At a study session with the Los Altos Planning Commissioners and City Council, several issues surfaced regarding affordable second living units.
City staff recommended that the council re-instate the former ordinance. But a majority of council members and planning commissioners want to create a new one.
"We want to find ways to make it (the ordinance) better and more inclusive," said Jeff Warmoth, a planning commissioner, at the Feb. 3 study session.
Three council members, Lou Becker, Francis La Poll and King Lear, want to consider an ordinance that would allow an affordable second living unit on lots 15,000-square-feet or larger.
No action can be taken at a study session, but it provides a forum for the council to discuss issues and a way for city staff to gauge the concerns of the council.
Last April a two-year trial of an ordinance for affordable second living units on 10,000- to 15,000-square-foot lots expired.
"That was trying to squeeze too much into too small an area," said Councilman King Lear at the study session.
The city adopted the original affordable second living unit ordinance in an effort to create more opportunities in town for low-income housing.
The city is mandated by state law to include housing as an element in its general plan.
During the two years the ordinance was in effect, four affordable second living units were approved. City staff had estimated there might be 15 that could count toward meeting the city's requirement for affordable housing, said Los Altos senior planner Jim Mackenzie.
Most of the four units approved were for elderly family members, Mackenzie said.
"Two grandmas a year isn't doing it," Lear said.
During the same period, five market-rate second living units were approved for larger lots, Mackenzie said.
The maximum square footage allowed for a second living unit is 640-square-feet. Recently an applicant approached the city for a variance to build a 1,000-square-foot second living unit on his larger lot.
For the variance the builder offered to make the unit affordable because it is for family members, and they would like more space, staff said.
If the city had an affordable second living unit ordinance, it could count the larger unit toward its goal.
There are 7,500 lots with between 10,000- to 15,000-square feet. There are only 400 of the larger lots.
As the lot size requirement goes up, there are fewer lots that would qualify for an affordable unit, Mackenzie said.
The state rates cities not only on how many affordable units it has but also on "how well you provide opportunities to create affordable housing," Mackenzie said.
The city made the affordable second living unit "a major plank in the housing element" the element that the state approved following a lawsuit against the city, said planning commissioner Penny Lave.
The staff advised the council, in a Jan. 29 staff report, that not extending the affordable second living unit ordinance "could be detrimental to the city retaining approval of the housing element and perhaps expose the city to a refiling of the earlier lawsuit by affordable housing advocates."
Mayor Kris Casto wanted the expired ordinance to be reinstated.
"It's an expectation the state has; it's working; we got four more (affordable units) we didn't have," she said.
The next step will be two public hearings, with the planning commission and with the council. The dates are not yet set, Mackenzie said.