The affordable housing portion of the West Davis Active Adult Community (WDAAC) project has generated some criticism from the opposition to the project, believing that the affordable housing component carries with it no assurance that the units will get built and represents an insufficient contribution from the developers.
The Vanguard this week sat down with affordable housing developers David Thompson and Luke Watkins, who explained the concept of their affordable housing project and addressed some of the concerns.
David Thompson explained that when they first started sitting down with developer David Taormino, considering the existing affordable housing requirements about three years ago, they figured that to be about 56 units for a project of this size. Mr. Taormino, David Thompson explained, had wanted to do at least double that amount. And they came up with a mechanism whereby they could put 150 units on the site, which was nearly three times the amount they were originally required to provide.
Mr. Thompson explained that the need for housing for seniors in Davis is well known and fairly large.
He pointed out that there are four major senior affordable housing sites, and also a number of smaller sites. The largest are Kennedy Circle (75 units), Shasta Point (68 units), Eleanor Roosevelt Circle (ERC)(60 units) and the CHOC (Community Housing Opportunities Corporation) Project (30 units).
For those four projects, the waiting list is about 441 people. For ERC alone, it’s 224 people. That means the waiting list is just about double the number of people served.
“It’s a shame,” David Thompson explained, noting that he has staff at Eleanor Roosevelt who spend a sizable amount of time simply answering calls from people wanting to move there, whom they cannot possibly accommodate. “We spend an inordinate number of hours dealing with the lack of affordable housing for seniors.”
The model that they are proposing at WDAAC is similar to the model they have at ERC. He explained, “The model that we have is the first one in the county where we built in social services onsite with the staff member to assist residents.”
There are 21 units that are set aside at ERC, where the county has the ability to fill it with clientele that match the requirement. At this point, the number actually in the county program is 40.
“That’s more than meeting the need that was required of us,” he said.
“We are very very busy, doing extra work for people,” he said. “Its pretty consuming. We don’t mind doing it, but it’s a higher level than we anticipated taking care of.”
ERC serves mostly low to extremely low income residents, many of whom are on Section 8 vouchers. Residents on average earn less than $13,000 a year, or around $800 per month. That would be an unlivable wage if they could not find affordable senior housing.
“It has worked really really well,” he said. “Quality of life at ERC is excessively better than what it was for its residents.”
ERC was so successful that the project was exported to Dixon. They were granted five acres of land to do it. They have done two phases so far – first 60 units, then 54 units, and now 44 units next year will be phase 3.
With over 100 projected units, there are a lot of things they will be able to do at WDAAC. One big thing is to solve the food security problem. “We have begun to figure out how to solve the food problem,” David Thompson explained. “That’s the biggest problem. They have been working in Davis with groups like Farm Davis, Yolo Food Bank and STEAC (Short Term Emergency Aid Committee) to deliver meals to the seniors.
He noted that Senior Meals on Wheels provides a lunch at the senior center, and he believes because of the size of the site at WDAAC combined with the folks living across the street at Shasta, there will be enough folks to have a second lunch provided at WDAAC.
David Thompson and Luke Watkins are a bit perplexed at the concern that the project might not be built.
Mr. Thompson explained, “I have been doing housing for 40 years and I’ve built everything that I’ve taken on.”
He said that, “There is a lot of our own capital at stake when we do these things. We would lose a lot of money if we every didn’t build something.”
There is a penalty if they end up applying for funding and then not producing the housing. In fact, David Thompson believes they would no longer be able to do affordable housing if they reneged on a project.
Luke Watkins noted that part of the ability for them to get funding relies on an evaluation of their experience meeting deadlines, and if they fail to produce, that will be a negative reflection on their ability to do housing in the future.
He, too, pointed out, “We’ve never not completed a project.”
As we noted last week, there is no financial incentive for the Taorminos to not have the affordable housing built. They simply donate the land and the affordable housing developers work on getting the funding and building it.
Luke Watkins has a different take on Redevelopment Agency (RDA) money and the availability of funding.
“Funding is always an issue,” he said. “But we are in the most funding rich era for affordable housing despite the loss of redevelopment money.”
He notes that, while RDA has disappeared, the governor has created a number of alternatives. AB 32, for instance, is generally known to require projects and communities to meet greenhouse gas and efficiency standards, but it generates funding that goes to affordable housing. About $250 million per year.
He and David Thompson, in the first round of that funding, won two of the grants and their projects got about $20 million out of the first $250 million given out.
He pointed out, in fact, there is so much other money coming through that, even after the shift away from RDA, there is plenty of available money. “RDA was only a small piece of the funding anyway,” he explained.
Funding is a process. He explained that, basically, you keep applying for different grants until you have enough funding to do the project. Mr. Watkins believes it will probably take about seven sources of funding by the time they are done. The first money will be from the Multi-Family Housing Program (MHP).
There are a few advantages that they have. One is that David Taormino is planning to have the access and roads for the entire project done in the same phase, so the infrastructure and roads will already be place. They are planning to do the project in two phases, so they will only need the financing for the first 75 units at the start.
In any case, neither David Thompson nor Luke Watkins, who have been doing affordable senior housing for 40 years, are anticipating a problem.
A few other points which they addressed – one is that, contrary to some who have argued that this is a bad spot for housing, they disagree. While it is true that the project is far from the downtown, they point out that many seniors do not want to go downtown. That is not where a typical senior wants to be, with the young people and the lack of services there.
What seniors need is access to things like a grocery store, a doctor’s office, and a pharmacy, and they want the ability to walk to those locations.
“We are glad to be next to a hospital,” David Thompson stated. He noted perhaps more important is the close proximity to the Davis Community Clinic, where more than 20 percent of their patient load are seniors.
“Getting back and forth to doctors’ appointments is a big deal,” Luke Watkins stated. “To be able to walk is great.”
Moreover, it is close to both Safeway and CVS. They don’t even have to cross Covell Boulevard to do so. However, they point out that the barrier of Covell Blvd. has been overstated. “You press a button, it stops traffic and they cross the streets.”
They believe suggestions of an undercrossing are actually disadvantageous for seniors who might have to walk with the assistance of walkers and would prefer to be visible in case of problems.
They also addressed the issue of the compensation by the developers. The dedication is over 4 acres of land and 3.7 acres of net land, after factoring in streets. They estimate that the value of that land is close to $1 million per acre, meaning the total contribution is more than $4 million.
They also note that Sterling, for instance, had to pay money because the 38 units of affordable were not sufficient to meet the affordable housing requirements, so they had a combination of on-site and in-lieu fees, whereas WDAAC will have all of its affordable units on site.
Sterling has not done anything beyond the basic affordable housing requirement, whereas WDAAC will have more than 20 percent of all the units set aside in the land dedication as affordable units.
Is this enough for voters to approve it? They will get to vote on the project on the November ballot.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
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We have an excess of age discriminatory housing in Davis already. We do not need any more regardless of how much they are paying The Vanguard.
ALL other recent large-scale developments in Davis have otherwise provided substantial subsidized low-income housing on-site which was either built and paid for by the developer themselves at a substantial cost or they contributed land AND millions of dollars toward the construction costsfor the development. – WHY NOT AT WDAAC?
David Greenwald says “There are no guarantees…there never are”. But that is NOT a true statement. There WERE guarantees that the low income housing will be built at at Nishi and Lincoln 40 because the developer had to build the units integrated into their project or early in the project. And at Sterling, the developer not only donated the land for the low-income housing site but also put up a big chunck of construction money themselves. At Cannery, they also had to build their own low income housing. No so at WDAAC. Why not?
Sterling Apartments on 5th St. is putting in a total of 160 apartments of which 38 (19.7%) will be dedicated and reserved as “low income”. They are also using 1.03 acres of land to do so which is 17.1% of the total 6 acre project. Sterling is donating the land used for the low-income housing as a separate but contiguous parcel just like at WDAAC. However, significantly, as additionally reported stated in the Staff Report recommending Council approval of the Sterling project,
“The proposed Affordable Housing Plan is contained in the Development Agreement. It requires provision of 38 affordable rental units and a $2,025,000 contribution to help with development of the affordable project. No City subsidy is anticipated. The site will be developed by Mutual Housing California, an affordable housing developer chosen by the applicant for this project.” (Emphasis added)
A $2,025,000 contribution / 38 apts. = $53,289/Apt
David Thompson of Neighborhood Partners (the likely developer of the WDAAC low income housing site) stated before the Planning Commission on November 8, 2017 that the required low-income contribution for WDAAC would be 76 units.
If the same per apartment contribution to actually build the low-income housing was were made by WDAAC as was made by Sterling, WDAAC would be providing over $4,000,000 in additional funding to the low income housing construction –
76 units x $53,289 per unit = $4,049,964
The amount of money actually provided by the WDAAC developer toward his low income housing obligation at WDAAC is $0.
As another example, the Lincoln 40 apartment project on Olive Dr. was approved only after the developer agreed to reserve almost 15% of the onsite beds for low income, very low income, and extremely low income subsidized units. Nishi 2.0 just passed a Measure J/R vote to put in apartments housing 2,200 beds of which 15% will also be reserved in perpetuity only for low income, very low income and extremely low income students.
Regrettably, This is not the case with WDAAC! Here the City Council abused its discretionary authority by allowing the developer to donate 4.26 acres of land, totaling only about 6% of the total project size (74.49 acres) to a non-profit that “hopes” to get enough government grants to build a 150 unit apartment complex. But these affordable units may never be built because they are entirely dependent on outside funding since because developer contributions for actual construction were not required by the City Council.
So in summary, based on the City’s already dramatically reduced requirements from 35 to 15% of in the City’s new Affordable Housing Ordinance passed last year, the developer has claimed that he is providing more than twice the affordable housing units required by the City. But this is not true. The developer is actually not providing ANY affordable housing units. He is merely donating the land on which affordable housing units “may” be built in the future if enough grant money can be obtained by another low-income housing developer.
If free grant money cannot be obtained, then no affordable housing units will ever be built on the dedicated land and the WDAAC developer could get away without ever meeting any of the onsite Affordable Housing Requirements that every other developer in town was recently forced to meet to get their projects approved.
Talk about having the City put their thumb on the scale for a developer!
“ALL other recent large-scale developments in Davis have otherwise provided substantial subsidized low-income housing on-site which was either built and paid for by the developer themselves at a substantial cost or they contributed land AND millions of dollars toward the construction costsfor the development. – WHY NOT AT WDAAC?”
That is a false statement. You need to actually do research. You are making false statements. For example, Sterling since I actually looked it up donated land for 38 units and then fulfilled their requirement through an in-lieu. The difference between WDAAC and Sterling is that WDAAC donated the land for 150 units or 20%.
“The amount of money actually provided by the WDAAC developer toward his low income housing obligation at WDAAC is $0.”
This is a false statement. The land donated for the affordable is worth over $4 million. Why do you keep repeating false statements?
David states, “The land donated for the affordable is worth over $4 million. Why do you keep repeating false statements?”
Says who?…the developer? Please provide some independent verification for this “fact”! Why do you continue to parrot statements provided by the developer without independent verification?
Says the real estate people folks I’ve talked to. David and Luke also had around 2 acres for a different project with an assessed value of $2 million. So it seemed reasonable that roughly $1 per acre was a ballpark projection. No matter what, it’s above the zero you continue to falsely claim.
The answers to all of Alan’s questions and assertions are actually in the article.
WDAAC is donating land that David Thompson estimates is worth about $4 million.
20% of the units will be affordable.
Thompson and Watkins have a record of achieving funding and building affordable projects.
Based on their track record in Davis, the chances of that outcome seem very, very low.
For the record:
This is a meaningless statistic. I hope Alan isn’t going to copy and paste it ad infinitum. Acreage isn’t the issue, the total number and percentage of affordable units in the project is the relevant statistic:
This is a meaningless statement. I hope Don isn’t going to copy and paste it ad infinitum. The number of theoretical units isn’t the issue. The actual money put up by the developer or the taxpayers to get the units built is the relevant statistic. These units will never be built if Neighborhood Partners can’t get free grant money from the government to put in these units! That is a FACT. Why is the developer not putting up money themselves for construction costs like at Cannery, Lincoln40, Sterling and Nishi? That is the QUESTION.
Do you think David Thompson and Luke Watkins will have difficulty obtaining grant money? They seem confident in their ability to do so, and I think they have a strong track record.
No, it comes directly from the individuals who would be building that housing.
I really hope you will tone down your rhetoric, Alan.
I’m wondering if Alan would be in favor of the WDAAC if they actually “built” (or gave a “big chunck of construction money” to build) affordable housing?
P.S. To David I know you probably have at least 20 more WDACC stories ready to go but you may want to think about a “WDACC free Wednesday” next week (so people can’t say you post about it EVERY day)…
Then vote no. I’m trying to get actual correct information out so that the public can make up their own mind.
I was one of the authors of the Argument Against Measure L filed on August 10 with the City Clerk. David Greenwald had this argument in his hands within several days provided courtesy of the supporters of WDAAC. In that Argument Against, we stated the following:
I stand by that statement for the reasons stated in my post above.
But this particular comment questions the objectivity and propriety of David Greenwald and the Vanguard for continuing to carry Dave Taormino’s water bucket for him on this project. He continues to write favorable article after favorable article for the project without ever presenting opposing facts that do not meet his or the developer’s narrative. There is not even an attempt at objectivity in his reporting for this article.
A perfect case illustration of this is David’s failure to get any of the alternative facts or figures I presented above into the article. All the information on the low income housing at Sterling, Lincoln40, Nishi, and the Cannery (where at each project the developer did put in large amounts of their own cash into actually building the low-income housing component of the project) was fully available to David but he chose not to include it in his one-sided article today because it would have obviously led the reader away from the conclusions the Vanguard wanted the reader to walk away with.
Nor did David make any attempt to contact me to get alternate facts from the opposition to counter WDAAC’s side of the story. David has my cell phone number and he has my email address and he knew I was one of the authors of the Argument Against. Why did he not contact me to get any of the information I provided above to actually make even a meager attempt at objectivity? You’ll have to ask him for the answer. But others might presume it is because the developer of the WDAAC has been paying David Greenwald and the Vanguard substantial amounts for well over a year to promote his project See the large ad buy to the right hand of this story if there is any doubt…it has been running continuously now for months and months.
And not only is Vanguard running favorable articles for the WDAAC developer, he has written hit pieces for them attacking our arguments without ever sitting down with us to get our side of the story. I’m sorry, but reporting like this gets perilously close to a “yellow journalism” standard in which every development deal in town is unabashedly supported without any attempt at fair and balanced reporting or hit pieces are published without even bothering to try to get alternative facts from those being “hit”.
This town does not need another publisher that just acts as a shill mouthpiece for the developers in town. But continued non-objective and obviously biased and one-sided treatment and reporting like this in the Vanguard gets this publication very close to dropping to that bottom-of-the-bucket standard.
“David Greenwald had this argument in his hands within several days provided courtesy of the supporters of WDAAC.”
More false information. It was posted on the city webpage.
Oh really, David? Then why did you write me in an email on August 12th (2 days after the Arguments in Favor and Arguments Against were submitted) and ask, “Do you happen to have a copy of the argument against – the city is not releasing it until the 20th. I’d like to push it out earlier.”
Hmmm
Because when I wrote you, it wasn’t up yet. They posted it the next day.
“Nor did David make any attempt to contact me to get alternate facts from the opposition to counter WDAAC’s side of the story. ”
I’ve gotten my info from a combination of the city and the developers. You’ve posted several provably false claims just on here today…
You know, David, everybody make some mistakes in reporting every now and then. If my mistakes are material, I own up to them and in writing – unlike your own mistaken missives which are buried and never acknowledged.
But your constant narrative, “You’ve posted a false claim…You’ve posted a false claim” (without ever acknowledging many of your own misstatements) and without actually dissecting whether something is truly a false claim or whether it is simply a matter of different interpretations of the same facts is starting to sound remarkably like someone we all know who just loves to scream, “FAKE NEWS!…FAKE NEWS!”
We are still waiting for Alan to write “I made a mistake the land they are donating for affordable housing will be worth millions if voters allow development” (you can debate how many “millions” it is worth but not that it will be worth “millions” if it is in the city and zoned for development).
P.S. To Alan rather than calculating the millions in donated land as percentage of the “site” why not calculate it as a percentage of the city (or state) to make it look even smaller…
Probably because this suggestion doesn’t make any sense.
Alan
“alternative facts”
You used this phrase twice in your recent post. I agree that there have been additional facts and alternative points of view which David has not covered thoroughly ( or maybe at all). But please, there are no such things as “alternative facts” and this somewhat comical and highly politicized phrase does nothing to strengthen your case.
Tia: Regarding “alternative facts” – I agree that this is not a good phrase to use, these days.
Perhaps a better phrase is “undiscussed facts” – such as the percentage of land dedicated for (unfunded) Affordable housing, at a given site.
I think it is important to note that the developers are required to provide sufficient land to build the units which are required under the affordable housing ordinance. There is no provision within the ordinance as to how much land they are to donate or a percentage requirement.
David: I believe that you are referring to the “interim” Affordable housing policy, adopted by the city council (which essentially coincided with the proposals put forth by the Lincoln40 and Nishi developers).
Prior to that, didn’t the city require 35% of proposals to be dedicated to Affordable housing?
I don’t believe any variant of the ordinance requires a specific land set aside.
Another “frequently undiscussed” fact is that the value of a given site significantly increases, as a result of development approvals. And, this is a primary reason for the vast wealth of many developers. They often obtain and sit on land for years (e.g., generating income from farming), with the hope that it will eventually be approved for development.
It would be interesting to know what the claimed value of the site in question is today, vs. how much it would be increased if the proposal is approved by voters.
In other words, the location of WDAAC solves the services issue better than the current re-design of Downtown? These developers are actually making a good argument for an even more walkable Downtown with better services…. and in the following I am making a comparison with an AAC integrated into a multi-functional and diverse community in the Civic Plaza area.
There is one huge supermarket available to WDAAC residents, a not so short walk along a major street and over a noisy freeway. Most will drive there, because the Marketplace is designed for driving… just like the WDAAC is designed for driving.
There’s exactly one route to Sutter Davis and DCC across parking lot. A weekly visit – which is perhaps atypical – by foot is someone better than the ability to walk multiple times a day to an improving Downtown? At the only real nice place to walk to from WDAAC is West Pond, but it’s a very indirect walk to get there. DCC is a lousy location for a facility that serves low-income people who have fewer mobility choices, though I realize that there are advantages to being next to Sutter Davis. A clinic at Davis Senior Center makes a lot of sense, too, as one could combine a visit with participation in other activities there.
There’s the Co-op and twice-weekly Farmer’s Market. There’s a huge diversity of destinations such as cafes. CVS will almost definitely look to locate a small version of one of their stores, complete with a pharmacy, once more people start living Downtown. It’s also not far from Civic Plaza to Trader Joe’s by bicycle along the north side of campus. There’s lots of specialty grocery stores, too.
Also let’s not forget that the ad that WDAAC runs shows one person in it, walking alone. Perhaps the artist has a clear vision of what will happen there?
I have no quarrel with developing city or school district offices into a mixed-use project. But I don’t see why you present it as an alternative to WDAAC. They’re not mutually exclusive. Some seniors might like the hustle and bustle of being close to downtown, others probably prefer a quieter and more separated location.
Also, it seems that discussions about getting the city, school district, or public utilities to vacate their established headquarters so they can be redeveloped always seem to go nowhere.
Don – For those who prefer a “quieter or more separated location” (which is a perfectly valid choice for some), do you really think that having this development right in the direct path of future development of the northwest quadrant and sitting right on Covell fits this bill. Plus, in terms of privacy, all of the sidewalks and walkways in this project pass directly between the homes meaning anybody from the public can walk right up to the front and back doors of this development’s single-story homes (at least as shown in renderings in the developer’s ads).
Plus, all of the parks and fitness center and wellness center and restaurant are completely open to the public (a feature also touted by the developer so seniors won’t feel isolated). I would suggest that if seniors really wanted this type of privacy that you infer (again, which I believe this is a perfectly valid choice – I am not knocking it), the entire project should be located in a smaller and more quiet community where the surrounding land is already entitled ONLY for low density residential growth or open space or parks. This project may very well be surrounded by industrial growth or very dense residential development in the future and not at all like the bucolic pastoral scenes shown in the developer’s ads.
The “Marketplace is designed for driving… just like the WDAAC is designed for driving” because people don’t “design” multi-million dollar projects for a “tiny” segment of the population (seniors who bike everywhere). I plan to keep riding my bike in my 60’s but a small percentage of people over 40 ride to shop and an even smaller percentage of people over 60 have ever taken a bike to the grocery store…
Todd
As a senior, I agree that location for one’s home is highly subjective. The developer seems to believe that older folks do not want to live downtown. And yet, the proximity to downtown as well as ability to downsize determined the location of my choice. From my home in OED, I can easily walk to the Co-Op for shopping, to downtown for restaurants, movies, two politicians offices, three art galleries, the Mondavi, two bookstores, some clothes & gift shopping and occasional fun activities such as meeting friends at Vino’s, the annual bicycle races, and arts walk about. I can walk to campus and to the Arboretum anytime. By comparison, I find the location of Mr. Taoromino’s project singularly unattractive and boring. But again, that is all subjective.
Well, put them at the edge of Downtown, make the area safe for 8-to-80, promote and support bikes that work for them, provide frequent transit (e.g. autonomous shuttles) for when feet need a boost … price parking and car use responsibly… and then they’ll do that stuff.
At a Central AAC they’ll be able to use a car if they want, and walk for free… at WDAAC they’ll have to use a car, and not be able to walk anywhere diverse (to repeat: For commerce there’s really only that noisy and stinky route to the Marketplace… that the low-income developers are promoting that aspect as something viable is a bare ass, rabid triumph for anti-intersectionality!!)
Daddy, can we have 27 more looks at the WDAAC Affordable Housing Proposal before November? Pleeeeeeez
To my exchange with Alan above, here is the city link where the ballot arguments – for and against are located: https://cityofdavis.org/city-hall/city-clerk/elections/november-6-2018-special-municipal-election
Who is this “Alan Above” ???
As I often play the Devil’s advocate, may I be known in these parts as “Alan Below” ???
He is better known as Nala Evoba
“double entendre”? Or, just my twisted sense of humor?
Dear Vanguard Readers:
We are grateful for the Vanguard coverage of the affordable housing component of WDAAC. Affordable senior housing in Davis is at a crisis point. At this time low to extremely low income seniors have no place to go in Davis and at least a three year wait if they get on a list. The needs of elderly seniors in Davis who are on just social security (about $10,000 a year income) are desperate. Let’s keep our eyes on that prize to getting 150 more units of affordable senior housing for those seniors most in need in Davis.
Secondly, various arguments are being made about the affordable component at WDAAC. Many of those are incorrect because different forms of affordable housing are unfairly being measured by the same standards.
For nearly 30 years, almost all of the developments that gave land to completely meet their affordable requirements did not also need to provide additional funding. WDAAC is following that nearly 30 year history but is in this case providing additional land for there to be almost three times the affordable units required (land for 150 units provided where only land for 56 units would be required).
Over 20 affordable housing projects have been built on land provided by developers where the land but no other funds were provided.
Neighborhood Partners
Yet another crisis. I don’t know how Davis survives with the almost daily crisis.
Easier to get subsidy (grant) for a crisis than just ‘the rent is high’.
I don’t believe this is accurate
The Vanguard has really changed over the years. It’s gone from fighting “the man” to what seems to me to being an ally to “the man”.
Keith
Are you really advocating abandoning all rational thought and discriminatory ability with regard to who does and doesn’t constitute “the man”?
Don’t worry Tia, physicians, regardless of gender or gender identification, are “The Man”.