By David M. Greenwald
Davis, CA – Earlier this week, the Vanguard hosted a webinar on city housing needs. It remains our view that filling the city’s housing needs over the next eight years will be increasingly challenging.
The city has put out a Housing Element virtual Community Workshop (here) that will remain active until April 2 (Friday of this week).
According to AIM Consulting, “Early technical analysis completed for the Housing Element Update has identified enough sites to meet the requirements for single-family housing, accessory dwelling units (in-law units), small-scale rental buildings, and condominiums/townhouses.”
What that looks like is unknown. Looking at past identified sites, most appear to be more aspirational in their ability to actually deliver housing. However, as we have noted previously, the city, in order to meet the requirements of the Housing Element and the Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA) does not actually need to build the housing.
But even with that lower threshold of legal requirement, AIM Consulting said, “The City now needs to identify additional sites to accommodate at least 230 more multi-family rental units. To meet State requirements, these sites must allow 30 dwelling units or more per acre of land.”
They acknowledge: “It will be challenging to find enough sites that will accommodate the amount of multifamily rental housing needed to meet the RHNA requirement.”
They write: “In order to meet the challenge of identifying sites for enough multi-family rental housing, the City is considering both short and long-term rezoning strategies. Rezoning is the 
process of changing zoning laws, which determine how land can be used and developed.”
On the map, they identify a number of possibilities.
They note that the Downtown Davis Specific Plan “is expected for adoption in late 2021. The plan would encourage redevelopment of the Downtown and could provide capacity for an additional 100 lower income units within the 2021-29 Housing Element Planning Period.”
They also identify some Residential Low Density Land—“Vacant land designated for Low Density uses could be redesignated to allow for high density housing (of at least 30 units per acre). Approximately 12 acres of land has been identified and could provide approximately 230 lower income units.”
Business Park and Office Land—“Vacant land designated for business park and office users could be redesignated to allow for high density housing… Approximately 30 acres of land has been identified and could provide approximately 600 lower-income units if fully developed for housing. Or a smaller portion of the sites could be identified for housing.”
Commercial Land—“Vacant land designated for Commercial uses could be redesignated to allow for high density housing… Approximately 1.5 acres of land has been identified and could provide approximately 30 lower-income units.”
As a longer term strategy there are a number of potential Measure J sites that are available—“vacant land within the sphere of influence could be annexed into the city and designated for high density housing…
“The multi-family rental housing capacity within the sphere of influence is unknown and may not be able to meet the City’s rezone obligation within the first three years of the Housing Element Planning Period (May 2024).
“Annexations and often complex but could be a long-term solution for providing an adequate buffer of multi-family rental housing units.”
But the map may be somewhat deceptive. For example, it notes that “not all areas in the Sphere of Influence are potential sites that can be used to meet the City’s RHNA requirements.”
Indeed, “some areas of the Sphere of Influence are already developed, and the City does not have legal authority to make land use decisions for the UC Davis campus, regardless of whether the campus is in the City or the Sphere of Influence.”
In my view, the bigger challenge is not to find enough short- and long-term rezoning sites, it is to actually build the housing. The good news is that falls outside of the legal scope of RHNA. The bad news is that it remains fundamental to finding enough housing to continue to keep Davis affordable for a range of incomes and demographics.
As I have written previous, it is not clear where the housing will go at this point.
When we looked at the 2008 Housing Element report which was quite meticulous, most of the peripheral sites listed—Signature, Wildhorse Ranch, Nugget Fields, Covell Village, the Northwest Quadrant, Stonegate (west of) and Oeste Ranch—do not seem particularly likely at this point in the time. Only a portion of the NW Quadrant has a property owner actively even in consideration, it would seem.
Infill? We have the Olive Drive project that is obviously in the works, but not a very large project. After that, we are probably looking at a bunch of projects that are relatively small. The city, as we have reported, has about 64 acres of commercially zoned land, some of which might be appropriate for housing—though that will detract from needs for commercial development.
The city should probably do an analysis of immediately available land in the city for housing. It is possible that things like DJUSD Headquarters or Civic Fields—both listed in the 2008 HESC (Housing Element Steering Committee) Report—get converted to housing, but, realistically, can you stake your planning on it?
That would seem to be an important distinction—housing we can build now versus housing that can be built if things line up correctly.
The downtown? We are going to have a Downtown Specific Plan. But there are three problems with putting housing in the downtown. First, without redevelopment money, it is going to be a long and very slow process for owners to level large areas of the downtown and redevelopment them. Second, the fiscal analysis shows that housing might not pencil out. And third, even if market rate housing pencils out, affordable housing is going to be even more difficult to pencil out.
Peripheral? There actually are not a huge amount of peripheral sites that can work at this point. Voters have already turned down projects at Mace, Wildhorse Ranch and Covell Village. A smaller proposal at Covell Village makes some sense, a project next to Bretton Woods in the NW Quadrant does, so does Wildhorse as well as Signature.
But other than perhaps the NW Quadrant site, I don’t believe that any of those spots are being actively considered. And, even if it is considered, proposed, and approved by the council, all of it relies on the voters for final approval—which as we know is rather problematic.
Yes, these decisions lie somewhat outside of the realm of the Housing Element, but as part of community planning including the General Plan Update, they seem rather fundamental.
—David M. Greenwald reporting
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So, similar vacuous bullshˆt to the Bretton Woods program that does not actually need to sell housing to Davis-connected buyers.
Is anything that has to do with Davis housing actually REAL, or is it all vaporous-bullshˆt designed to fool fools?
In fairness, RHNA is state/ regional not local regulation.
Wow you’re really beating the drum on this subject continuously aren’t ya?
1. As I said last time you wrote this article (2 weeks ago?); there still hasn’t been a compelling reason to encourage new residential growth (aside from the school funding reason which is debatable but a worthy separate discussion). As with most things political these days there seems to be two polarized camps; the NIMBYs and the Think of the Poor Souls That Can’t Live in Glorious Davis and Will Have to Bare the Burden of Living in Woodland, Dixon or West Sac. As I’ve said before I’m not against residential growth (as a former residential developer it would be funny if I was) but I would like a good reason for encouraging residential growth.
2. The discussion is moot since Davis still (as I’ve said before) lets the inmates run the asylum through Measure J. You’re right that strictly infill development in Davis is probably too expensive for beneficial residential growth.
You haven’t been around long KYE. This drum has been beating like the Energizer Bunny on meth since the early 2000’s.
It’s worse than that. The inmates get to decide IF they run the asylum, and they also have a stake in ownership of the asylum, and the value of their stake increases by their running the asylum.
Isn’t the lack of affordable, accessible housing for the local workforce, younger families, people with disabilities, etc. reason enough? Suggesting that these people can simply live elsewhere is the height of NIMBYism, not to mention elitism.
NO. Your comment is essentially Helen Lovejoy’s “Think of the Children!”.
If you or someone else wants to put together a compelling report on residential and the benefits to the local workforce which in turn benefits the city…I would really be interested in hearing it. As I said, I’m open to residential growth if there’s a good reason for it.
Oh…that silly indignation…like not being able to live in Davis is some sort of horrible burden on others….hmmm…who’s being elitist???? Not being able to live here for many is simply an economic reality. I can no longer afford to live in San Francisco…I have no belief that I have any right to live there. I can’t afford to live on Maui…should Maui be concerned about it’s ability to house me? Or should Maui consider if it’s to their benefit to house me?
There’s some serious irony in your (false) accusation of me of being a NIMBY. I’ve been verbally drawn and quartered by neighborhood NIMBYs over residential development projects.
An economic reality created by the City’s planning and policies, which are matters of choice, not inevitability.
Yes.
If you live in Lahaina and work at a coffee shop or garden center there, it should be reasonably possible for you to find a place to live in or near Lahaina that doesn’t cost more than 30% or so of your income.
I have been acquainted now for decades with young adults who work in Davis and compete to find housing in this market. These folks don’t know for sure where they will be living next year at any given time, or they face annual 5% rent increases (probably higher in fall 2021). I don’t know how long it’s been since you’ve been in that situation. I’m not, but I know a lot of people who are.
So I am sympathetic to their situation and consider the supply problem, which is largely created artificially in Davis by the voters, to be a major source of the problem.
The university’s cavalier refusal over several years to adequately plan for their impact on the local housing market is certainly a major factor as well. But it’s not all one of the other. Lack of private supply increase coupled with poor planning between the city and university combined with lagging supply by the university has added up to a big mess with respect to affordable housing and reasonable housing supply locally.
I have also been acquainted with young adults who moved up in their professions, gained partners and children, and were seeking to find housing that they could afford under the basic mortgage qualification parameters. In the years I’ve known these folks, in both categories, I’ve watched as they’ve gradually been priced out of the Davis market, or, in the case of those employed here, have simply had an inadequate amount of supply from which to choose. This is spurring the growth and rapid sales of housing in south Woodland and west Dixon.
Ask the barista you get your coffee from next time where they live and what percentage of their pay goes to that rent.
A region that is growing, and has increasing jobs, will need to provide housing for the folks who work in that region. Presently Woodland and Dixon and West Sacramento are providing that housing.
TLDR? People who work here need places to live.
Or another way to look at this – this is a university town where people who work at the university and some who attend the university can’t afford to live here. And then we get people who live comfortably who shrug their shoulders at the situation.
Good luck with that – in almost any community, for that matter. At least, not without a bunch of roommates and/or Affordable housing, etc.
What this does is shift the cost of employees from the employer, to taxpayers at large (e.g., in the form of Affordable housing and health care costs). That cup of coffee or plant charged to the consumer does not reflect the actual cost.
Not sure if you’re referring to students, but there’s a boatload of housing already-approved for them, on campus and in the city. Some claim that the megadorms will also house non-students, and that was a key part of their argument in support of them.
Some landlords have been hit pretty hard by the eviction moratorium (while being unable to collect rent). In Davis, the vacancy rate has skyrocketed due to the pandemic. Those are costs of business, which ultimately must be accounted for when calculating income (rent) vs. costs. And if rent isn’t high enough to cover costs, then more units won’t get built – regardless of how many more are approved.
Probably should also compare that to rent increases throughout the region, before concluding that this is a “Davis-only” thing.
There’s lots of YouTube videos which show that many low-income renters cannot afford even the cheapest areas of this country, with very minimal rent costs. And those are also the same areas which have essentially no growth restrictions. This is why the eviction moratorium was enacted – not necessarily to protect students in Davis (many of whom returned home for a semester, with online access to classes).
Bottom line is that we have a capitalistic system “in charge of” housing, which leads to those with limited income at the mercy of that system. Except for Affordable housing, which subsidizes low-wage employers (and the price charged to their customers).
Are you aware that landlords get recouped 80%?
https://caanet.org/gov-newsom-signs-bill-with-2-6-billion-in-federal-funds-for-unpaid-rent/
And yours is essentially Marie Antoinette’s: “Let them eat cake.”
David: I am aware of that program (in California only), but I understand that there are specific requirements to qualify (for renters, I understand). And, not all of them do.
Regardless, a 20% loss is still a loss, as are vacancies (e.g., in Davis). And, dealing with whatever bureaucracy results from that program.
I suspect that in Davis, the biggest loss is from those students who returned home (and left vacant units behind). Again, that’s a cost of business, which means that rent ultimately has to be high enough to cover that (along with all other costs, in a capitalistic system).
My comment was primarily intended to show that the inability to pay rent is a significant problem throughout the country – even (and perhaps especially) in the cheapest areas.
Anyone employed at UCD, or is a student there is (generally) not one of the people truly at the bottom of the system.
My comment was mainly intended to make sure that accurate information is posted. Whether the 20 percent not covered is a loss, I’m not sure. THat may be the reduction of costs as the result of fewer tenants.
The 20% “discount” appears to be primarily for those who are occupying their units.
Not the vacant units, for which the lease is essentially null and void.
The document posted lists some of the requirements to qualify.
But I suspect that in Davis, the larger cost was from students who abandoned their leases (one way, or another) before this program even started.
We’ve been allocated a share of regional housing growth to meet. This isn’t an internally generated requirement–it is coming down from the state. That’s the compelling reason.
Even so, this is about whether we will continue to tolerate being a segregated community. Our building restrictions are pushing prices out of the reach of ethnic groups that have historically been excluded from building the wealth needed to buy a home in Davis. Perhaps if we give the descendants of slaves the $200,000 in foregone assets that past laws caused we could solve this problem differently, but that doesn’t look like that’s going to happen. So instead we need to increase the housing supply to push down prices to affordable levels.
No. You could zone a super fund site and meet the housing requirements by the RHNA. So the state requirements are fairly irrelevant to the discussion. In fact David said: “However, as we have noted previously, the city, in order to meet the requirements of the Housing Element and the Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA) does not actually need to build the housing.”
I thought we had discussed this here numerous time before. Increasing the Housing Supply through builders building houses does not bring down housing to affordable levels. I hate to burst your mythic bubble about this concept. Builders only build if they can get current housing prices or increase the current prices for the homes they build. You know what builders do if they can’t get the prices they want for their homes? They don’t build. (they may build a few homes on spec to get buyers to jump start the local market). You’d have to massively increase the infrastructure and figure away to decrease the labor cost of construction to get builders to build quantities of homes that could go on the market and never mind just lower home prices to make them affordable but even stabilize them.
That’s fiction–a Superfund site can’t be rezoned. (Davis already has experience with this in East Davis.)
And David is wrong on this time around. The state has decided that it is going to enforce meeting the RHNA goals through local funding restrictions.
https://www.hcd.ca.gov/community-development/accountability-enforcement.shtml
This is driven by STATE mandates, not local preferences, and there’s not denying this. You’ll need to present facts that support your assertion.
As to the fundamentals of supply and demand, ask homeowners in Las Vegas and Phoenix about how a housing supply excess can drive down prices. The point isn’t to necessarily to reduce prices, but rather to stop the rapid escalation. That comes specifically from increasing the housing supply. Builders will rescale their expectations as prices stabilize or even fall. The fact is that several large housing developments have been proposed in Davis, and have been built in Woodland that have affected housing supply and prices.
I was a bit disappointed in the Housing Element survey. It simplified the many of the choices too much, and framed others in a manner that I didn’t think were realistic. The sphere of influence included UC Davis and two already approved projects (Nishi and Bretton Woods). That was eventually fixed, but more targeted selections would have been more useful.
For within-City options, instead of being grouped by zoning type, they should be grouped geographically to be considered in the context of location and access for multifamily residents. The Downtown is properly placed as one group. The locations at J & Kennedy and Mace & Alhambra should be a second group that is already amongst MF housing and not an immediate candidate for commercial or office development. The office/business parks along I-80 should be another group because it is potentially usable soon for non residential use and air quality impacts are worse. Finally, the commercial and residential space along south Mace should be grouped (or each separately considered) because they require special considerations for MF development.
Voters, by invoking Measure JeRked, have turned down a lot more housing than that. Imagine how many developers have never even considered trying to build a project in Davis at all.
Let’s all sing the Davis Elitism Anthem: “I worship Measures J/R/D! They keep my property value high high high! And high rents for my buildings bleeding from stu-dents! Let’s keep Davis for ourselves! Measure J/R/D, we worship thee!”
No shˆt, Sherlock.
Yes, I would call not having to do something, a lower threshold. LOFL
Thanks highly paid consultant. We knew.
Eight ‘COULDs’ !!!!!!!! If coulds were houses, Davis would RIDE !!!
We pay consultants to write this stuff? I would have written that for FREE.
HA! Seriously??? That war is LOST and becoming LOSTER. You think subsidizing of rent on a few hundred people in the future is going to make a dent? Have you not heard — we have a hard JeRkeD perimeter, Bay Area work-at-homes finding Davis one of the most attractive places to dump their sold-home cash and move to, and UCD will be at record attendance levels in Fall ’21. Bidding wars taking place on local sales, and already — seeing these trends — local landlords are expecting a return to low vacancy rates, and therefore raising fall rents — 5-10% from renters I’ve talked to. That 12% vacancy figure for this school year was a low-UCD-attendance, Covid-19 blip.
See these recent local articles regarding the reality of Davis’ “affordability”:
New homes in very short supply
https://www.davisenterprise.com/news/business/new-homes-in-very-short-supply/
Shortage of homes for sale sparks bidding wars
https://www.davisenterprise.com/news/local/shortage-of-homes-for-sale-sparking-bidding-wars/
As Mick Jagger sings in “Shattered”: “Up Up Up Up UP !!!!!”
As of 1/1/2020 (for units that are occupied, I understand):
California’s rent control law, explained – Curbed LA
For anyone interested, I wrote a comment guide for the HE with alternatives to pushing multifamily housing far from the best locations. Feel free to share! https://bit.ly/DavisHousingYes
From Joe Bolte’s link:
“In 21 years, Measure J/R/D has produced 0 housing units.”
But it has protected commodity production land where you get the lowest value added bang for the buck. Of course it did this at the expense of converting agricultural research fields at UC into student housing. In case you don’t know the value added through research is the biggest bang for the buck. So it appears we have our economic priorities backwards.
“As I said last time you wrote this article (2 weeks ago?); there still hasn’t been a compelling reason to encourage new residential growth ”
There are many reasons you simply don’t value them.
First and foremost UC Davis is growing rapidly. It is the economic engine of the region. The local community turning its back on providing infrastructure supporting UC is creating all sorts of problems locally. These problems will only get worse over time as Davis continues to be run by the politics of the last century whose sacred cow, Measure J and its successors, are supported by both Nimby’s and political cowards.
Man there’s a lot to unpack here. Okay first of all let’s clear something up.
Underlying Beliefs for Policy
From Eric Gelber
From Ron Glick
For the most part I don’t believe anyone has the right to live anywhere. If you can’t afford to live somewhere; you move. I’ve done it. Relegating people to living in near by cities isn’t some sentence of damnation; Woodland, Dixon and West Sac aren’t circles in hell. It’s the reality of how communities develop everywhere.
Who has the right to live here? Where do you draw the line? Does everyone who wants to live here have a right to live here? If the median household income necessary to buy a house is $150K (I’m just pulling this number out as an example); what if we decide….people with median household incomes of $100K should be able to buy homes…no wait…what about households that make $80…or $60…$30K (which is about $15 an hour)? As soon as you set a line…some people are going to have to live elsewhere in nearby communities. What I’m saying is…what is the policy and why? Too many people clutch their pearls a think of the children when they talk about housing affordability…often with some indignant moral outrage (see David’s reply above: ” And then we get people who live comfortably who shrug their shoulders at the situation.”) Then they simplistically say we just need to build more houses. All I’m asking is what is the rational for any policy going forward?
Here’s the other thing that some here don’t seem to accept. Residential Housing Is A Cost to a Community. So from a financial perspective, people driving in to a city and working and then leaving is actually a good thing. People driving into a city and buying things is a good thing. Business and sales tax without the cost of providing services. Right now Davis is a bedroom community. Most people leave Davis to work. Even worse; people leave to shop and for entertainment and generate tax revenue elsewhere.
So IMO, there needs to be a good reason for increasing market rate housing in the city…other than irrational moral outrage. Maybe the numbers support a housing increase to support economic growth in someway. Maybe an employer or potential employer has specifically said they need homes for their workers to be near by (closer than Dixon and Woodland I guess?).
Housing Affordability & Home Builders
I believe affordable housing is a separate issue from the general market rate homes.
I don’t oppose figuring out a way to get affordable housing into Davis.
I oppose relying on for-profit builders adding market rate housing supply as a solution to the need for affordable housing or to make market rate housing affordable.
I’ve stated my reasons. It seems like some don’t believe me.
From Richard McCann
Now raise your hand if you’ve ever worked for a developer and was in charge of running the pro forma (which includes home price forecasting) for perspective planned communities. Or raise your hand if you had your own development company and ran those pro formas for perspective investors and lenders. I’m talking 200+ unit Planned Communities that open in phases…..hmmm….is there a reason why those communities open in phases? Do builders just keep building with a ready supply of houses sitting vacant and ready? No. Let me ask you this; did the home builders rush to build out a bunch of homes during the Great Recession and flood the market? Or did they sit on the “shadow lots” (mostly paper lots and some finished lots)? Yes home prices came down and supply went up….but not because of new construction. So no, new home construction adding to the supply to even stabilize home prices is a silly idea. Your more likely to cause home prices to go up with new construction based on builder behavior. Another thing…now that I think about it…is that land owners aren’t as likely to sell or develop in a flat market or especially one that is going drop….in my experience, farmers (usually those with land that get annexed….if by miracle it gets passed Measure J) are shrewd about knowing the local real estate market and when to sell.
So IMO, affordable housing and market rate affordability are different things. Both logistically and conceptually.
Affordable Housing Plan & Policy
So what’s the solution? Well, IMO it’s generate revenue for the city through commercial growth and then funnel some of that money into affordable housing.
Davis needs to do whatever it can to get people to work and spend their money here. Look at Vacaville or West Sac’s websites. They show an inviting image and information to prospective businesses/industries. In fact they specifically target some types businesses/industries. Davis? They have a link to an Opportunity Zone map. Most of the rest of it focuses on how businesses can fit Davis’ vision. Not how Davis can fit and accommodate. businesses/industry. People rightly criticized DISC because it didn’t have guarantees of anchored tenants. People worry that because of the pandemic there will be a shift to less of a centralized business office structure. Now I don’t think it’s as overblown bad as some but I can tell you that the city and builder that can PARTNER and customize their services and structure/facilities the most will get the clients to move in and anchor new business parks. What doesn’t help is a city (because of something like Measure J) that forces them to build a Kale Garden Roof, renewable refuse powered HVAC units and a windmill powered sewage treatment plant.
So once you get some commercial office and retail in and some tax revenue; we need to figure out how much of it goes to affordable housing? There has to be some rational….what that is right now…I don’t know. 10%? 15? But what I do know is that there should be a regional, state and federal wide effort to plan this. Why? Because what if Woodland has zero affordable housing units? Where would those people go? To where there are affordable housing units…and thus Davis resources are further stretched. We can’t control what Woodland (or Dixon or Winters…) does but we can coordinate with them to properly plan policy as best as possible.
So then how does Davis allocate those resources? Obviously planning for affordable housing. Good luck getting infill for that without protests from the neighbors…the best bet would be to annex property (I think you could sell affordable housing to the voters…as long as they trust developer). So then you have to figure out are there any special populations you want to target? Maybe workforce housing for police, fire, teachers, healthcare/first responders…baristas? Sometimes Workforce housing is defined as 120% of the household income…which is $70K in Davis…or $84K adjusted. But whatever the definition…that can be debated another time. I’d probably encourage the city and DJUSD to partner in building workforce rental units for new entry level teachers. And of course a percentage of funds that go toward actual low income housing needs. I dunno right now I’m just throwing ideas out there. But the point again is to specifically target affordable housing goals and to pay for them through new commercial growth.
Some what unrelated to all this…..
From Richard McCann
That’s not true. You can pay through the nose to clean up the environmental contaminants (like Hunter’s Point in San Francisco). It’s just often cost prohibitive to do so.
But my point is that the RHNA isn’t going to come and count actual built houses that meet their requirements. You could zone Mordor for residential development and simply say to the RHNA…well we did our part….those darn greedy developers won’t build homes next to Mount Doom and if the RHNA says you should change your plans…sure no problem…just rezone Arrakis and hopefully CEQA doesn’t find out about those pesky giant sandworms.
Residential housing is the reason a community exists.
A bit over-simplified… common interest, common goals (in Davis: Ag, University Farm, supporting business), and yes, housing is the linchpin to make the other goals work…
Don’t know of many/any successful ‘communities’ where housing was the main ‘goal’, raison d’etre…
Miami Beach and Key West are exceptions to Don’s rule … in my opinion.
But with that said, given the fact that between 80% and 90% of the people who live in the City of Davis who have jobs commute to a place outside the City in order to go to work, the residential housing to jobs ratio in Davis is highly skewed toward housing and away from jobs.
One of the telling indicators that confirms that reality is that the population of the City of Davis in the day time is between 10,000 and 20,000 people fewer than the population in the night time. 10,000 of that “lost” population happens because over 20,000 Davis residents go elsewhere to work, while only 10,000 non-Davis residents come into the City to work (source; US Census figures). The other 10,000 plus are UCD students who leave their residences in the City to go to their educational “job” activities on the campus.
Endangered giant sandworms need a home, too! 🙂
(My fifth comment – saved the real “gem” as my last one?)
“Press any key to end this call.”