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Planning Commission delays fast‑track schedule for Park Merced after questions about rent‑control protections
Summary
After weeks of concern from commissioners and tenant groups, the Planning Commission agreed to keep the Park Merced schedule within a more typical notice window and requested a draft development agreement and additional details to be provided in advance of the entitlement hearing.
The San Francisco Planning Commission on Sept. 30 stepped back from a compressed timetable for the Park Merced rezoning and environmental review process, directing staff to provide commissioners and the public more time and to circulate a draft of the proposed development agreement.
Planning Department staff said the department planned to initiate code and General Plan amendment hearings on Oct. 21 and hold the entitlement hearing and EIR certification on Nov. 18, with the packet and comment responses delivered two weeks before the hearing. Commissioners said that schedule risked shortchanging public review and urged more time for community outreach, a fuller review of the development agreement and clear notice to potentially affected neighborhoods.
Commissioner concerns centered on whether the department and developer had given adequate legal and operational detail for how Park Merced’s large‑scale demolition and replacement program would preserve existing rent‑controlled housing. Mitchell Omerbrook of the Affordable Housing Alliance told the commission he was “not sure at all how it’s going to be accomplished” and warned that recent court decisions such as Palmer and provisions of the Costa‑Hawkins and Ellis Acts raise legal questions about replacing rent‑controlled units.
The developer’s counsel, Jim Abrams, responded that the project team expects to secure protections through a development agreement and said the sponsor “promises to preserve the 3,221 rent‑controlled units that exist there now forever,” adding that the agreement is the same contractual method the city has used in prior projects. Advocates and tenants asked to see the development agreement language and to have a public hearing focused on it.
Commissioners asked staff to provide the draft development agreement as early as possible and to confirm public notification schedules. Staff agreed to attempt to circulate a draft in advance and to continue coordinating interdepartmental review, while several commissioners signaled they would press for additional outreach and time to examine legal and phasing details before final entitlements.
Next steps: staff will attempt to circulate a draft development agreement to commissioners in advance of future hearings and the commission will hold the initiation and entitlement hearings on the revised schedule, with additional outreach requested by members of the commission.
