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Council swaps one housing-site entry in certified housing-element inventory as part of settlement step
Summary
Council approved an amendment to the 2023–2031 housing element to remove 4701 Patrick Henry Drive from the site inventory and add the recently approved Mission Point site at 3005 Democracy Way; action was made contingent on finalization of a settlement agreement with Housing Action Coalition.
The Santa Clara City Council voted unanimously Tuesday to amend the city’s 2023–2031 housing-element site inventory, removing a development site at 4701 Patrick Henry Drive (Great America Technology Park) and adding a recently approved project at 3005 Democracy Way (Mission Point).
City staff said the amendment implements terms of a pending settlement agreement with the Housing Action Coalition (HAC) and preserves the city’s compliance with state housing-element requirements and the Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA).
Nut graf: The change does not reduce the city’s total capacity to meet RHNA but shifts capacities among income categories. Staff told the council the buffer for lower-income units would decrease from 33% to 18% under the revised inventory, while above-moderate capacity would increase; staff and the city’s housing consultant had reviewed the amendment with the state Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) during the process.
Community Development Director Afsha Hamid explained that the housing element must maintain a sites inventory that demonstrates adequate capacity to meet the city’s RHNA and Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH) requirements. The amendment swaps the Patrick Henry site, which staff indicated faced development uncertainty, for the approved Mission Point project, which has defined residential capacity.
Hamid said staff consulted HCD and that the change would preserve the required county-wide and state buffers; the lower-income buffer falls but remains above the state-required minimum of 15% for the cycle, according to staff’s analysis. City Attorney staff asked the council to make the council action contingent on final execution of the settlement agreement with the Housing Action Coalition; council included that contingency in its motion.
Public comment included a request from Jaime Vasquez, a representative of the Northern California Carpenters Union Local 405, who urged the council to ensure projects are built by contractors that pay prevailing wages and hire apprentices: “If we want these projects to uplift the community, they must be built by responsible general contractors who pay area-standard wages,” Vasquez said.
The council approved a resolution to amend the general plan’s housing element sites inventory, contingent on final settlement execution. Staff said the amendment will be submitted to HCD and incorporated into the housing-element record.
