By Calvin Welch, Housing and Land Use Member, HANC Board
Some 90 folks turned out at HANC’s January meeting on Mayor Lee’s proposed (and wildly misnamed) “Affordable Housing Density Program.” They heard Dean Preston and Gus Hernandez of the “Affordable Divisadero” Coalition (of which HANC is a member) present the “Affordable Divis Plan,” a community based alternative to Supervisor Breed's massive “up zoning” of Divisadero street last year. Unlike Breed's original plan, the community plan couples density increases with a requirement of 50% of the units being affordable to residents earning area median income and below. The plan also calls for developers paying for MUNI service and other infrastructural costs to meet the demand they generate as well as a ban on demolition of rent controlled units and the displacement of existing merchants.
The community plan is the “mirror image” of the City's AHDP . The Mayors plan, as originally drafted, allows displacement of merchants, demolition of rent controlled building, requires no public hearing on projects, and allows developers to build without making transit or infrastructure investments in the community to address the new demand. The two-floor, automatic density bonus pushed by Lee would repeal existing minimum apartment unit size and allow the building to cover 80% of the lot. Joseph Smooke form the Richmond District and Paul Webber of Nob Hill listed the devastation to those neighborhoods should the plan be adopted as drafted.
HANC”S membership voted to oppose the Mayor's AHDP and support the Affordable Divis plan. The Planning Commission will continue its consideration of the AHDP at its February 25 meeting. After passing at the Planning Commission, the Mayor's plan would need approval by six votes of the Board of Supervisors to pass. That vote is expected later in the year.