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Home My WebLink AboutAffordable Housing Board - Minutes - 03/04/2021AFFORDABLE HOUSING BOARD REGULAR MEETING March 4, 2021, 4:00-6:00pm Remote/Online via Zoom due to COVID-19 3/4/2021 – MINUTES Page 1 1.CALL TO ORDER: 4:02 2.ROLL CALL •Board Members Present: Kristin Fritz, Jen Bray, John Singleton, Tatiana Zentner, Diane Cohn, Daphne Bear •Board Members Absent: Bob Pawlikowski •Staff Members Present: Sue Beck-Ferkiss, Brittany Depew •Community Members: John [no last name listed] 3.AGENDA REVIEW 4.CITIZEN PARTICIPATION •John – Shared some concerns about Kechter townhomes and impacts on traffic and thoughts on the Housing Strategic Plan. 5.APPROVAL OF MINUTES Diane moved to approve February minutes. John seconded. Approved 6-0. 6.NEW BUSINESS A.Update on Kechter Land Bank – Sue Beck-Ferkiss Land Bank is the only long-range affordable housing incentive. The City buys land to keep for future affordable housing – locks in price that would likely be more in the future, and ensures we have affordable housing throughout our community. Kechter Road location near two parks, two schools, good opportunity zone. In 2017, Council had a priority to issue an RFP for homeownership on a Land Bank property, and staff decided Kechter was most appropriate. Issued RFP in 2018, only received one response, issued second RFP in 2019, which received three responses. Chose TWG as development partner and entered into an Exclusive Negotiating agreement with them. Project feasibility studied in 2020. Hope to bring purchase and sale to Council in May 2021. Partners: City of Fort Collins, TWG, Housing Catalyst, Elevation Community Land Trust, State Division of Housing. Required subsidy about $98,000 per unit. Discussion: •For discussion: Would the board like to make a recommendation regarding selling the Kechter Land Bank parcel for $25,000 to develop Kechter Townhomes as permanently affordable for-sale homes? •How does this project’s subsidy amount compare to other projects? Staff Liaison DocuSign Envelope ID: BBD0F2D9-A5EA-4A06-8988-BB2BCAE3FC44 AFFORDABLE HOUSING BOARD REGULAR MEETING 3 /4 /202 1 – MINUTES Page 2 o City’s subsidy experience has mostly been with Habitat for Humanity – the City has provided up to $80k per unit subsidy. • Development proposal is for 54 units. • Elevations Community Land Trust started in 2018, aspire to be statewide. o Initial projects in Denver and Aurora. o Have 40-50 homes that have been completed and sold, and many more projects in the works. o Not the mortgage issuer. • How did we get to the $25,000 amount? o Wanted to withhold some amount of the value for closing costs and other associated costs, etc. but are mostly donating the land (appraised at $1.2 million). • What does permanently affordable mean? o Easier in a rental scenario but, either way, the land is restricted. o Purchase process includes buyer certification of meeting income requirements and sales price certification as affordable. • Has a traffic study been done? o Yes, a study has been done and it’s been considered by the hearing officer in their decision making. • Need to increase affordable homeownership options in attempts to approach housing crisis. o This is a great way to work toward city goals outlined in the new plan. • This touches on several goals we haven’t done in the past, specifically homeownership projects. o Past land bank parcel (Horsetooth) went to rentals. • Have added 1000s of houses and apartments to this part of town, don’t see 54 units causing a huge increase in traffic concerns. Diane moved that the Affordable Housing Board make a recommendation to the City to sell this Land Bank property for the Kechter Townhomes project for $25,000. Jen seconded. 5-0-1 (Kristin abstained) B. Recommended Land Bank Code Change – Sue Beck-Ferkiss Land Bank Reverter Clause currently in code states that the City can take land back in cases of noncompliance. City wants to update language to increase flexibility in response to noncompliance issues. Potential investors, lenders and developers have had issues with how it’s currently worded. Would allow development-specific remedies for noncompliance with City Code’s requirements for the Land Bank Program. Discussion: • How does this affect Kechter? o It might affect Kechter, but more importantly it’s a change for the betterment of the whole program. • Has there been investor feedback or review? o Have received legal feedback and no concerns. DocuSign Envelope ID: BBD0F2D9-A5EA-4A06-8988-BB2BCAE3FC44 AFFORDABLE HOUSING BOARD REGULAR MEETING 3 /4 /202 1 – MINUTES Page 3 • Feels like a big improvement. • Happy to see these modifications because every deal is different. o This code language allows for solutions to be crafted individually depending on each specific situation. • The Board supports the overall idea but feel unable to respond to specific Code language. Jen made a motion to recommend changing city code language to replace the codified right of reverter with development specific documents providing legal remedies for non-compliance. John seconded. 6-0-0. C. Update on Affordable Housing Fee Credits – Sue Beck-Ferkiss Fee waiver program recently transitioned to fee credit program. Came up with set amount of subsidy per unit. New program provides fee credits developer can put in account to pay fees of their choice. $14k per unit, $5,500 for adaptive reuse (e.g. Mason Place – took existing building, which had already paid impact fees, and received credits for that). Two projects will qualify: Spark (Oak 140) downtown (79 units) and Cadence (55 units). Will go to Council Finance Committee in April. Discussion: • Is this subject to independent funding? o Eventually, would like pool of money, but currently a big leap from former process. Intermediate step was to ask for set amount, which was approved by Council. • Each request must be considered and approved by Council. • In the past, fee waivers were backfilled through general fund reserves or Affordable Housing Capital Fund dollars. o Would continue to recommend fund with GF reserves or Affordable Housing Capital Fund. • Only units in the developments that target 30% area median income households or below would qualify for this fee credit. Daphne made a motion to make recommendation supporting anticipated upcoming fee credit requests for Housing Catalyst’s Spark project and VOA’s Cadence project. John seconded. 5-0-1 (Kristin abstained) D. Update on Affordable Housing Board City Code Amendments – Sue Beck-Ferkiss Part of larger Board & Commission Reimagine Project. Proposed changes regarding AHB: Specifying a preference for appointing a board member with lived experience of residing in affordable housing and adding ability to make recommendations regarding expenditures for affordable housing. Discussion: • How does the City define a current or former resident of affordable housing? o Assume it would be self-declared on their application. DocuSign Envelope ID: BBD0F2D9-A5EA-4A06-8988-BB2BCAE3FC44 AFFORDABLE HOUSING BOARD REGULAR MEETING 3 /4 /202 1 – MINUTES Page 4 • Currently states no one serves more than 2 terms. Recent terms have been shortened to one year, are these still considered full terms? o Sue will investigate this and report back. 7. OTHER BUSINESS a) City Council Six-Month Planning Calendar b) Council Comments c) Review 2020 Work Plan d) Update on Affordable Housing Projects • Certified Kechter Townhomes as 100% affordable e) Future AHB Meetings Agenda • Depending on ballot outcome, may want to have presentation on Hughes Development. • April will be focused on competitive process. 8. BOARD MEMBER REPORTS a) Liaison Reports • Jen – Fort Collins Board of Realtors have presentation from proposed Hughes Development – well designed and thought out, may want to consider bringing this to AHB in the future. • Daphne will be able to attend first Planning & Zone board meeting next week. 10. ADJOURNMENT: 6:04 DocuSign Envelope ID: BBD0F2D9-A5EA-4A06-8988-BB2BCAE3FC44 AFFORDABLE HOUSING BOARD REGULAR MEETING 3 /4 /202 1 – MINUTES Page 5 Attachment 1: Comments from Zoom Chat: From John Singleton to Everyone: 04:22 PM page 25 has the graphs John spoke about. both rent and own show 30% From John to Everyone: 04:52 PM The cost to bring these to market is 285k+100k = 385k. For less than amount, residents can purchase “luxury” condos at Morningside a few blocks away (north end of Observatory Village). Recent sale for 345k https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/3839-Steelhead-St-UNIT-F-Fort-Collins-CO-80528/88798793_zpid/ This is one reason why housing economists advocated "vouchers" (e.g., section 8) as an ultimately cheaper and better way to subsidize housing, without the unintended effects associated with trying to control prices. To mitigate unintended effects, many deed restricted projects distribute the restricted units within market rate projects, instead of dedicating 50+ units all being deed restricted. The traffic study used 2017 data grown by 2%. We have added more than 1000 apartment units in this area in the last few years. with another 500 apartment units proposed Kechter is also used by people going to/from Timnath, Windsor and Costo. Zach recently posted signs asking people to find another route. In the first public meeting, the traffic engineer said that Zach had to most dangerous traffic situation of any elementary school in PSD From John to Everyone: 04:58 PM Traffic from the high school and Zach backs up in front of this project, which will force traffic through the neighborhood. 1000 drivers try to get to Fossil High in the morning, and about 500 try to get to Zach. Much different than down the road on Kechter/ From John Singleton to Everyone: 05:04 PM John, thank you for the information. Some studies on Housing Vouchers: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1111/cico.12180 and https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/10511482.2008.9521639 From John to Everyone: 05:05 PM Thank for the information. https://batten.virginia.edu/alleviating-poverty-through-housing-policy-reform DocuSign Envelope ID: BBD0F2D9-A5EA-4A06-8988-BB2BCAE3FC44 AFFORDABLE HOUSING BOARD REGULAR MEETING 3 /4 /202 1 – MINUTES Page 6 From John Singleton to Everyone: 05:06 PM Will read thank you. From John to Everyone: 05:11 PM There is not much refereed academic research on deed restricted housing, perhaps due to short history, and perhaps because most academics have been more interested in solutions for those more impoverished. Vouchers were advocated in part due to the massive failures in public housing projects in the 1970s (e.g, Newark and Chicago), as well as the failure of rent control (e.g, New York). DocuSign Envelope ID: BBD0F2D9-A5EA-4A06-8988-BB2BCAE3FC44