Housing project gets city approval

CITY HALL — Three city agencies on Tuesday tentatively approved a 72-unit affordable rental housing project for the south San Fernando Road corridor despite concerns from neighbors that the additional apartments would further choke traffic and on-street parking.

Developers of the Vassar City Lights project, also known as Vassar Villas, must still secure nearly $18 million in highly competitive state tax credits to put toward the total $38-million cost before the city fully signs off on the development.

Once the total funding is secured, Vassar Villas at 3685 San Fernando Road will join the adjacent 68-unit Glendale City Lights affordable rental housing project, which is already under development, in permanently transforming Glendale’s southernmost point into a more dense residential area.

“That area is certainly being revitalized,” Housing Authority Vice Chairman Don Mincey said.

But more than a half-dozen neighbors who live behind the 3600 block of San Fernando Road — which will also have a condominium project at the historic Seeley’s Building — spoke out against the two forthcoming housing projects at the meeting. They argued vehicles associated with the combined 140 additional apartment units would be too much for their residential area.

“There really isn’t enough room in this neighborhood,” said Richard Hart, who lives within a block of the project sites.

Traffic moving southbound on San Fernando Road into Los Angeles, particularly during evening rush hours, often backs up to Brand Boulevard and beyond.

Neighbors pointed to the congestion as proof enough that adding more than 500 residents to the area would be unsafe and too burdensome.

All of them opposed the parking exception, provided under state law, that will allow developer Salim Karimi, president of Los Angeles-based Advanced Development and Investment Inc., to build 37 fewer parking spaces than would normally be required under city code.

But Karimi pointed to the underutilized parking structures at other affordable housing projects in defending the parking plan. At least one full level of his completed Metropolitan City Lights, a 65-unit affordable-housing project on 1855 S. Brand Blvd., goes unused on any given day, he said.

When parking provisions for Vassar Villas and Glendale City Lights are combined, it pencils out to two spots per unit — more than what is required with the parking exception, he added.

City officials also argued that many of the residents, who must meet low-income eligibility requirements, do not have the wherewithal to buy two cars. With the project about two blocks away from the Glendale Amtrak/Metrolink station, many residents will opt for public transit.

A representative for Forest Lawn Memorial Park, with its main entrance on South Glendale Avenue just a block east of the Vassar Villas site, sought to formalize the public transit policy, suggesting developers subsidize tickets or provide other incentives so future residents “do not have that extra car.”

With Tuesday’s unanimous tentative approval from the City Council, Housing Authority and Redevelopment Agency, Karimi now has about six months to secure the state tax credits before about $12.1 million in city assistance is allocated to the project in the final development agreement.

City housing officials are not expected to open Vassar Villas to applicants until the five-story project is closer to its tentative opening in late 2010.