Get Full Government Meeting Transcripts, Videos, & Alerts Forever!
Get email alerts on the Affordable Housing topic
No spam. Unsubscribe anytime.
Council reviews plan to extend SDC waiver for affordable homeownership through 2029
Summary
City staff recommended extending Springfield's system development charge (SDC) waiver for affordable owner'occupied homes through December 2029, with guideline changes to address land division barriers and annual reporting instead of a hard cap. Councilors asked for tracking and clarity on program effectiveness.
Springfield city staff recommended extending a temporary waiver of city system development charges (SDCs) for affordable homeownership projects through Dec. 2029, while tightening administrative guidelines and reporting requirements.
Katie Carroll, the city's housing analyst, told the council the waiver covers only the city's SDCs (not Willamalane or the Metropolitan Wastewater Management Commission) and applies to new units sold to households at or below 80% of area median income and kept affordable for at least five years. "The SDC waiver for affordable homeownership housing waives the city's SDCs," Carroll said, adding that the waiver was set to expire at the end of 2025 or when $300,000 in SDCs had been waived.
Carroll said the program has produced limited fiscal use so far: "To date, the city has only waived a total of $62,000 in SDCs under the program," and three of nine granted waivers resulted in fees being paid back after developers could not complete sales because of land division obstacles. Carroll said staff proposes administrative changes to reduce that risk, including requiring applicants who need land division to attend a development initiation meeting and holding off on waiving SDCs until land division is complete.
Councilor Booker pressed staff on program effectiveness, noting low uptake despite the policy. Carroll responded that the returned waivers stemmed from project logistics rather than eligibility rules and that staff added penalty fees and timeline adjustments to address that specific failure mode.
Staff'recommended policy changes are explicitly administrative, Carroll said: "We're not recommending any substantive policy changes at this time, though," meaning eligibility (income level and five'year affordability) would remain unchanged. Because Willamalane adopted a similar waiver that is also set to expire, staff said they coordinated timelines and will report the council's decision to that agency.
Rather than reinstating a dollar cap, staff recommended extending the waiver through 2029 and reporting annually to the council, with the option for council to add a cap or pause if necessary. Carroll said outreach to local developers suggests potential eligible projects that could total more than $500,000 in city SDCs over the next four years, driven in part by previously approved land acquisition for Square One Villages.
Next steps: staff will bring a resolution for council consideration at the Dec. 1 regular meeting if the council agrees with the approach.
Why it matters: The waiver is one local tool to reduce up'front development costs and encourage production of lower'income homeownership units, but councilors emphasized the need to track whether the changes make the program more usable and whether additional supports are needed for projects to reach completion.
