A step toward affordable housing

Mathis Winkler

NEWPORT BEACH -- Wanted: Affordable housing developer to build at

least 100 apartments for low-income seniors. Have $2 million to help out

if need be.

That’s a so-called “request for proposals” City Council members are

expected to approve at their meeting tonight.

“We’re trying to let the world know that we have money to subsidize a

project,” said Councilman Tod Ridgeway, who chair’s the city’s affordable

housing task force.

But while he agreed with his colleagues that the move would hopefully

bring the city a step closer to getting much-needed affordable homes for

its senior population, a lack of adequate land might turn out to be the

real problem.

“It isn’t for a lack of trying,” Ridgeway said. “Somebody’s going to

have to find a site.”

He added that not many were available, apart from a few places around

Hoag Hospital and some along West Coast Highway in West Newport Beach.

While Newport Beach doesn’t actually have to build affordable housing

units, state law requires the city to have programs in place that

encourage such developments.

The housing element in the city’s general plan requires developers to

set aside a certain percentage of apartments for affordable housing.

The $2 million that is up for grabs came from the One Ford Road

project, where the developer opted to hand over a check rather than build

affordable apartments.

The Irvine Co. also still has an obligation to build 172

affordable-housing units in return for constructing more than 850

market-rate homes in areas such as the Upper Castaways, Harbor Cove and a

stretch of land east of MacArthur Boulevard.

City and company officials have been working on a project for Bayview

Landing at the corner of East Coast Highway and Jamboree Road.

While Ridgeway said he had hoped to see that complex completed within

two years, negotiations were moving “very, very slow.”

One of the main issues that’s still being debated is the mix of

apartments for people with low income and those with moderate income.

Company officials want to build more moderate income units, which bring

in more rent, Ridgeway said, adding that task force members were not in

agreement with that.

Rich Elbaum, a company spokesman, said he wasn’t aware of any

disagreements as a result of the ongoing discussions with city officials.

He added that he didn’t know the specifics of the negotiations.

As far as the request for proposals is concerned, city officials have

set June 1 as the deadline for submissions from developers. But even if

someone comes back with a workable idea, it would still take years before

seniors could move into their new homes, Ridgeway said.