The ongoing process to amend D.C.’s Comprehensive Plan received a key approval vote Tuesday after Council Chairman Phil Mendelson removed language that had caused concerns among planners and housing advocates.
Category: Affordable Housing
CSG in the News: Phil Mendelson added important affordable housing language to the Comp Plan, but some are trying to undo it
Phil Mendelson added important affordable housing language to the Comp Plan, but some are trying to undo it
…On October 2, Chairman Phil Mendelson’s latest draft of the plan’s Framework Element added language similar to those principles, especially around building and preserving affordable housing and protecting tenants in affordable housing when their properties undergo redevelopment. The chairman’s draft also centers the importance of, as DC grows, building in racial and economic equity, a credit to interventions by Councilmember Kenyan McDuffie (Ward 5) and Councilmember Trayon White (Ward 8).
The final vote on the Framework bill is on Tuesday, October 8, and last week, some opponents emerged to fight this language. We’re pushing for it to remain….
The Comp Plan Framework now borrows much of this language
Chairman Phil Mendelson’s latest draft of the Framework has…a lot of what the Housing Priorities Coalition proposed! (The final version will be released on Monday.)
Notably, it reflects an amendment introduced by Councilmember Brianne Nadeau (Ward 1) at the bill’s first reading. Advocacy by many of affordable housing groups who were part of the original coalition, like, DC Fiscal Policy Center, Housing Association of Nonprofit Developers, Enterprise Community Partners, Coalition for Nonprofit Housing and Economic Development, and Coalition for Smarter Growth emphasized the necessity of this sort of language, so it’s a win that Mendelson added more beyond what he had included in the version voted on at first reading.
Not everyone is happy with the new community benefits language. Attorney David Goldblatt of Goldblatt Martin Pozen LLP, which does lobbying and real estate transactions for large companies, wrote a letter on behalf of the DC Building Industry Association (DCBIA) asking to water down this language. Goldblatt said the changes were in the interests of the DC Housing Authority, though his letter says he’s not speaking for DCHA, just DCBIA.
It’s worth repeating that this language is only about benefits given in exchange for zoning flexibility as part of a PUD, like more density. It doesn’t impose any kind of unfunded requirement on property owners. What it does is say is that in exchange for more affordable housing or anti-displacement measures, you can build taller or bigger in proportion.
Affordable housing is really necessary. It’s also expensive. With more floors or larger buildings, it can become economically feasible to offer one-for-one replacement, “build first,” and other features that the city’s residents deserve when their homes are redeveloped.
Not all developers are supportive of this concept, but a lot are. Many think it’s a great idea to build more affordable housing and avoid displacing anyone, as long as they can design a project which does so and actually works economically. Sure, if people could build higher and didn’t have to build affordable units, that would be even more profitable, but public policy can ensure we get affordable housing, while projects still “pencil out.”
Right now, DC’s acute limits on new buildings directly prevent developers from paying for more affordable housing to avoid displacement. Some people from the development community, at least, would like to be part of the solution, and the proposed rule would let them.
The proposed Framework language takes a big step toward achieving what the Housing Priorities Coalition recommended. It’s not everything, because this language just applies to PUD benefits. There will be other opportunities to enact these and the rest of the coalition’s 10 principles in the rest of the Comp Plan. The Office of Planning will release its amendments to the rest of the document October 15, along with housing targets and map changes.
Read the full post here.
RELEASE: Affordable Housing Groups Praise Council Chairman’s Comprehensive Plan Bill
Press Release
DC HOUSING PRIORITIES COALITION
CONTACT
Cheryl Cort, Coalition for Smarter Growth: 202-251-7516; cheryl@smartergrowth.net
Courtney Battle, HAND: 202-384-3764; cbattle@handhousing.org
Affordable Housing Groups Praise Council Chairman’s Comprehensive Plan Bill
Washington, D.C. – October 3, 2019 – Today a coalition of affordable housing stakeholders applaud critical revisions to the draft Comprehensive Plan released by DC Council Chairman Phil Mendelson. This transformative update incorporates three of the coalition’s priorities: ensuring the creation of affordable housing, preventing displacement, and addressing racial equity. The bill will get its final votes by the full Council next Tuesday, October 8.
“We are gratified that the Comprehensive Plan bill offers the guidance our city needs to make affordable housing and preventing displacement top priorities. The bill also provides clarity to the development approval process, clearing the way for increasing affordable housing and other public benefits, along with community input as part of the negotiated process,” said Cheryl Cort, Coalition for Smarter Growth, a member of the DC Housing Priorities Coalition.
The group pressed for the DC Council to amend its bill after the first vote on July 10, urging the body to adopt stronger language on how affordable housing would be prioritized in land use decisions. It appealed to zoning experts and the DC Office of Planning to work with the DC Council to ensure the development approval process (i.e. Planned Unit Developments), would achieve greater levels of housing affordability, tenant protections, and increased certainty. The group’s goal was to achieve more affordable housing and prevent displacement of existing residents, while reestablishing a more fruitful development review process.
“We talk about the Framework elements as a “bill of rights” for District residents and communities,” said Melissa Bondi, Mid-Atlantic State & Local Policy Director for Enterprise Community Partners. “It is important that the current language reflects our values, including prioritizing resident protections, emphasizing greater housing affordability, and evolving our approaches to achieve a truly inclusive, equitable city.”
“We thank Chairman Mendelson for amending the Comprehensive Plan bill to prioritize the creation of affordable housing and prevention of displacement, while also providing needed clarity to the development review process. We particularly appreciate that the administration, the Council, and advocates were able to find common ground to facilitate a more equitable development process for the District,” said Steve Glaude, President and CEO of the Coalition for Nonprofit Housing and Economic Development (CNHED).
“The revised language provided by Chairman Mendelson will accomplish the goals we set – to elevate affordable housing and racial equity, and fix the broken project review process, said Heather Raspberry, Executive Director of the Housing Association of Nonprofit Developers (HAND). “Creating and preserving more affordable housing throughout the District is the cornerstone to building an inclusive city where all of our neighbors have an opportunity to thrive. We appreciate the Chairman and Council’s thoughtful review of the Plan which will serve the city and surrounding region well.”
“Prioritizing affordable housing and the prevention of displacement in the Comprehensive Plan are two necessary steps our city must take in charting a path toward a more equitable future,” said Adam Kent, Senior Program Officer at the Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC). “We look forward to working with the DC Council on the remaining elements of the Comprehensive Plan to ensure these priorities are maintained throughout.”
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DC Housing Priorities Coalition
Who We Are
The DC Housing Priorities Coalition includes: Enterprise Community Partners, DC Fiscal Policy Institute, Coalition for Nonprofit Housing and Economic Development (CNHED), Somerset Development Company, Coalition for Smarter Growth, Greater Greater Washington, United Planning Organization (UPO), Local Initiatives Support Corporation (LISC) and the Housing Association of Nonprofit Developers (HAND).
Why We Formed
The Housing Priorities Coalition formed three years ago to help update the DC Comprehensive Plan, the land use policy that guides development decisions in the District. (Learn more from DC Office of Planning on the DC Comprehensive Plan amendment process here). See the full Housing Priorities Coalition amendment package here. The Housing Priorities Coalition’s guiding principles for amending the DC Comprehensive Plan are:
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- Meet the housing demand
- Equitably distribute housing
- Best utilize areas near transit
- Include families: ensure homes for people of all income levels and of all household sizes, including families.
- Prioritize affordable housing as a community benefit
- Preserve existing affordable housing
- Protect tenants
- Support neighborhood commercial corridors
- Clarify zoning authority
- Improve data collection and transparency
Why These Priorities:
Lack of affordable housing and risk of displacement are among the greatest challenges DC faces to achieving racial equity, quality of life for residents, and economic sustainability for all.
Low-income District residents, particularly residents of color, do not currently enjoy equal access to affordable housing connected to communities of opportunity, perpetuating a gaping racial equity gap.
The Planned Unit Development (PUD) process, which is an important way to produce new housing with substantial affordability, is now held up in constant court challenges resulting in thousands of stalled homes, including hundreds of affordable homes. Court challenges and rulings have relied heavily on narrow interpretations of the Comp Plan, so the proposed amendments help to clarify how the Zoning Commission should judge and prioritize PUDs. Such clarification is critical, because even the risk of lawsuits has dramatically reduced the use of PUDs for affordable and market-rate housing (ex: Park Morton public housing blocked due to Bruce Monroe PUD lawsuit). View the list of stalled projects published by Washington Business Journal here.
CSG in the News: D.C. Council advances key comp plan changes in bid to ease activists’ concerns
Final changes to the first section of the D.C. comprehensive plan are taking shape, and it seems District lawmakers have acquiesced to the demands of activists and some city leaders who worried a previous draft was seriously flawed.
D.C. Council Chairman Phil Mendelson is circulating a draft of amendments to the plan’s “framework element.” Crucially, Mendelson and his staffers have rewritten a section of the bill that a coalition of housing advocates and developers feared would open the door to a flood of new legal challenges to large new developments.
The chairman had hoped to pass this legislation by now, as changes to this section of the comp plan are broadly seen by the development community as being essential to beating back future lawsuits seeking to hold up planned-unit developments. But he chose to delay consideration while this debate over the language played out.
With issue seemingly resolved, it should set the table for the council to, at last, finalize the amendments to the framework element by Oct. 8.
“We think the language in the revised bill addresses our concerns about fixing the broken PUD process and elevating affordable housing,” said Cheryl Cort, policy director for the Coalition for Smarter Growth and a lead organizer of a campaign to raise awareness about potential problems with the old language. “The chairman really listened carefully and considered all the issues here.”
Cort and many of her colleagues in the housing advocacy world worried that changes to one section of the framework could “generate a tremendous amount of uncertainty in the PUD approval process or would open up PUD approvals to litigation in a brand new way.” A member of the D.C. Zoning Commission voiced similar concerns, as did Planning Director Andrew Trueblood.
View the full story in the Washington Business Journal here.
CSG in the News: Guest Commentary: A Tour of West Falls Church & the Railroad Cottages
LOCAL COMMENTARY
Guest Commentary: A Tour of West Falls Church & the Railroad Cottages
September 27, 2019, by FCNP.com, the Falls Church News-Press
By Stewart Schwartz & Sonya Breehey
The best way to understand how to make our communities more sustainable and livable, is to get out and walk. That’s why the Coalition for Smarter Growth led one of our signature walking tours, this time in West Falls Church, from George Mason High School to the Railroad Cottages, along the W&OD Trail, and back along Broad Street (Route 7). We were joined by 40 people for the tour, meeting up at the Capital Bikeshare station next to Haycock Road. A number of our attendees arrived by bike and Metro.
We were welcomed by Mayor David Tarter and Councilmembers Letty Hardi, Phil Duncan and Ross Litkenhous from the City of Falls Church, Councilmember Pasha Majdi from the Town of Vienna, Delegate Marcus Simon, city planning commission and transportation commission members, staff, residents, and volunteer advocates from across Northern Virginia. Mayor Tarter provided an update on plans for the entire West Falls Church Metro area including Falls Church’s new high school and redevelopment area, the Virginia Tech campus, and the Metro station parking lots.
Walkable, mixed-use, mixed-income development next to our Metro stations is essential if we are to grow without making traffic worse and essential for cutting the transportation emissions that are now the leading source of greenhouse gas emissions in our region. Transit-oriented development will also expand the city’s tax base, providing funding for schools and other services.
Councilmember Hardi discussed safety issues facing people crossing Broad Street. Delegate Simon and others talked about safety issues along Shreve Road where a person was tragically killed by a vehicle as she walked on the sidewalk. The region is experiencing a big uptick in pedestrians and cyclists killed or injured by vehicles, and redesigning our streets to be safer for all users is imperative. Fortunately, a project is in the works to make the Route 7/Haycock Road intersection safer, and additional safe crossings are planned as part of the city’s redevelopment project. Meanwhile, Delegate Simon and other officials are pursuing safety improvements for Shreve Road.
We then walked a short distance along the W&OD to the Railroad Cottages — a highlight of the tour. When proposed, these 10 cottage style homes on 1.25 acres were the subject of significant concern from neighbors. The triangular site next to the W&OD trail originally allowed for four building sites. But in view of the significant housing needs in our region, and a desire to create environmentally sustainable homes with a sense of community, the project’s visionary development team proposed 10 cottages and a shared common house. The cottages are arranged along a central pathway, with cars parked away from the homes.
The homes were built to “Earthcraft Gold” energy-efficiency and sustainability standards and use Universal Design to allow for mobility when aging in place. It’s an 18-minute walk from the cottages to the West Falls Church Metro, 14 minutes by bike to the East Falls Church Metro on the W&OD trail, and a five-to-10-minute walk to a range of shopping and services along Broad Street. The stormwater management is cutting edge — controlling stormwater runoff to the same level as a healthy forest.
The residents of the Railroad Cottages graciously opened their doors to us, showing us their homes and describing what it’s like to live in the community. Project visionary Theresa Sullivan Twiford, architect Jack Wilbern of Butz Wilbern Architects, and developer Joe Wetzel of the Young Group, told us about the approval process and its many challenges.
Our planning and zoning rules in the region do not make it easy to build clustered homes, and the time and cost for special approvals adds to the cost of each new home. It is easier to build “by-right” very large, nearly full-lot occupying houses, which on this site would have cost $1.5 million or more, than to build these smaller 1340 to 1380 square foot homes.
Given our region’s housing needs, 10 homes within walking and bicycling distance to Metro are better than four. Still, at about $800,000 apiece, these homes remain out of reach for most families. They point the way, however, to the potential for smaller homes, and especially duplexes, triplexes, and fourplexes, to provide more options with greater affordability.
We need to identify the best places for these homes in terms of access to transit, jobs and services, and make the design, zoning and approval process easier. Otherwise, our grown children and many sectors of our workforce will simply not be able to afford to live in our community. Creating more walkable, transit-oriented communities is how we can grow sustainably, provide the homes we need, and fight climate change. Fortunately, as the tour showed, the City of Falls Church is emerging as a leader in this effort.
Stewart Schwartz is the executive director of the Coalition for Smarter Growth, and Sonya Breehey is their Northern Virginia advocacy manager.
View the guest commentary in the Falls Church News-Press here.
CSG in the News: Editorial: A Falls Church Example Of ‘Smart Growth’
Editorial: An F.C. Example Of ‘Smart Growth’
Stewart Schwartz, executive director of the prestigious Coalition for Smarter Growth, last weekend chose to conduct one of his organization’s famous walking tours in the City of Falls Church, focusing in the recently-completed cottages project developed by City developer Bob Young, chair of the City’s Economic Development Authority, and his team. The cottages were identified by Schwartz’s group as important in the wider conversation about “sustainable growth” because they represent a departure from the prevailing notion of what single detached homes should look like and offer to the demographic trends of tomorrow….
The cottages project, he added, “Point the way to the potential for smaller homes, and especially duplexes, triplexes and fourplexes, to provide more options with greater affordability…Creating more walkable, transit-oriented communities is how we can grow sustainability, provide the homes we need and fight climate change.”
So, clearly, where the City can “lead by example” would be in the area of instituting the kinds of planning and zoning rules changes that will have the effect of incentivizing shifting development priorities in just that direction.
View the full commentary in the Falls Church News-Press here.
CSG in the News: ‘We’re Going To Run Out Of Space To Build Housing’: D.C. Mayor On How To Add Density In Upper NW
‘We’re Going To Run Out Of Space To Build Housing’: D.C. Mayor On How To Add Density In Upper NW
by Jon Banister, Bisnow Washington DC, September 23, 2019
To achieve her goal of adding 36,000 housing units to the District by 2025, Mayor Muriel Bowser said the city will need to have difficult conversations.
Bowser discussed strategies for adding density in Upper Northwest D.C. on an Urban Land Institute panel Friday, after ULI presented its recommendations for allowing more housing development in the Rock Creek West area….
The area west of Rock Creek Park has seen significantly less housing development in recent years than other sections of the District. Bowser said earning the support of residents of that area for new housing requires talking about the issue in a different way….
One of the primary roadblocks to building new housing in recent years, city officials and developers agree, has been the deluge of appeals that have delayed dozens of projects in court….
A consequence of the appeals has been developers beginning to abandon the planned-unit development process, which allows greater density in exchange for community benefits, Coalition for Smarter Growth Policy Director Cheryl Cort said. The majority of appeals have challenged the Zoning Commission approval of PUD projects.
“The planned-unit development process is broken, and in fact, we don’t have to worry about lawsuits anymore because hardly anyone is filing planned unit developments,” Cort said. “It’s hardly a perfect process, but it was designed to bring the community into a discussion rather than just a matter-of-right deal. We’re losing that opportunity.”
Read more in Bisnow here.
Planners, advocates seek to change troubling provision in DC Comprehensive Plan bill
DC Office of Planning and advocates seek to change troubling provision in DC Comprehensive Plan bill
by Cheryl Cort & Stewart Schwartz, Coalition for Smarter Growth
On October 8 (postponed from September 17), after three years of discussion, the DC Council is poised to adopt a bill that sets the framework for the rest of the Comprehensive Plan. However, language inserted into the bill in July by Council Chairman Phil Mendelson would impose standards for the Zoning Commission’s review of Planned Unit Developments (PUDs) that would both block new affordable housing and increase displacement.
Housing advocates in the Housing Priorities Coalition have expressing alarm over the provision, while seeking to strengthen the plan’s commitments to affordable housing and displacement prevention. And this week, in a September 11 letter from the DC Office of Planning, Director Andrew Trueblood expressed concern that the Council bill’s language would create “a novel and ambiguous review standard,” that would lead to even more litigation.
Planned Unit Development is a flexible, participatory review process which has been all but halted in the District as a means for building new housing due to lawsuits. Clarifying the PUD approval process has been a goal of both affordable housing advocates and developers in the wake of thousands of housing units being stalled in lawsuits in the last few years. PUDs have been largely abandoned in favor of “by-right” development, meaning loss of opportunities to exchange flexibility and increased density for more affordable housing and other community benefits. Only three PUDs have been proposed in 2019, down from dozens per year in recent history.
The Office of Planning raised concerns about the previous PUD guidance in the Council’s version of bill before the first vote on July 10, 2019. At the same time, affordable housing and smart growth advocates have been urging for clarification of the PUD process so that we can create more housing and give high priority in PUDs to building and preserving more affordable housing, and preventing displacement.
Advocates cite the Bruce Monroe plan (now stalled in litigation) as an example of the benefits of PUDs where affordable housing is made a high priority in review and approval. At the core of the plan to replace all 174 homes for the deteriorating Park Morton public housing complex, is the nearby mixed income PUD for the Bruce Monroe site.
In July, Chairman Mendelson changed the guidance language, adding new standards, including requiring the Zoning Commission to determine if a PUD or Zoning Map Amendment “is generally compatible with the physical and visual character of the surrounding neighborhood.” As noted in previous posts, prioritizing physical form of neighborhoods — rather than its activity or its people — suggests that this factor is more important than other goals in the plan, like preserving and building more affordable housing, and preventing displacement of long-time residents.
This “physical and visual character” language raises the specter of exclusionary zoning according to affordable housing advocates, who note that this language is similar to planning language that has historically perpetuated housing segregation. Office of Planning’s September 11 letter recommends removing the exclusionary language and the other new standards created by Mendelson in the July version of the bill.
Affordable housing advocates are alerting their supporters to the potential exclusionary impact of the language. In addition to recommending adoption of the Office of Planning’s recommended language or its outright removal, the groups are also supporting Councilmember Brianne Nadeau’s proposed amendment for another section of the bill – which would make affordable housing and displacement prevention priorities in PUDs.
Andrew Trueblood’s letter says the Office of Planning looks forward to working with the Council committee to “make sure we get it right and avoid unintended consequences that would undermine the District’s ability to meet the needs of its residents, especially the need for affordable housing.”
On October 8, we’ll see if the DC Council adopts language to make the city more inclusive or more exclusive, and if they will adopt a predictable Planned Unit Development Process that places a priority on affordable housing as part of PUD approvals.
Click here for CSG’s action alert.