The community is invited to provide input on the City of San Luis Obispo’s Draft Inclusionary Housing Ordinance update, a tool to increase the supply of affordable housing in SLO!

SLO's Inclusionary Housing Ordinance is currently written and implemented ineffectively and works against the ultimate goal of providing for more affordable units in the City. The City Council should not adopt the ordinance until changes such as the following are incorporated:

- Reduce Inclusionary Fee to $5/sq ft. The proposed fee is astronomical and is working against the goal to provide for more affordable and market-rate units. Even in high-end places like NYC and LA, an inclusionary fee of 10% barely works.
- Exempt multifamily projects of 2-10 units. This will incentivize “Missing Middle Housing” by individual homeowners and small builders that is cheaper to construct, cheaper to rent, and easier on existing infrastructure. The proposed IHO as written would add fees to a project demolishing old single-family homes and then building four or more units of housing (now feasible under SB9 and SB10), punishing the exact kinds of projects we need
- Include Condo Conversions (from rental to ownership) in applicability for inclusionary fees. Ellis Act evictions and rental->ownership conversions are a big driver of displacement and homelessness in our community.
- Include State Density Bonus vs City Density Bonus in the Ordinance. Current IHO language is unclear in stating which bonus would apply.
- Exempt Deed-Restricted units from impact fee calculation.

Good Afternoon,

I hope your day is going well.

I would like to provide my public comments-
Rental subsidy should cover any rental expense that exceeds 30% of individuals net income. Recommendation is to have participates report income quarterly (Every 3 months) for rental Subsidy renewal. Individuals can report monthly if they need too. Classify low-income as $0- SLO County Median income. Classify Moderate-income SLO County Median Income to $144,000 (SLO County middle class high end) Mortgages should not exceed 30% rule. This should help support SLO in being more family friendly, because a Single family Household can not compete in this rental market.
Best Regards,
Valerie Butterbredt

Hello, this comment is aimed just as well to the architecture review team as well, and building departments.

I whole heartedly support affordable housing projects in the City of SLO in general theory, but multiple recent projects aimed at increasing housing and affordable housing have permanently degraded our wonderful city to ‘Any City USA’ by blocking the view shed of our city from our city streets.
Examples include New project on Foothill Blvd, Santa Barbara St, and Laurel Lane and older project on South St. Everyone involved in approving all these project referred to above should be ashamed of themselves.
Projects must also have appropriate parking. Thinking people will not have cars by forcing the issue of insufficient parking us just stupid and wrong headed. Laurel Lane parking for our local small business will never be the same as new tenants in a project with either no parking (how it appears) or significantly less parking than needed is negatively effecting the neighborhood. Will be the same for any other project with insufficient parking. Plus the ‘walled-in’ street effect from 4-5 stories high at the sidewalk destroys the character of our beautiful city. As does the terrible architecture of all of these projects. What happen to height restrictions and setbacks?!?!
In short recent projects have HARMED OUR CITY FOREVER by:
• Poor architecture standards
• Blocking our view shed of the surrounding mountains
• Insufficient parking impacts to neighborhoods and small businesses
• Multi-story building 4-5 stories high at sidewalk ‘box in our streets’ (home require height setback, why did you abandon this for new apartments).
• Complete lack of green space (especially in townhouse/condo developments, example all the new/newer condo off Orcutt)
• PLEASE DO NOT DESTROY WHAT MAKES OUR CITY GREAT with short sighted and poorly thought out impacts.
• Just a few more projects like recent ones and SLO will no longer be SLO it is known and loved for being, please don’t add more harm to the damage already done.
Current city approval if apartments, condos, townhouses is starting make SLO look like a LA suburb. Maybe you need to look at Santa Barbara for some examples. Why is the city not requiring classic old town type architecture on city core, Monterey St. projects like several downtown developments have already done with notable departures like Hotel SLO and the ugly La Quinta Hotel. Why are you requiring Craftsman style and/or mission styles this city has so much of, and is part of it character. I have talked with long time city residents who feel exactly as I do. Stop ruining our town. Not against the goals, just a complete failure in execution so far.

One addition comment as a FYI, I would encourage anyone in interested in mixed housing with affordable to luxury homes to look at the original phase one of the development behind CSU Channel Islands in Camarillo CA as an example of development done right. It was built about 20 years ago.

Bill S

Good morning,
I am reading the email that I received this morning asking for public input needed on Draft Policy to Increase Affordable Housing in San Luis Obispo.

I am so grateful that the city is looking into this. I have lived in San Luis Obispo since 1989. When I moved here, I was married and we bought a house in Pismo Beach. I got divorced in 1995 and ever since I have been renting because I could not afford to buy anything.

I worked at Cal Poly from April of 1989 until my retirement in December of 2020. I receive my pension from Cal Poly and Social Security. I have an outstanding credit record, no debts. I would love to be able to buy an affordable 1 bedroom in the city of San Luis Obispo.

Well, let me tell you an experience that I had a week ago. I went to see a condo in the new development of San Luis Ranch. The Harvest Lofts. The price for a studio of 407 square feet. The price I was told was $420,000! Plus of course the homeowners association. Since this studio was the "cheapest" it did not get an assigned parking place. I asked the lady what about the units of affordable sales that every development has to have, what are those prices? She said she did not know because the City of San Luis Obispo decides the prices, and there is nobody in the city that knows anything about it. I was amazed with her answer.

I know that there is a list and I put my name on that list with the city. I understand that there is a lottery. But the prices are so high. I am a retired person with a fixed income. These condos are supposed to be for people that work and live in SLO. I am working for the San Luis Coastal Unified School District as a Spanish Interpreter and Translator. I worked at Cal Poly for 31 years and 8 months. I graduated from Cal Poly in 2001 with a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science, and in 2011 with a Master of Arts in Education.

I have been renting where I live since April of 2006. I like the place and the landlords but they sent me a letter in May of 2021 telling me that they were going to raise my rent 10% a year until it comes to the level of rents for a 1 bedroom apartment in San Luis Obispo.

Have you seen the rents in SLO? I went to see the 3 new apartment developments on Orcutt street. The development on Orcutt near Johnson, a studio the price was $2,320 per month. It was nice but a studio. The prices for a 1 bedroom $2,600 per month. I asked the person showing me the apartments. Are you renting to Cal Poly students? He said a couple but we have renters from Seattle, Washington, the Bay Area and the L.A. area. As you know, these are people with high salaries who are working remotely and they can afford the prices of rents in SLO because the rents from the areas that are coming from are very high. What about the people like me that work and live in SLO but do live on a fixed income? I cannot compete with these renters.

I visited the other development Connect on Orcutt, where the price for a one bedroom was $2500 and a studio $1997. I asked the person showing it to me are the developers from SLO? His answer, not from Santa Barbara.

I visited Twin Creek and there for a one bedroom apartment the rent was $2,625! I asked the person showing in, what happens after the one year lease is up? His answer, I do not know. Which means that the rents are going to continue to go up.

SLO has always been expensive but I wish the city would do something for people like me, honest, retired and with an outstanding credit record, with no debts. I am afraid that my 1 bedroom apartment, 650 sf, that I have lived in for the last 16 years is going to go up to almost $3,000 a month!

I hope that my input will help you.

This ordinance is doubling down on a strategy that has already failed. During a housing shortage, increasing taxes and fees on the thing we need most, more homes, will simply reduce the construction of new homes. This is borne out by evidence other cities that attempt to increase affordable housing by increasing affordable housing mandates:

"Recent evidence from Los Angeles suggests that voluntary incentives foster increased production of affordable housing, while mandates alone increase the cost of producing housing, dampening both market-rate and affordable housing production."

https://calmatters.org/commentary/2022/05/sugar-works-better-than-vinegar-to-encourage-affordable-housing-developers/

"The amount of affordable housing produced under IZ has been modest and depends primarily on how long IZ has been in place. Results from suburban Boston suggest that IZ has contributed to increased housing prices and lower rates of production during periods of regional house price appreciation. In the San Francisco area, IZ also appears to increase housing prices in times of regional price appreciation, but to decrease prices during cooler regional markets."

https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0042098009360683

Increasing costs to would-be developers will simply decrease the likelihood of building more homes. Projects that do get built will involve rising rents of the market rate units, with an inadequate amount of subsidized homes.

Furthermore, by exempting smaller projects, you are increasing the likelihood that fewer homes get built on valuable land in SLO that could be used for more homes.

Rather than taxing the thing we need - more homes - SLO should be looking to incentivize the construction of more infill housing.

I do not support the current draft ordinance. It will not meet it's stated goals, and in fact will likely worsen the already scarce supply of homes in SLO.

You say you have been working on this since 1999, but all I have seen since then are L.A. charlatan developers raping our neighborhoods with the blessing of the City. Look at what you have done to the north side! And the only low income housing you got out of this disaster are a handful of small studios. So, YES, it is time to set 5% for low income and 5% for moderate income in future constructions, and not just studios. It is also time to turn to LOCAL developers who might be more interested in the community and less in filling their pockets. It is also time to take control over the financial supervision. The City should know exactly how much profit the developer is going to make, and keep it at a reasonable level. Finally, you need to keep an eye on the low income housing that has been built. For example, nobody seems to know whether the low income studios at 22 Chorro are full or not, and nobody seems to care. You attracted the L.A. sharks because they knew you were an easy prey, so send the word that these days are over, that you will keep much better control over the supply of housing in SLO, and demand more affordable units.

My name is Luke Stewart, and I am a local renter. I am in full support of the ordinance update to increase the affordable housing mandate. If this is the best that the city can do, it should absolutely be passed as quickly as possible to begin to plug the hole in the boat. Moving forward, I think it is important to note that there is a lot more to be done. Primarily, it is the duty of the city to limit the current domination of R-1 zoning in the city that makes it illegal to build affordable housing throughout the vast majority of the city. The issue of housing unaffordability will be perennial so long as dense neighborhoods are forced to subsidize wealthy suburbanites through high infrastructure costs, planning policies in favor of inefficient large homes, and underfunding of city services that don't require automobiles and disposable time and income. The unfairness of this situation is absolutely not an excuse for developers to deny their responsibility to build affordable housing, but rather a reflection of the poorly formulated structure of the city's zoning laws as a whole.

Is there any type of real affordable housing in San Luis Obispo? The rental prices are not realistic for most people to survive here. How are families supposed to live here realistically.
Is there anyway to offer tax breaks to landloards that rent to families with children. Is there a way to cap rentals prices. Is over $1000 a room affordable? The wages don’t add up in order for most people to survive. So many of these house in Slo are not even close to the worth of the rent.
People are not going to drive over 2 hours to work in slo at a low paying job. We are going to start losing workers and there will be no one left to do the work that needs to be done to keep the city going. We already see that with businesses that can’t hold staff. Are there plans for real affordable housing? A realistic place for most people to live?

Too little too late. No such thing as “affordable housing” in SLO county. 3500-4K a month for a 3 bedroom is ridiculous. Work all month just to pay someone else’s mortgage giving them an asset while you just have a place to sleep and store your belongings. More and more people are becoming homeless each day. Most are in a dormant state of homelessness, just one paycheck away from being homeless. Rents are sky high and they will keep raising them as people are getting desperate and will pay more to not be homeless, until they can’t. The houses available for the obscene cost are not even worth it. Slum lords charging way too much because they know they will find someone to pay the rent. The paying wages do not match the inflation. Just went to Sprouts yesterday and half the store is empty because they can’t keep employees because no one wants to work a dead end job that’s not paying their bills. The whole system is broken and needs an overhaul but that’s not going to happen. And it’s going to get worse. Hope you enjoy seeing all of the ghost carts and homeless around San Luis Obispo because they aren’t going anywhere because there is no solution. What are you going to do? Build some projects? Where?? It’s not going to happen. With the cost of everything including building materials how are you going to build “affordable” housing. You’re not. So keep raising property taxes and they will keep raising rents and eventually maybe everyone will throw up their hands and stop working and paying rent and squatting in the homes they still have access to. You’ve got everyone pinned down and the times are only going to get harder. G R E E D Y Politicians don’t care if you are homeless. They gave everyone “stimulus” just to take it all back the next year with inflation. We live in a society. Good luck everyone.

We must build affordable, low-income housing for our working families in San Luis Obispo who staff offices, restaurants, hotels, grocery stores, and the trades in San Luis Obispo. Discontinue building "high-end" apartment complexes for luxury student housing such as on Foothill. We need homes for families, who are currently packing multi-generational households into shoddy houses, apartments, and trailers.