Glendale council directs staff to study transfer-of-development-rights program after mixed public reaction
Loading...
Summary
Council directed staff to draft a TDR program framework to sell unused city development rights for housing and revenue generation, excluding certain land-use overlay areas for now; public commenters raised concerns about parking, outreach and neighborhood impacts.
The Glendale City Council on Feb. 24 instructed staff to study a transfer-of-development-rights (TDR) program that would allow the city to sell unused development potential from select city-owned donor sites to private receiver sites — a tool staff said could generate revenue and direct housing growth to appropriate corridors.
Bradley Calvert, then the community development director, told the council the voluntary program would convert unrealized floor area from city properties (for example, an underbuilt fire station) into transferable square footage that private developers could buy and apply to projects in targeted areas such as the downtown specific plan and Tropico. Staff emphasized the program would not include properties currently addressed by the land use element or the CORO overlay — specifically excluding Montrose parking lots and other CORO parcels at this time — and that a draft ordinance would return to council after additional study.
Staff suggested parameters and guardrails for council input: limit uplifts to a modest percentage (staff suggested 10–25% and noted council may consider no more than 50%), restrict transfers to designated receiver geographies, tie transfers to development (not the land in perpetuity), require adherence to existing development standards except for narrowly defined height or floor-area exceptions, and consider mechanisms to encourage affordable housing or homeownership. Staff said valuation methodology (per-square-foot pricing or appraisal) and an inventory of eligible properties would be part of the next steps.
Public commenters were divided. The Montrose Shopping Park Association’s president, Gigi Garcia, said MSPA would support moving development potential off its parking lots only if parking for events and film production was preserved and if the city pursued EV charging and solar in those lots. Other residents urged exclusion of CORO parcels, more public outreach, and caution about impacts to neighborhood character, fire and flood risk, and affordability.
Councilmembers asked technical questions about how TDR would interact with existing density-bonus and inclusionary rules, whether developers could 'double-dip' to gain extra density, and whether the program could incentivize condominiums and homeownership. Staff said the council could prohibit combining TDR purchases with density-bonus incentives and could design unit-mix or ownership incentives as part of the ordinance.
On the record, council members signaled conditional support for further study: they asked staff to inventory candidate donor parcels, analyze revenue potential and market demand, model uplift caps (a number of councilmembers suggested a 25% target and no more than 50% cap), evaluate neighborhood impacts, and return with a draft ordinance and analysis before any sale. The council moved to note and file the report and provide the direction to staff; the clerk recorded the action as a note on file with direction to proceed with study and draft regulations.
