? The reality is that if there is no demand for additional housing, Davis does not need to, nor will it grow. However, the story does not end with that statement. California General Plan law requires each city and county to have land zoned to accommodate its fair share of the regional housing need. This fair share is known as the Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA), which for Davis is calculated by the Sacramento Area Council of Governments (SACOG). Information about RHNA is available here.
To comply with the RHNA requirements of California law, Davis is not required to make development happen, but it must eliminate barriers to the production of 498 additional housing units by ensuring that enough land is available to accommodate that RHNA allocation specified by SACOG for the period from January 1, 2006, to June 30, 2013. The RHNA allocations for the whole Sacramento five-county region are available here.
One of the significant areas of disagreement within the HESC members has centered around the charge it was given by the City Council regarding Growth Rate. On the one hand, the RHNA allocation is only 498 additional residential units between January 2006 and December 2013. On the other hand, the Planning Department Staff’s interpretation of the 1% Growth Guideline as a target rather than as a cap means over 2,300 additional residential units over the same period. One can’t help but ask the following question:
“City Council members and Davis residents came out in force in March 2007 to strongly oppose Yolo County’s recommendation to consider 2,100 additional residential units in the HESC planning area in the 23 years between now and 2030. Given that, why is the City Council and HESC now considering even more units over 6 years?”
No matter what your answer is to that question, the HESC and City Council need your feedback. One could even add a fourth set of feedback questions to the three groups HESC has identified above:
d) Volume of Housing Growth – Which of the following growth rate targets between now and December 2013 would you support or suggest?
¨ Only grow by the RHNA mandated allocation of 498 additional residential units.
¨ Grow at a rate between 498 and 1,500 additional residential units.
¨ Grow at a rate of between 1,500 and 2,300 additional residential units
¨ Grow at a rate higher than 2,300 additional residential units.
¨ Other
To put those numbers into further context, (click here), the Planning Department Staff provided the HESC with a breakdown of the inventory of residential units for which certificates of occupation (181), building permits (115) or other additional permits (339) have been issued or approved. Those 635 already approved (or built) units more than meet the RHNA allocation, and further they raise the Planning Department Staff growth under their interpretation of the 1% Growth Guideline to 2,950 units between now and December 2013.
Fortunately, the Council has voted to clarify the wording of the 1% Guideline Resolution. Sue Greenwald and Steve Sousa both made motions to that effect, and both Sousa and Ruth Asmundson stated on the record Tuesday night that the 1% Growth Guideline was always intended to be a cap, not a target. So if you have an opinion about the 1% Growth Guideline, let your Council members know your thoughts, and be sure to ask them to be more explicit in their charge to the HESC.
You may ask, why do we need a Growth Guideline at all? The answer to that is clear when you look at the following annual building permits issued numbers:
1998: 999
1999: 926
2000: 566
2001: 206
2002: 307
2003: 265
2004: 135
2005: 250
2006: 104
The huge spikes in 1998 and 1999 represent the rapid build-outs of the Mace Ranch and Wildhorse developments. Council wanted to be sure that did not happen again, so they adopted the resolution, which begins as follows:
The City Council finds that an annual average growth parameter for the City is appropriate for future growth management and planning after considering:
a. The internal housing needs identified in the “Internal Housing Needs Analysis” report.
b. The most recent and likely future fair share housing needs issued by the Sacramento Area Council of Governments (SACOG).
The idea behind the resolution is good, but it was never intended to be anything other than a cap . . . to prevent a recurrence of the problems experienced with Mace Ranch and Wild horse. To their credit, Council appears poised to clarify any misunderstandings that may exist vis-à-vis the 1% Growth Guideline.
In closing, please read and act on the following HESC flyer:
