News - Local

Wednesday, Aug. 06, 2008

County's condominium ordinance, designed to protect affordable housing, fails first test

The board approved the conversion of 20 San Miguel apartments into condos over the next few years

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The county’s young condominium conversion ordinance, designed to protect affordable housing, faced its first test Tuesday, and the Board of Supervisors says it flunked.

Criticizing the ordinance’s vagueness, county supervisors tentatively gave the go-ahead to convert 20 occupied apartment units on 11th Street in San Miguel to condominiums over a period of several years.

The vote was 3-2, with Harry Ovitt, Katcho Achadjian and Jerry Lenthall voting for the condo conversion and Bruce Gibson and Jim Patterson opposing it.

Supervisors were unanimous in telling county planners that the ordinance needs a closer look so that it’s “as black and white as it can be,” as Achadjian told the planning staff.

It was the first time a proposed conversion of apartments to condominiums had come before supervisors since it adopted its ordinance in January 2007.

The law was designed to keep the shrinking number of apartment rentals from disappearing altogether.

The county Planning Commission had argued against the conversion on the grounds that it would “create a substantial loss of affordable rental housing.”

Commissioners said that San Miguel has 61 apartments, and this proposal would convert almost one-third of them.

However, applicant Raymond Barker, represented by attorney Thomas “Ty” Green and Rachel Koveski of Kirk Consulting, said the wording of the ordinance failed to include other affordable housing, such as mobile homes and houses.

He said that including those would add between 154 and 315 rental units.

Patterson objected to expanding the definition.

“The applicant was well aware” that the ordinance referred solely to apartments, he said. Gibson, who was a Planning Commissioner when the county adopted it, concurred.

Nonetheless, Green — backed by Ovitt, who lobbied strongly for the conversion —said as written, the limitation to apartments is not there. Achadjian and Lenthall went along.

“You can’t just arbitrarily pick (the definition) you want in order to satisfy an argument,” Ovitt said. He insisted that all rental stock, not just apartments, be included.

Barker agreed to convert only a few units as a time, possibly as few as four in the first year. That number remains unclear, as does the time frame for complete conversion. Supervisors made no provision in their vote Tuesday to guarantee that the families currently renting the apartments would get first crack at buying them.

All the tenants supported the conversion, hoping it would lead to their owning a home.

They sent a petition that said Barker “has given us his word that no tenants will be asked to vacate their units and that we may continue to rent and occupy our units for as long as we choose.”

Green said Barker “has no intention” of leaving anyone out in the cold, but “how you allocate the units … I don’t know how to answer that question.”

In 2007, 14 apartment units were built in the county, none in San Miguel, according to a report from planner Elizabeth Kavanaugh to supervisors.

The two-hour discussion took place against the backdrop of a severe shortage of affordable housing and rental apartments.

“There’s consistently more demand than supply,” Gibson said.

Supervisors have said many times, individually and collectively, that finding ways to help provide dwellings county residents can afford to live in is one of their chief concerns.