New criteria for housing approved
Barbara Diamond
The City Council added seniors on Tuesday night to the preferred
applicants for the affordable housing on Glenneyre Street.
“That was not the original intention of the Affordable Housing and
Human Affairs Committee,” said the Rev. Colin Henderson, a committee
member. “It was supposed to be for people working for low wages.”
The City Council voted 3 to 0 to add seniors 65 or older and
people displaced by a city-sponsored projects to the preference list
-- each criterion given two points -- and banned smokers from the
list.
Related Management Co., a subsidiary of project developer, Related
Cos. of California, had recommended three criteria for preference:
two points for applicants who work in town, two for applicants who
live in town, two points and one point for applicants who lived in
town within the past two years, but were forced to move out due to
the cost of renting.
The council voted to tighten the management company’s
recommendations by requiring local employees to work 25 hours or more
to be eligible for preference points and stipulated a date of Sept. 2
for those applicants who claimed residency.
Only applicants who are 65 or older, work 25 hours or more in
Laguna Beach, have lived here since Tuesday, but were displaced by
the development of Treasure Island, and meet the low-income
requirement would qualify for the maximum eight preference points.
“Alice Graves would be very concerned about this,” Henderson said.
“And she would have been at the meeting Tuesday night.”
The late Alice Graves, who chaired the city committee that deals
with human affairs and affordable housing, tenaciously fought for
affordable housing for “the working poor,” a phrase she regretted but
said she used for lack of a better one.
Graves, who conducted surveys to prove the need for affordable
housing for low-income workers in town and lobbied on their behalf,
argued that seniors already had housing reserved for them. Workers
with small salaries either shared places with others or lived out of
town.
Laguna Beach has 84 low-cost rental units reserved for seniors: 72
at Vista Aliso and 12 on Broadway, with a waiting list of about 200
that’s not restricted to Laguna Beach residents. There is also a
condominium project on Third Street for seniors-only owners, with
caps on the selling price.
The Glenneyre Street project will add 26 low-cost studio
apartments to the city’s inventory of affordable rental units and
fulfill the goals in the housing element of the Laguna Beach General
Plan.
“Approximately 200 names are already on the waiting list, and we
haven’t advertised yet,” said Pat Barry, Community Services director.
“We expect a significant number of applications.”
Seniors were added to the preferred tenant criteria at the
insistence of Councilman Steven Dicterow, who chaired Laguna Beach
Seniors Inc.’s drive for funds to construct a senior center.
Councilwoman Elizabeth Pearson, who also has worked on behalf of the
seniors, and Mayor Toni Iseman supported the addition. Councilman
Wayne Baglin and Councilwoman Cheryl Kinsman recused themselves from
the discussion and the vote, citing possible conflicts of interest
because of property they each own within a 500-foot radius of the
project.
Baglin asked City Atty. Philip Kohn on Tuesday night to
investigate ways that would allow the councilman to vote on the
affordable housing project, which he said would not affect the value
of a condominium he owns on Third Street.
City Manager Ken Frank proposed the Sept. 2 residency deadline to
exclude applicants who might move into town in the next couple of
months to help them qualify for the affordable housing project. Frank
also proposed the addition of preference points for the people who
were displaced by city-sponsored projects.
“There are only two that I can think of: Treasure Island and the
Community Center on Third Street,” Frank said.
The council preference-point formula was to be forwarded to
Related Management Co., which will manage the project.
“I think we would be fine with seniors,” said Christine Polowski,
West Coast compliance manager for the project management company. “It
is not an issue, as long as it is approved by the state, county and
HUD [federal department of Housing and Urban Development], which
helped fund the project, and doesn’t conflict with regulatory
agreements.”
The city’s Affordable Housing and Human Affair’s Committee, which
met the Thursday before the council meeting, was not informed of the
changes, Barry said.
The council authorized staff on Tuesday to work with the
management company to begin the application process.
A deadline for applications will be announced when the units are
advertised. Applications will be randomly numbered, and preference
points will be assigned to each application. Applicants with the
highest preference points will be screened in order of application
numbers. All applicants must meet the income cap, set annually by the
county, based on the median salary for a one-person household in
Orange County, currently $52,900 a year. Six of the 26 units in the
Glenneyre Street project will be reserved for tenants with an income
of 30% of the median, currently $15,900 a year, and 20 units for
tenants with an income of 40% of the median, now $21,200 a year.
The management company will select the tenants but have encouraged
city staff to be there to observe the process.
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