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April
16, 2003
Mayor
Jerry Smith and Council Members
[Sent by FAX: 831-899-6227]
Seaside City Council
Seaside City Hall
440 Harcourt Avenue
Seaside, CA 93955-0810
RE:
Fort Ord Reuse Authority Affordable and Workforce Housing Study
City Council Meeting of April 17, 2003 – Agenda Item #17
Dear
Mayor Smith and Council Members:
This
letter is to comment on Agenda Item #17. The staff is recommending
that your Council authorize and direct a letter to the Fort Ord
Reuse Authority, making five specific comments on an Affordable
and Workforce Housing Study recently presented to FORA.
LandWatch
urges the City of Seaside to direct that the following statement
be included as the very first point in any letter sent to the Fort
Ord Reuse Authority:
"The
City of Seaside encourages FORA, working with all of the jurisdictions
who are represented on the FORA Board of Directors, to do whatever
it can to maximize the production of housing that will be affordable
to families and individuals who currently live and work on the
Monterey Peninsula. While Seaside recognizes that there are many
difficulties and obstacles to the production of truly affordable
housing on Fort Ord (some of which we outline in this letter)
we believe that maximizing the amount of affordable housing on
Fort Ord—and maintaining that affordability on a permanent
basis—is vital for the future economic and social health
of Monterey County, and for the City of Seaside specifically."
In
short, LandWatch believes that Seaside (and the other FORA jurisdictions)
should "accentuate the positive," and seek to "eliminate
the negative" where affordable housing is concerned. That’s
from an old song, and it ought to be the theme song of Seaside and
every other jurisdiction facing the implications of the current
and future housing market on the Monterey Peninsula.
Simply
put, unless their local governments do something about it, housing
that average and below income families can afford will just disappear.
That is already happening—and it’s happening in Seaside,
which has traditionally thought of itself as a community that "provides
affordable housing opportunities" for families and individuals
wanting to live in Monterey County, and on the Monterey Peninsula.
Seaside
doesn’t provide any affordable housing opportunities anymore!
The Draft City of Seaside 2002-2007 Housing Element, dated October
2002, and prepared by Cotton/Bridges/Associates, includes a table,
on Page HE-App-20, that tells the truth.
The
maximum price that is affordable for a large, moderate income
family is $229,225 for an ownership unit. If a house sells
for more than $229,225, then even a large family, with an income
equal to 120% of the median income, cannot afford that house.
The
KB Homes Project—approved by an earlier City Council—set
aside NO homes as affordable units. The lowest price for a home
in this new development is $475,000.
What’s
worse, when homes are sold in Seaside, they are virtually never
sold at $229,225 or less. In other words, every time a home is
sold in Seaside, one more affordable housing unit becomes unaffordable.
Over time, absent some successful action by the City, there will
be NO affordable housing in Seaside. Currently, there are NO affordable
housing "opportunities," because "opportunities"
is a word that talks about the future. There is "affordable"
housing in Seaside, but it’s all the result of earlier purchases,
when prices were truly affordable. They aren’t any more, and
every time a house sells, a lower income family or individual is
replaced by someone with an above-average income (often out of town
investors).
This
is (regrettably) the fact. In view of that fact, we hope that the
City of Seaside will try to do everything it can (and will urge
FORA to do everything it can) to make truly affordable housing available.
If
we, as a community, can’t succeed in that effort—and particularly
if we don’t even try, just pointing out all the reasons it’s
hard to do—then working families will be forced out of the
Monterey Peninsula cities, including Seaside, and our community
will be very much the worse for it.
Thank
you for taking our suggestion seriously. Recognizing the difficulties
(they’re real), we hope that Seaside will urge FORA to do everything
it can to help produce truly affordable housing on the former Fort
Ord. Please "accentuate the positive," and send the message
we’re recommending.
Very
truly yours,
Gary
A. Patton, Executive Director
LandWatch Monterey County
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to Seaside Issues and Actions]
04.18.03
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