Santa Rosa City Council open to developer’s West End housing plan

The Santa Rosa City Council grudgingly agreed Tuesday to consider giving up a section of a West End street to help a developer build 165 apartments near the future downtown commuter rail station.

Council members supported studying the idea further, but also made it clear they had unanswered questions about parking and affordable housing and would need more information before signing off on the proposal.

Sonoma resident Rick Deringer, through his firm Odyssey Development, has been trying for more than a decade to transform a historic winery warehouse in the city’s West End neighborhood into housing.

His 110,000-square foot property is located north of Western Farm Center between the city’s historic DeTurk Round Barn and the rail line. It’s just across the tracks from where another developer wants to build 72 units of housing on Wilson Street.

The warehouses on the property, one of which dates to the 1870s, are currently home to a boxing gym, moving company, and restaurant supply company. Deringer has also previously proposed using the space to assemble futuristic three-wheeled electric vehicles, but he said that endeavor is on hold.

Deringer’s DeTurk Winery Village project has evolved from an approved 73-unit proposal in 2007, to a 115-unit project last year to one seeking 165 units this year.

He’s now proposing a complex of four buildings, three for housing and one retaining approximately 30,000 square feet of commercial space. The housing would be mostly one and two-bedroom units, most in four-story buildings 41 feet tall.

Some residents of the adjacent historic West End neighborhood have express concern about the height of the buildings, but the zoning in the area encourages higher densities around the future Sonoma Marin Area Rail Transit station, which is under construction.

Before the housing development can proceed, however, Deringer says he needs the city to give up its right to a 20-foot-wide section of the east side of Donahue Street. The area, totaling 18,725 square feet, is needed to increase the density of the project and to make space for the 175 proposed parking spaces, Deringer said.

Clare Hartman, deputy director of planning, said the area was “one of the more complicated” to develop in the city and the proposal to turn over a section of street represented an “opportunity … to look more creatively at how to support housing.”

The city has taken similar steps in the past to support commercial projects, but this would be the first involving a residential project, she said.

Deringer’s application would be given a high priority by the staff of the Planning and Economic Development department, she said.

“This is housing downtown. It’s exactly what we’re looking for,” Hartman said after the meeting.

But comments by some council members suggested they are skeptical of the proposal.

Councilwoman Julie Combs signaled that she needed to know more about the affordable housing proposed before agreeing to give up a chunk of a city street for a private development.

“I am hesitant to do a concession of a public good without a commitment of public benefit,” she said.

Deringer has said 16 units would be dedicated to low-income housing.

Councilman Chris Coursey said he wants to know whether, under the proposal, the DeTurk Round Barn would still be accessible for people to rent for weddings and other special events.

He also said it wasn’t clear to him if the low-income housing was voluntary or required in exchange for the higher densities proposed for the project.

Hartman said the number of units allowed for the project would increase if the city gives up the section of street as proposed, but she said it was too soon to say if any affordable units would be required and, if so, how many.

Developers of market rate housing have the option, which they rarely select, to build affordable units into their projects. In most cases they instead pay an affordable housing fee to the city, which the city uses to help construct affordable housing in other locations.

Hartman said the project was still in the conceptual phase and the housing density, parking and other issues would all be analyzed in detail once a formal application is made. She said the council and other boards and commissions would have other chances to weigh in on the project details.

“I think a wise observer of council would hear that we had a number of concerns about what the (project) elements were going to be and the affordability package,” Combs said.

You can reach Staff Writer Kevin?McCallum at 521-5207 or kevin.?mccallum@pressdemocrat.com. On?Twitter @srcitybeat.