yeah. okay. good afternoon. this meeting will come to order. welcome to the april 2024 regular meeting of the land use and transportation committee of the san francisco board of supervisors. i'm supervisor mariana melgar, chair of the committee. joined by vice chair dean preston, the committee clerk today is john carroll, and i would also like to acknowledge jeanette engel from safeguard tv, mr. clark, do you have any announcements? yes. thank you. please ensure that you've silenced your cell phones and other electronic devices you brought with you to the chamber today. if you have public comment on any of today's sorry if you have public comment on today's singular agenda item, when your item of interest comes up and public comment is called, please line up to speak along the western wall of this room. you may submit your written public comment by emailing me at joanne period. crowell at sf gov. org or you may send your written public comment to our office in city hall. that is the clerk's office, room 244. city hall's address is one. doctor

carlton b goodlett place, san francisco, california 94102. items acted upon today are expected to appear on the board of supervisors agenda of april 16th, 2024, unless otherwise stated. thank you very much, mr. clerk. before we call item number one, i would like to make a motion to excuse president peskin from today's meeting on the motion offered by the chair to excuse member peskin, vice chair preston preston, i chair melgar i. melgar i madam chair, there are two eyes. thank you, mr. clerk. please call item number one. agenda. item number one is a resolution authorizing the city and county of san francisco acting by and through the mayor's office of housing and community development, to submit an application to and participate in the pro housing designation program administered by the california department of housing and community development. thank you, miss sheila nikolopoulos from the mayor's office of housing and community development is here. and i also see the director of macd, dan adams, who is here to

answer any questions, go ahead, mr. michalopoulos. good afternoon. sheila michalopoulos, director of policy and legislative affairs for macd, before you today is a resolution to support the city's application to the state department of housing and community development to their pro housing designation program. the board approved a similar resolution, filed 220826, in october of 2022. the state's approval of that application was delayed to give san francisco time to align certain policies, such as adu regulations, with the pro housing requirements. earlier this month, under their newly updated pro housing designation program guidelines, hcd resubmitted our application to the state for the pro housing designation. we have worked with hcd to revise the resolution in line with their updated guidelines, as having a pro housing designation will give san francisco additional points in applications for competitive housing and infrastructure funding, including important funding sources like the affordable housing and sustainable communities grant program, the infill infrastructure grant program,

and certain state transportation funding programs. san francisco needs state funding to build affordable housing. two thirds of funding for the construction of affordable housing in san francisco comes from state or federal government. only one third of the funding comes from the city. the competition for statewide affordable housing funds is intense, and every point towards a higher score matters. when the applicant pool is crowded, the affordable housing and sustainable communities program and the infill infrastructure grant programs have awarded. 18 san francisco projects. more than 309,000,000 in 4 funding rounds since 2018. this funding helps build thousands of new affordable units. these funding opportunities are becoming more competitive though, so having preference points via the pro housing designation is an important part of securing state funding and realizing our affordable housing production goals, specifically, there are three housing projects totaling 352 units that have pending applications to the affordable housing and sustainable communities grant program for up to 50 million each. that includes 35 million for the

housing developments and 15 million for supporting transportation improvements. so 150 million total. if awarded, these projects would start construction next year. there is also a transportation grant application for 26 million that mta for mta that will be pending later this spring. to qualify for a pro housing city, san francisco must meet threshold requirements, including a compliant housing element and submission submission of the annual progress report for housing element. comply with a variety of state housing laws, adoption of best practices in its treatment of homeless encampments, and an executed apply for resolution, which is before you today. in addition, san francisco's application includes documentation of existing pro housing policies and categories such as favorable zoning and land use, acceleration of housing production time frames, reduction of construction and development costs, and providing financial subsidies. our application to the state highlights 14 existing policies that fit into these categories, including our local density program, home sf, which exceeds statutory requirements by 35.

local adu programs that increase density in single family residential areas and expedite permitting for adus. our policy of no parking requirements for residential development. zoning that allows for mixed uses, and commercial districts. establishment of a one stop permit center to expedite permit processing. priority permit processing for 100% affordable projects and projects with increased affordability impact fee waivers for 100% affordable projects with city subsidy and local capital funding sources such as the housing trust fund and the affordable housing production and preservation fund, and local operating subsidies such as losp and sos. the application identifies existing policies and programs only. it does not commit the city to any policy changes. a successful application for the pro housing program is expected to enhance san francisco's ability to access critical state funds for housing and infrastructure. these funds are especially important in these times of increased statewide competition for limited resources. we expect the state

to complete the review of our application by may 17th. with the governor's budget announcement gutting the non ahsc housing capital programs for the next two fiscal years, it's all the more important that we put our most competitive feet forward this year and next year for the affordable housing, sustainable communities, because this is cap and trade funded and it's not a risk of pullback like some of the other programs we are available to answer. any questions. thank you. thank you so much, miss nikolopoulos, supervisor preston, thank you, chair melgar. and thank you, miss nikolopoulos, for the presentation. and also just, will say that, fully concur around the need and whatever we can do to make ourselves more competitive, for these funds. so in that respect, the resolution before us is welcome. and i also want to say, i want to thank you for what i understand, and director adams was some work behind the scenes with the

department, city state attorney and others to strike that balance that you referred to of, of, making sure we meet the criteria that's been set up, but also without pre deciding or undermining, further efforts that are, you know, will be before the board and the administration. so i appreciate the care that went into creating the resolution. i do want to comment, a bit on this. some of this is just the nature of this resolution. sort of no one's no one hears fault on this front. but but, but some things i do just want to put on the record while we're talking about this, because i think it's important. and i've spoken to this before. when it came through committee the first time we had this so-called pro housing designation, i just want to note and not normalize what i view as the absurdity of the state, calling this an aid having baked into now the state, codes the

idea of pro housing versus non pro housing. nobody can actually explain what pro housing is. it appears to be a firm that one set of lobbyists uses for certain policies. and then we're supposed to accept that anyone who doesn't see things their way is somehow anti housing. so i think it's an unfortunate terme. it is apparently really the state's i think euphemism for state housing policies that, at least as applied in san francisco, operate primarily to increase land values and incentivize the building of luxury housing that working class people cannot afford in our city. and then i think, to make the irony even greater, the state has developed a program where failure to immediately pass laws or to increase property values and incentivize luxury housing locally result in the state blocking funding for affordable housing. so couldn't

make this up. if i were trying to state actually conditions affordable housing money for the poor and working class folks of our city, not on the city ramping up our investments in affordable housing for poor and working class people, but instea on whether we are sufficiently incentivizing housing that in our market is unaffordable by design. so it is no wonder that in the last rina cycle, we over produced market rate housing and underproduced affordable housing. so i understand this resolution statutorily required for us to have a competitive edge, for state affordable housing money. so i understand why it's before us, and i look forward to passing it today and hopefully at the full board as well. despite this really absurdity of how the state law requirements are structured, i think we all want to be competitive for these funds, i do note and i have

resisted the urge to, to start proposing amendments, to this resolution because i don't want to complicate this, but i, i do feel the need to note this on the record, a dynamic that i think is missing from this resolution. it's probably not needed in the resolution, but i think it's important and that and that is the many efforts to increase our affordable housing stock that have been approved by this board of supervisors and have been obstructed, defunded or delayed by the mayor, and these are ongoing disputes. there are policy differences. there are budget differences, and i think they should be noted on the record, even if not formerly included in the resolution. so consistent with san francisco's duty to affirmatively further fair housing, this board of supervisors has authorized and urged additional affordable

housing investments and developments above and beyond those undertaken by the mayor's office, including, but not limited to, urging the use of proposition i revenue from 2020, and each year for affordable housing, which the mayor has refused to budget each year, appropriating funds. the board has appropriated funds into san francisco's housing stability fund for preservation, acquisition, which last year the mayor defunded by $20 million and, leaving what is currently, basically a zeroed out budget precluding many worthy projects from being acquired for housing permanent, affordable housing preservation, the board has urged development of affordable housing on city owned land at parcel k in hayes valley. it's. the mayor has now delayed indefinitely. and in addition,

for what can only be described as purely political reasons, the mayor intervened to block affordable housing development at 400 divisadero, which could provide over 160 affordable homes for working class san franciscans and formerly homeless san franciscans. so i raise all this, and that's just a partial list, to urge the administration to do better on affordable housing. i welcome the new leadership at mcrd and look forward to continuing to work with director adams and his team, but i will continue to use every opportunity to urge the mayor to stop blocking this board and the voters of san francisco when it comes to the development of affordable housing in our city, and i also want to warn that if the mayor continues on this path, path of blocking these critical affordable housing investments, that i fear that the mayor's ongoing obstruction and defunding of affordable housing could well compromise our

so-called pro housing designation and make it even harder for our city to secure scarce state affordable housing funds. so thank you, madam chair, for the time. just wanted to put that on the record, fully prepared to support the resolution and interest in the public comment. thank you. thank you so much, supervisor preston. so, i am also prepared to support this resolution, i want to add a couple of things. since we're putting things on the record, i wholeheartedly agree with you in your comments about the city's lack of investment in affordable housing, our systems, our capacity, our coordination with other departments, and more importantly than anything else, our funding towards affordable housing, needs to be more robust and keep up with our talk for sure, i have spent most of my

career in affordable housing and, you know, it is where i think our pain point is, as a city, where i will disagree with you is because i, represent district seven, it's the west side of the city, my district is the largest district geographically because it is so low density, i have west portal avenue, one of our very successful commercial corridors, which is zoned for 27ft height, and could support a lot of housing, as well, and i think that, you know, we have in the past made decisions that have concentrated both development pressures and, you know, just incentivize development in some areas of our city and not in others, i was around working for the mayor's office of housing when we, negotiated the eastern neighborhoods plan, which, of course, incentivized and

concentrated development in mission soma bayview. the eastern side of the city. while no building happened in district seven. and while some folks, you know, in my district do like it that way, i fear that for the next generation, it makes living on the west side undoable, and i, you know, doing this job because i want my kids to stay here. i want the next generation to have a sustainable, environmentally, responsible city that is connected, that is affordable, that includes both market rate and affordable housing on the west side, neither of which we have built, thus far for the past, you know, 40 years. so i, i look forward to making sure that our housing element is operational in a way that makes sense for all districts. and for future generations, and that we continue working together,

working with advocates and pressuring, you know, folks, so that we can have as much affordable housing investment as possible all over the city. yes. supervisor preston, thank thank you, chair, and i appreciate the comments. i think the one thing, though, that i want to push back on, because i think you framed it as a disagreement and i'm not sure there is one, i'm not arguing or taking issue with efforts to deal and incentivize development on the west side. and i just want to be clear like that or or elsewhere in san francisco. my point in my remarks was, what makes no sense is to tell, like the residents of the fillmore district, there's not going to be state affordable housing money for you because some change to incentivize market rate housing out on 40th avenue didn't happen fast enough for the state.

that's the dynamic that i'm getting at and really object to so strongly. there is a conversation to be had, and we've had this conversation in committee and at the board around the right levels of incentivizing development, the right height, the density. and i think we all welcome i mean, i'll speak for myself. i welcome that conversation. i just don't want to pretend ever, that that's a conversation around creation of affordable housing and what the state has done by this dumbing down of housing policy into this pro housing or not, pro housing is they've they've really conflated the issue of creating affordable housing in our city, with creating market rate housing in our city. and i understand there's a more of a trickle down analysis that says if you just create enough market rate housing, somehow, it's all going to become affordable. i've been in dealing with affordable housing for over two decades. that hasn't worked and doesn't

work, but but but they've taken it one step further here with not just conflating it in theory, but now actually setting up a system whereby by the measures of our success on the market rate housing, which again, it is fine for us to revisit and look at, but using that to decide whether or not to award grants to our city for affordable housing is completely upside down. it only benefits developers, and it only hurts low income and working class san franciscans. okay, let's take public comment on this item, please, mr. clerk, thank you, madam chair. if you have public comment on agenda item number one, please come forward to the lectern now. good afternoon, supervisors. john avalos from the council of community housing organizations, we are here to

urge you to support this resolution on, i do believe that there are certain contradictions that, have been elucidated by the by the committee here today, the fact that we have a housing element, the city is in compliance with it. we have done a lot of work as a city to actually approve that, to look at how we, upzone the west side of the city and build a framework for that. it also be able to protect a lot of communities on the eastern side that are dealing with anti-displacement issues. this is something that this committee has been grappling with all this time, i do look at, kind of an absurdity about that. san francisco does such a great job in affordable housing, production and planning. we do that actually really well, despite the lack of resources more than other, jurisdictions around the state of california. and yet we do have to apply for a pro housing designation on top so we can still be competitive, even though we're probably more

competitive already. it's this, housing designations that gives us, the same advantage we probably had before. so it's necessary that we apply for it. there are a number of community housing organizations that are subject to the this pro housing designation that would benefit from it. so it's vital that we do approve of it. however, there's a clause in one of the resolve clauses here that that basically says that, you know, you're not supposed to do any more additional legislation that could help us to, you know, could make sure that san francisco lose its housing designation. you're not supposed to do that. and that's what your, your you're approving here today that does tie the hands of the city and county of san francisco to look at how we might, you know, be innovative. right now. we're not beating our our progress goals that we have for, housing construction. and there might need to be some adjustments that are being made, we also need to look at how we protect certain neighborhoods against displacement. and that could be our hands could be tied. so please support this

resolution. but i understand there are definite contradictions here. thank you. thank you for sharing your comments. do we have anyone else who has public comment on agenda item number one? madam chair, thank you so much. public comment on this item is now closed, we are, on break next week, so this cannot go as a committee report. it will have to wait until after we get back. so i would like to make a motion that we, send this out to the full board with positive recommendation on the motion that this resolution be sent to the board of supervisors with the recommendation of land use and transportation vice chair preston preston. i member peskin is excused. chair. melgar i melgar i, madam chair, there are two eyes. okay. that, motion passes. thank you. are there any more items before us today? there is no further business. we are adjourned. thank you.

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