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The City Council is set Tuesday to discuss potential options and opportunities for city programming that could support affordable housing in Pleasanton after councilmembers recently expressed interest in city-sponsored affordable developments.
According to the staff report from the upcoming council meeting, the workshop will focus on providing the council with “information, options and opportunities to discuss the development of a program to support affordable housing project(s) in Pleasanton.”
“The input from this workshop will inform a broader discussion of policy priorities around the city’s overall affordable housing strategy, which will be presented to the City Council in the future and will include use of the city’s Lower Income Housing Fund as well as consideration of other programs or future partnership opportunities, such as those to support ownership housing,” according to the Oct. 1 agenda report.
Pleasanton has 1,267 affordable housing units — 1,126 of which are rental and 141 are ownership units — according to the report. The report also states that in the city’s ONE Pleasanton Strategic Plan and the 2023-2031 Housing Element, the city committed itself to find new ways to support the construction of affordable housing and to address homelessness.
In the past, the city used significant resources such as the lower income housing fund to provide financial support to three housing projects: the 131-unit Kottinger Gardens Phase 1 senior housing development, the 54-unit Kottinger Gardens Phase 2 and the 31-unit Sunflower Hill at Irby Ranch development.
But it has been several years since those projects were built, according to staff, and with affordable housing continuing to be an ongoing issue the City Council recently directed staff to “evaluate the feasibility of the City initiating and potentially providing more substantial resources toward the development of an affordable housing project.”
During Tuesday’s workshop, staff will go over the different types of projects, resources and programs that could help advance a program for “new city-supported affordable housing development, or developments, in Pleasanton.”
But in order to develop and implement such a program, staff will need input and initial direction on several key items and questions which would help inform them on their next steps and overall efforts.
Specifically, staff will be seeking input on aspects such as the target population who would be served by such a city-sponsored affordable housing project, what the type of housing the project should be, whether the city should focus on a quick build project that would be build at low cost and address the most urgent housing needs and how the city should use resources such as the lower income housing fund and potentially city-owned land.
The council could also discuss the possibility of creating more permanent or long-term housing solutions, which would be more costly according to the staff report. Staff also pointed out that all of the options and opportunities that will be discussed during Tuesday’s workshop will be focused solely on affordable housing for rent.
“This is a recommendation based on practical considerations, driven by the nature of available outside funding, and the types of projects that are going to be feasible; it is also a staff policy recommendation based on the much greater number and types of households that could benefit from this important investment of local funds,” according to the staff report.
After Tuesday’s discussion, staff will develop elements of a program that cover the input from the meeting with the goal of bringing it back to the council for final consideration.
The City Council meeting is scheduled to begin at 7 p.m. Tuesday (Oct. 1). The full agenda can be accessed here.
In other business
* New members for the city’s Energy and Environment Commission, Economic Vitality Committee, Human Services Commission, Library Commission and Youth Commission will be officially appointed to their respective positions.
According to the report, the city did not receive any applications for the commercial real estate and life sciences positions on the Economic Vitality Committee — those positions will remain open for application until the vacancies are filled. There are also two vacant positions on the Youth Commission — one for a middle school and one for a high school senior member — which will both remain unfilled this term.
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