Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Downtown Economics topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Downtown Plan five‑year monitoring report: jobs and housing rebound since recession; downtown housing share rising
Summary
Staff presented the 2014 five‑year Downtown Plan monitoring report reporting employment and housing rebounds since 2008, rising hotel and business tax collections, and a sizable pipeline of downtown office and housing development; commissioners flagged implications for Prop M and nexus studies for fees.
The Planning Department presented the 2014 five‑year update to the Downtown Plan monitoring report, summarizing data from 2008–2014. Key findings included a rebound in vacancy rates after the recession, strong growth in downtown jobs (about 14% downtown job growth since 2008), rising hotel occupancy and average daily room rates, and business tax collections up roughly 55% from 2008 to 2014. The report showed approximately 14,400 housing units constructed citywide in the reviewed period (about 30% in downtown/C3 districts).
Staff highlighted that Prop M limits office approvals to 950,000 square feet annually; between 2008 and 2014, 6.14 million square feet was allocated under the program with an available surplus in the allocation. The downtown pipeline includes roughly 3.6 million square feet of office and about 5,400 housing units; citywide pipelines are larger. Commissioners asked about the jobs‑housing nexus and nexus studies for fee updates and requested additional outreach on assumptions (for example, worker‑square‑foot conversion). Public comment urged study and action on formulae that link jobs to housing/fees.
