Arcata council opens hearing on Rogers Garage affordable-housing funding, declines decision after residents raise contamination and traffic concerns

Arcata City staff opened a public hearing May 21 on a plan to commit Community Development Block Grant (CDBG) program income and other local housing funds to the Rogers Garage affordable-housing project but did not act, instead telling the council they would re-notice the item and return on June 4 for further deliberation.

The item before the City Council asked for roughly $1.3 million in CDBG program income and related allocations tied to the site at Old Arcadia Road and Highland (the Rogers Garage site). Staff said about $300,000 of local program income would address general administration and activity delivery and roughly $800,000 would be proposed for the project; the remaining program income would be returned to an economic-development loan pool. Because technical questions and correspondence had arrived in the days before the meeting, staff recommended taking public comment and postponing any funding or final CEQA decisions until a newly noticed hearing.

The recommendation matter-of-factly framed a dual-track process: funding review before the council and a separate land-use entitlements track handled by the Planning Commission. “The design review process is a discretionary hearing the planning commission will take,” staff said, and cautioned council members against making statements that could prejudice any later appeal of the Planning Commission decision.

Residents, parents and school employees urged the council to halt any funding decision until environmental questions are resolved. “Are you willing to poison our children for the sake of grant funding?” said Michelle Warner, who identified herself as an employee of Jacoby Creek Elementary School, directly across the street from the proposed development. Warner and other speakers cited soil-sampling results they said show lead, cadmium, arsenic and benzene at levels they described as many times over safety limits, and asked the city to require a full CEQA initial study rather than rely on a project exemption.

Other speakers reinforced concerns about traffic, parking and neighborhood scale. Several people who live on Highland and in the Bayside neighborhood said the planned building footprint and the number of units would intensify already-congested morning drop-off conditions at Jacoby Creek School. One commenter said the preliminary plans showed 45 units but only about 43 on-site parking spaces, a disparity neighbors called insufficient.

Representatives of the developer, Danco Communities, noted they were not presenting design details that night and said they would be available to answer questions. “This project, if it were to go into construction, would leverage tens of millions of dollars for the community,” project manager Mackenzie Dibble told the council. She said the program-income allocation would make the project more competitive for financing such as tax credits and state resources. Danco’s representative, Chris Dart, was also present.

Staff emphasized overlapping procedural steps and an open record on environmental review. According to staff, the council previously used a “common-sense exemption” in earlier predevelopment funding actions and has considered a categorical infill exemption in the project record; staff said those earlier determinations were made before a formal project description was available. Several residents and local environmental professionals urged the council that the public record now supports an initial study and, if required, a full environmental review under CEQA rather than an infill exemption.

City staff outlined the procedural next steps they planned: accept public comment at the May 21 hearing, then re-notice a fuller hearing for June 4 with additional staff responses to letters and questions that had arrived. Planning entitlements and design review would proceed at the Planning Commission level; the Planning Commission’s decision would be appealable to the council. Staff also said the council had previously approved and applied for other housing funds, including Permanent Local Housing Allocation (PLHA) resources, to support project development, and that the Rogers Garage request is one element of a larger funding and entitlement pipeline.

Speakers raised additional programmatic and technical questions: whether the city or a nonprofit would hold title if CDBG acquisition funds were used; whether prior remediation planning was current and sufficient (residents said an existing cleanup plan is two decades old and may not match changed site conditions); whether soil testing has captured spring-fed wetlands and potential groundwater pathways; and how wastewater and sewer capacity links to other city projects. Members of the neighborhood also urged staff and the council to examine alternative sites nearby that residents said have less contamination and more buildable acreage.

After closing public comment the council followed staff’s recommendation and did not deliberate on funding or take a vote. City staff said they will prepare responses to the outstanding environmental questions and public letters and will re-notice the matter for the June 4 council meeting. A separate future date will cover Planning Commission design review.

Why it matters: the Rogers Garage site sits immediately across the street from a K–5 school and in a residential Bayside neighborhood; the proposal would add dozens of below-market units on a small lot, and the contested evidence about soil contamination and traffic impacts has drawn sustained neighborhood opposition. The case highlights tensions many cities face between accelerating affordable-housing production, leveraging competitive state and federal funds, and responding to environmental and public-safety concerns raised by neighbors.

What’s next: the City Council will receive a newly noticed staff report and public hearing on June 4. Planning Commission hearings on design review and entitlements will proceed separately; council members were reminded that any comments they make in a funding hearing could be reviewed if they later sit as the appeal body for a land-use decision.