Planning director says four housing ordinances sent to City Council, aims for Feb. 12 effective date

The City Planning Commission heard an update Thursday from Vince Bertone, director of planning, that four housing‑related ordinances the commission had previously reviewed were forwarded by the Planning and Land Use Management Committee to the full City Council and directed into formal legality. Bertone told commissioners staff aimed to have the ordinances in effect by Feb. 12, and planned to return them from formal legality to City Council in the second week of January so permits could be issued by that deadline.

Bertone said the ordinances cover the citywide housing incentive program (CHIP), the resident protection ordinance, the housing element sites and minimum density ordinance, and a citywide adaptive reuse ordinance intended to streamline conversion of underused commercial buildings into housing. He said the state completed an initial review and “found that the ordinance before you complied with our housing element and state law,” and that several committee modifications were made before those items reached the full council.

Among changes described, Bertone said the Planning and Land Use Management Committee narrowed the scope of a faith‑based incentive within CHIP to low building typologies — townhome or neighborhood‑scale projects — and limited the incentive to roughly 2.5 floor‑area ratio or one additional story (about 11 feet). He said public benefit incentives under that program were limited to land donation and child‑care facilities. For projects proposed on publicly owned land, affordable set‑aside levels were adjusted from 100% to 80%, and the definition of shared‑equity projects was revised to include public agencies. An additional base incentive was added to allow eligible projects to seek relief from widening adjoining roadways during construction while still requiring other public improvements, such as constructing sidewalks or installing street lights.

Bertone said projects in very high fire hazard severity zones, hillside areas, coastal zones or projects subject to conditional use would not be eligible for the incentive. He also said the Planning and Land Use Management Committee requested additional study on several topics, including the potential expansion of corridor transition areas beyond 700 feet in selected high‑resource areas, and there was substantial discussion at council about whether to include limited higher‑density development in some single‑family areas.

On the adaptive reuse ordinance, Bertone said staff proposed a small amendment to align conversions with the city’s Responsible Hotel Ordinance by limiting conversions to hotels with fewer than 300 guest rooms and clarifying that new hotel uses would require a conditional use permit. Bertone added that the resident protection ordinance was forwarded for formal legality with no substantive changes but with requests for additional study.

What’s next: Bertone said staff expects to return the ordinances from formal legality to City Council in early January so they can be in effect by Feb. 12. The commission raised no questions on the report during the session.