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Council presses staff to clarify housing-equivalency and trigger language in benefits framework
Summary
Councilmembers asked staff to re-check the housing-equivalency calculations used to award points (staff referenced roughly $13 per sq ft commercial linkage fee rising to a $20/sq ft illustrative figure for additional jobs-housing linkage), and to clarify when donated land or affordable housing commitments must be built or be subject to city action.
Councilmembers used the study session to press staff for precise equivalency methods so benefits across categories can be compared objectively. Several members said they want transparency and peer review of the valuation method that converts benefits (for example, undergrounding utilities or donating land) into points.
Troy Reinholter explained the city's current commercial linkage fee is about $13 per square foot and that staff’s earlier conversations identified an additional jobs–housing contribution that made an illustrative total contribution near "$20 per square foot." "So the value of the additional linkage ... is currently about $7 a square foot," Reinholter said, describing how the framework calculates a 3-point affordable housing contribution relative to the existing linkage fee. Councilmember Romero and others asked staff to confirm those numbers and present the peer-reviewed valuation when applicants submit allocation requests.
On the 10‑year backstop for donated land (a proposed trigger allowing the city to take land back if expected affordable housing never materializes), staff said they are amenable to negotiating project-specific timelines rather than a rigid 10-year automatic reversion; Council asked staff to draft clearer trigger language to avoid allowing a commercial project to finish while the promised affordable housing is indefinitely delayed.
