Healdsburg talking strategy shift on housing growth

Healdsburg Mayor Shaun McCaffery says he’s jealous of Windsor.

The predominately bedroom community incorporated less than 25 years ago may have less luster than Healdsburg, a premier Wine Country tourist destination where many people would love to live, if they could afford it.

But “Windsor seems to be way ahead on housing,” McCaffery said of the neighboring town a few miles to the south, which has more than twice the population of Healdsburg.

“They’re making a housing development based around Oliver’s Market,” he said. “People want to live next to a nice supermarket. That’s exactly what they’re doing.”

His reference was to the Bell Village project, now under construction with an Oliver’s, and 387 apartments proposed nearby, but yet to break ground.

The mayor’s comment served to grab attention during a workshop on the thorny and complex issue of how to provide more ?entry-level and rental housing for working people and families in Healdsburg, one of the priciest real estate markets in Sonoma County.

Healdsburg is defined by its 158-year-old plaza, a thriving downtown with restaurants, shops and tasting rooms, and nearby historic homes with a variety of architectural styles.

Data presented by a consultant showed slightly more than two-thirds of the 344 homes sold in Healdsburg over the past two years went for more than $575,000, affordable only to buyers with 140 percent or more of the county’s median income. The homes listed were sold in the Healdsburg ZIP code, including some outside city limits.

Virtually all the sales were of existing, mostly single-family ?homes, since only 14 homes were built in Healdsburg during the same time period.

“It’s not a very robust picture,” city consultant Jim Heid, president of UrbanGreen, said of the home construction, adding that the dozen-plus new homes are “people building for themselves.”

Basically, a lack of housing production, coupled with high outside demand, makes mid-priced housing difficult to find.

That means many people who work in Healdsburg have to commute from elsewhere. It also is difficult to attract desirable employers to diversify beyond the city’s tourist economy if the city can’t provide housing opportunities for new workers.

The dilemma already is apparent among some of the town’s existing employers. Only 46 percent of Healdsburg city staff and only 20 percent of Healdsburg hospital employees live in the city, and just 42 percent of school district employees live in town, according to the consultant.

“We have a responsibility to supply some housing to people who work in this community,” Councilman Gary Plass said.

Councilman Tom Chambers said there is a need to build neighborhoods “for kids and old folks.”

The comments came this week in the first of several City Council workshops scheduled over the next couple months. The initial meeting was to create a baseline understanding, touching on the factors that drive housing costs, including land, labor, capital, infrastructure and the entitlement process. The next workshop, on Feb. 23, deals with housing options. A meeting March 25 will outline and prioritize potential solutions.

Council members said they were encouraged by some of the information presented in this week’s session, including tools and techniques other communities are using. Some cities dedicate sales tax revenue, have general obligation bonds or impose an added real estate transfer tax to create affordable housing.

Housing also can be made less expensive by building on smaller lots with common open space or with fewer garages, especially on sites close to public transportation.

The workshops are an outgrowth of one of the City Council’s top 10 goals - to create more housing for low- and moderate-?income families and also update the Growth Management Ordinance.

In a subsequent interview, McCaffery said, “Our hands are tied” because of the Growth Management Ordinance.

“If we want more affordable workforce, market-?rate housing, the GMO is the linchpin to the whole thing,” he said.

The growth ordinance, which was approved by voters 15 years ago, restricts the number of new market-rate homes in Healdsburg to an average of 30 units a year, although subsidized, affordable housing is exempt.

It was passed in response to approval of larger subdivisions such as Parkland Farms on the city’s periphery and concern that Healdsburg could lose its small-town charm with excessive development.

But new construction has not even come close to the cap in recent years, largely because of the protracted downturn in the economy. And planners and consultants say the growth limit makes it hard to finance and build apartments, townhouses, live/work and other creative projects that can put a dent in the affordability problem.

In particular, the city has a plan for redeveloping the south central part of Healdsburg with mixed housing and commercial uses, 80 acres that includes Nu Forest lumber products and the area around the train depot.

“I’d like to see a significant housing component to that - not infrastructure tied to tourism, but tied to residents,” McCaffery said.

After extensive study, a committee last year recommended a slightly more flexible growth ordinance, but the City Council didn’t think it went far enough and postponed putting it on the ballot.

McCaffery said the council can propose a new growth ordinance, likely for the November 2016 ballot, that would allow more housing units to be built every year. But he said the impetus for change needs to come from the community.

“My opinion is some of this has to come from the grassroots in order to do the housing projects we want to do,” he said.

You can reach Staff Writer Clark Mason at 521-5214 or clark.mason@pressdemocrat.com. On Twitter@clarkmas.