Photo by Monique Schoenfeld, Town Crier
Linnea Sloan, second from right, was able to purchase her own home in Los Altos at an affordable price. That's because she took advantage of a state law that requires Los Altos to provide some affordable housing. Sloan said she fought to stay in Los Altos so her children could keep their friends and not change schools. Her children, pictured from left, are Laura, 16, Randy, 19, Karen, 21, and Emily, 15. There are currently 25 owner-occupied affordable units in Los Altos.
Town Crier Staff Writer
It's been a struggle, but city is making room for less affluent
There are no questions in Linnea Sloan's mind about affordable housing in Los Altos.
"It saved me," said the 54-year-old single Los Altos mother of four, aged 15, 16, 19 and 21. "It allowed my family to stay in the same school district with the same friends, the same phone number."
Just a year ago she didn't know what might happen.
She was lying in bed in the house she was renting on View Street, reading the Town Crier, when she saw an ad showing her house for sale.
"Then just above, I saw an ad for affordable housing for a family of four. It only ran once. I hung in there like crazy to get it. It turned out I was the only one who came close to qualifying. It was a long, hard process to qualify."
But she did. And in April 1997 she and her kids moved into their new home, a below-market-rate, 1,400-square-foot, three-bedroom cottage on Tyndall Street.
She paid $230,000 and now has a 30-year fixed-rate mortgage. The other Tyndall houses in the project sold for $535,000 to $575,000, she said.
Five years ago, after her divorce, Sloan had to leave her home in Los Altos Hills. She became the sole support of her family and rented the house on View Street so her kids could stay in the same school.
Now she owns her own home and feels pretty good about what she's been able to do.
"I wrote a letter and thanked the city," she said.
"The program worked as it should. I really appreciate the town."
Affordable housing today
Just the phrase itself sounds unlikely at a time when housing costs are zooming. It is no small task for a community like Los Altos, built-out and affluent, to generate affordable housing.
But state law mandates that the city provide affordable housing and has certain goals that Los Altos must meet. For 1990 to 1997, which has been extended to 1999, the city must create 17 units for very low income, 14 for low income, 19 for moderate income and 56 for above moderate income, for a total of 106 new housing units.
The city has come a long way. There are 25 affordable owner-occupied units in Los Altos now that weren't here five years ago, with two more under construction. And there are 13 affordable rental units that have been approved - eight at the 87-unit Tree Farm development on El Camino Real, and five second living units.
The city's doing well, "a lot better than anybody thought they'd be able to do, more than I ever thought they could," said Tom Anderson, a past president of the Los Altos Homeowners League.
Affordable housing is defined as housing capable of being purchased or rented by households of moderate incomes or lower, based on the household's ability to make monthly payments necessary to obtain housing. Housing is considered affordable when a household pays less than 30 percent of its gross monthly income for housing.
Very-low income equals 50 percent of the county median income; low income equals 50 to 66 percent of the county median; and moderate income equals 67 to 120 percent of the county median.
In Santa Clara County in 1997, the median income was $70,200 for a family of four. So very-low income was $35,100; low income was $43,500 and moderate income was $84,250.
To create affordable housing, the city code requires a residential developer to provide either 10 percent of the units as affordable to very-low income households or 20 percent of the units as affordable to lower-income households.
In return, the city must offer incentives to developers, such as allowing greater density for a project, waiving or lowering city fees, or some other type of carrot.
Typically, the below-market-rate units in a project will not have the same level of amenities as the other units, said Nancy Moore Wright, formerly Nancy Hendee, of Community Housing Developers, Inc.
Los Altos contracts with this San Jose-based non-profit agency to sell the below market rate units in town.
There may not be a fireplace, upgrades or hardwood floors, Wright said. Often the affordable unit is on a smaller lot, the site may not be as attractive as the others in the project, the view not the same, it's in the basement or on the heavy-traffic side of a development.
"Each developer finds a way to recover their cost. They may say they have to eat the difference in price, but they make it up on the extra units," Wright said.
To find buyers, "we advertise when a unit is available," she said. Priority is given to those who have lived in Los Altos two years or more or work for the city or school district, she said.
Once a buyer has been selected, the buyer goes out and gets their own financing. Deed restrictions, that "last forever," are set up to keep the property affordable, even when the new owner decides to sell, Wright said.
The restrictions require the unit be owner-occupied; it can't be rented; and it must be sold to a household with an income in the same category that the seller was at the time of purchase. So a moderate income household would sell to another moderate income household. And the sales price is restricted to a percent increase in the median income for the county.
"There's no windfall for the seller," Wright said.
"Bigger banks won't agree to the deed restrictions," she said. "But all savings and loans will go along with it."
Wright said she's impressed with what the city has been able to do. "It's wonderful Los Altos has been able to build more low-income housing, to get developers to go along. They've been able to keep some residents they couldn't have kept."
Like Linnea Sloan and her family.
A contentious history
But it wasn't always so.
Some refer to the early 1990s, when the city was struggling to bring the housing element of its general plan into state compliance, as the most divisive period in the city's history.
In 1987, the city began to update its general plan. By law, one of the parts, or elements, of a general plan, is housing. And the housing element must include how the city is going to provide its share of housing for the region, including affordable housing.
In 1990, the city sent its housing element to the state. The state said it did not comply with state law because Los Altos did not have enough property zoned for multi-family and there were inadequate programs to insure affordable housing, said Los Altos senior planner Jim Mackenzie.
The city council formed an affordable housing committee. It recommended, in a July 1992 report, inclusionary zoning and forming a Los Altos Community Housing Corporation that would administer money for building affordable housing.
Inclusionary zoning is a concept that mandates affordable housing within an area. Sometimes it just isn't practical to build affordable housing in a particular area, so the ordinance allowed for a developer to pay in lieu fees, so the city could build the affordable housing elsewhere.
In response, the mayor appointed a blue ribbon committee on affordable housing. That committee reported in December 1992 that "there is not a need for a separate housing corporation."
In 1993, city council passed an affordable housing ordinance that included inclusionary zoning.
"Subsidized Housing is Coming to Los Altos!" read the headline in the Los Altos Homeowners League spring 1993 newsletter. The Homeowners League "spearheaded" the effort to have a referendum of inclusionary zoning put on a ballot. It passed in November 1993, as Measure G, and rescinded the city's affordable housing ordinance.
By early 1994, a group of citizens, one of whom lived in Los Altos, served the city with a lawsuit. The suit claimed the city had a "15-year history of non-compliance with state law because of deficiencies in the housing element of its general plan."
By then several projects, such as Chester Circle and Chartwell condominiums, that included affordable units, were under way within the city. So Judge Jeremy Fogel, citing these efforts in his July 15, 1994 response, threw out the lawsuit.
But not without a cautionary note to the city.
"It would be naive not to believe that at least some of the people who voted for Measure G did so because they oppose the existence of any low income housing in Los Altos, ever," Fogel wrote.
"The obligation of local government to promote the availability of affordable housing through its general plan process is firmly embedded in the law ... The law applies no less to affluent communities than to others."
In January 1995, the city's housing element was approved by the state, "based in part on the city's commitment to encourage and facilitate increased second unit development," wrote Carolyn M. Badenhausen, acting deputy directory of the state's department of housing and community development.
Second living units
The city's second living unit ordinance, passed in the spring of 1995, was allowed to expire last April.
And that has Los Altos resident Ruth Polata worried.
"We're at a point when we could go off track regarding affordable housing," Polata said. She was a member of the affordable housing committee of the early 1990s.
"We've fought enough battles, with lawsuits, letters from Sacramento. I don't want to see the city backslide," she said.
The city projected there would be 15 low income rental units from the second unit ordinance between 1995-1997 and counted that toward its required goals. As of Dec. 8, 1997, the city has in fact approved five second living units, and is not taking applications for more because the ordinance expired.
Former Councilwoman Patti Williams, a strong advocate of affordable housing who was on the city council at the time the ordinance was enacted, said the sunset clause in the ordinance was "for review, not to sunset it."
Polata sees the second living unit ordinance as an "excellent way to deal with a housing need. We can't make a big dent in needs, but I hope we'll look for ways to do what we can."
Others disagree.
"It's something we need to review," said Councilman Francis La Poll. "But in the general view - it hasn't had much effect."
Anderson would "prefer to let that die."
Some council members have said the ordinance may be discussed at the council goal-setting session scheduled for next Tuesday night.
The hardest portion of the affordable goals for the city to meet are those for very-low income units. The city counts 19 units from the Four Seasons Motel toward the 17 required units.
"We believe it counts," in the affordable housing mix, said city attorney Bob Booth, "because the rooms are long-term rentals, at least month to month. The motel does not pay the hotel tax. Therefore, it is not a hotel."
The police respond to more calls at the Four Seasons, Los Altos' only motel, than any other single spot in the city. Domestic violence, drugs, indecent exposure and assault have all brought the cops calling.
Progress made
Even with some lose ends and unresolved parts, the city is marching closer to its goals for providing affordable housing.
Los Altos is creating a new model, one development at a time, that started with the four-unit condos Abby Ahrens built on Second Street. Just four units. But one was affordable, one of the first low-income units in town. And she didn't get any concessions from the city.
"I chose to prove that a developer could make a difference," she said.
"Polata believes that the most helpful change," in Los Altos, "has been a change in attitude. Just because you don't have a high income, doesn't mean you're an undesirable neighbor."