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HomeMy WebLinkAboutMinutes - Affordable Housing Committee - 05/08/2019Approved on May 10, 2019 AFFORDABLE HOUSING COMMITTEE May 8, 2019, 10:30 AM, City Hall, Champlain Room Members attending: Leslie Black-Plumeau, Sandy Dooley, Larry Michaels, Todd Rawlings, and John Simson Members absent: Tom Bailey, Michael Simoneau; Liaison absent: Monica Ostby, Planning Commission Also present: Regina Mahoney, CCRPC, Paula DeMichele, from Essex Town; Leo Nadeau, SoBu resident Minutes by Sandy Dooley AGENDA 1. Call to order, emergency procedure, agenda review, comments from guests 2. Review and approval of minutes of 4/16/2019 committee meeting 3. Chair’s comments 4. Welcome Regina Mahoney from CCRPC to lead discussion of the latest draft of inclusionary zoning regs for Transit Overlay District 5. Discuss Planning Commission TDR subcommittee work to date – John Simson 6. Reports and updates by committee members 7. Adjourn 1. Call to order, emergency procedure, agenda review, comments from guests: John called the meeting to order at 10:32 a.m. He noted how to exit from building. John welcomed Paula and Leo to the meeting. (Regina had not yet arrived.) Leo was asked whether he had a particular goal in attending the meeting. He replied that he wanted to learn what is meant by the term “affordable” housing. 2. Review and approval of minutes of 4/16/2019 committee meeting: Leslie moved and Todd seconded motion that the minutes of the 4/16/19 meeting be approved as drafted. Motion passed 5-0- 0. 3. Chair’s comments: John shared idea he wants members to discuss when inclusionary zoning regulation draft is ready for Planning Commission. This idea is to plan and carry out a process in which committee would explore residents’ interest in/support for an initiative focusing on Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs). The process he has in mind would include focus groups via which we would educate residents about the need for more “affordable“ housing in SoBu and learn whether or not residents support ADUs as a method of addressing this need. John also mentioned that Mike’s, Sandy’s, and his terms on the committee were expiring this year and he expected the three would apply for re-appointment and, he hopes, be appointed. He noted that the ad for applicants to the committee states that there are three Affordable Housing Committee vacancies, which means that City Council has not acted on the committee’s request to have size of committee increased from seven to nine members. He is sending an email to Kevin Dorn and Helen Riehle, asking that the City Council take action to increase the committee’s size, as requested. 4. Welcome Regina Mahoney from CCRPC to lead discussion of the latest draft of inclusionary zoning regs for Transit Overlay District: Members first discussed the Regina’s draft memo from committee to the Planning Commission. Members asked that a reference to the Comprehensive Plan (CP) and the numerical goals for affordable housing included in the CP be added to the memo. Members also asked that data regarding current market rate rents and purchase prices for new apartments, condominiums, and single-family homes be added to the table that includes the “Maximum Rental Prices” and “Maximum Purchase Prices for Homeownership.” Regina and members then discussed/identified sources for this information. Leslie offered to assist in obtaining the new condo/home purchase prices. Allen & Brooks was cited as likely source for rental data. Questions raised re Allen & Brooks data: are the prices for both new and existing rental units? Do the prices include rents charged by Champlain Housing Trust (CHT) and Cathedral Square? Their rent prices are virtually all significantly below the market rate. Regina will seek answers to these questions as she researches available sources for the market rate data. Members recognized that how the market rate prices compare to the AMI targets in the draft regulations may prompt revisiting the AMI targets we have proposed. Discussion then moved to the latest draft of the Inclusionary Zoning regulations. The discussion focused on three topics: (1) which “utilities” to include as part of housing costs for rental units; members agreed to continue with “water, electricity, and heating costs” as drafted; (2) whether to include “annual condominium or homeowners’ association fees” or a portion thereof; members agreed to include 50% of “annual condominium or homeowners’ association fees”; and (3) which information sources to cite as bases for estimating “water, electricity, and heating costs”, “average annual mortgage insurance premiums”, and “annual condominium or homeowners’ association fees.” Leslie volunteered to work with Regina in defining a method for estimating “annual condominium or homeowners’ association fees.” Leslie shared information on recent SoBu sales indicating that these fees ranges for $185-281 per month. For “water, electricity, and heating costs” and “average annual mortgage insurance premiums” members mentioned information available from the VHFA (Vermont Housing Finance Agency) website and the HUD Allowance Schedule for Utilities as potential sources for data to use in estimating these costs. Regina will explore these resources and others, as needed, to identify sources for these costs or ways to estimate them. Members also agreed that all information that had previously been proposed for inclusion in an Appendix was operational in nature and did not need to be included in an Appendix. They will be developed as separate “operational” or “procedural” documents. Regina will do follow-up work on the memo to the PC and draft regulations and join us at our May 14th, 10:00 a.m. meeting. Members thanked Regina for her great work on the memo and draft regulations. Sandy will find out if people that purchase “shared-equity” homes through CHT are required to purchase mortgage insurance. 5. Discuss Planning Commission TDR subcommittee work to date – John Simson: John anticipates that the Open Space Interim Zoning Committee will produce a science-based report that will identify primary and secondary natural resource protection areas and propose that regulations not allow TDRs to be transferred to either primary or secondary natural resource protection areas. John is advocating for TDR committee to support allowing development to continue in the districts that already have water and sewer infrastructure. He expects the TDR committee to propose allowing TDRs to be used outside the Southeast Quadrant. Monica has proposed that SoBu regulations limit the size of dwelling units to a maximum number of square feet and that developers/lot owners be required to purchase TDRs to receive approval to construct a larger unit. Whether the committee will support this is (in John’s view) uncertain. The joint meeting of the Interim Zoning Committees will not take place until June. John had hoped that draft new PUD regulations would be available by now, but that is not the case. 6. Reports and updates by committee members: Todd shared with members and guests information he received from Sandy and information he developed for possible inclusion in a Handbook or Handbooks ([1} for people seeking housing in SoBu and [2] for developers seeking to build in SoBu). He asked for clarification regarding the focus of these Handbooks. Members agreed that the focus is to be on Inclusionary Housing availability for folks seeking to live here and the requirements for Inclusionary units in developments for people seeing to build housing here. Members agreed to review the materials that Todd handed out and provide feedback to him. 7. Adjourn: At 12:40 p.m. Leslie moved and Todd seconded motion that the meeting be adjourned. Motion passed 4-0-0. (Larry left meeting before adjournment.) Bike rack: ● 1/8/19 Emails to K. Dorn and D. Young to be completed by 1/24/19 City: DONE! ● Keep and address at 1/24/19 committee meeting. Work on Committee’s page on the City’s website ● Combine with item immediately above. (Quoted from January 23, 2018, meeting minutes) “John asked Mike to prepare a work plan for the committee to collaborate with Coralee to enhance its effectiveness in communicating with residents via the City’s website and via other means. The plan should include specific assignments to be carried out by identified committee members. Mike accepted this assignment.” Homework (not yet reported on): All bike rack tasks should include date of assignment and date for task completion.