Increasing Supply of Affordable Housing in Santa Rosa

By Susan Gorin

The supply of affordable housing in Santa Rosa can be increased significantly if the City works proactively to encourage construction of new units and retain the supply of existing units.

The Growth Management Ordinance and Housing Allocation Plan both included components designed to encourage the construction of affordable housing. Although many in the community recognized they were not working effectively toward this result, the deficit in the production of housing, especially for low and very low incomes, was not acknowledged until after the last few years of significant economic growth and rapidly escalating housing prices.

The lack of affordable housing contributes to and exacerbates other community issues including homelessness, congestion on our highways, multi-families living in single residential units, illegal granny units and increasing difficulty in attracting qualified personnel for our schools, emergency services, retail and other industries.

The City has finally acknowledged the seriousness of this problem and is working with Economics & Planning Systems to evaluate and potentially modify 25 existing programs that may contribute to the financing and production of affordable housing, including the growth management ordinance and the housing allocation plan. Another useful strategy is to use the general plan process to identify parcels of land throughout the City, which are appropriated sited in the downtown core area, adjacent to rail transit hubs, on arterial roads, or perhaps in or adjacent to industrial parks, and rezone them for higher density. We have only 10 acres of land in the City zoned for medium-density and 0 acres zoned for high density. To increase affordability, we need to increase density and thus create economies of scale.

All of these strategies can be utilized to increase production of affordable housing. However, it will require a City Council who is focused and works collaboratively to effectively work toward this goal. The City must use creativity to promote/approve innovative designs of higher density, mixed-use developments, which include a strong component of affordable units, as well as market-rate units. It will require a yearly review of housing production and establishing City goals for the following year. It will require the City to be proactive in working with builders and non-profit organizations to help site and accommodate higher-density developments. And it will require the City to reach out neighborhoods and include them in the planning, so their concerns are heard and ameliorated before the project goes through the planning process.