In the NEWS:Senior Housing Problem in Redlands

Commentary: Below is an article about Senior Housing in Redlands.

Interesting features:

One Redlands is only putting up 1/4th of the money. There is no indication of the ownership of the raw land as in GT the RDA is Providing the Land at a buck a year and 1/2 of the funds.

Two The funds Redlands is providing will in 55 years result in "Ownership" as we have after 60 years.

Their building rents are far lower than the projected rents in Grand Terrace.

The Bonus... is an interesting way to indicate a Change in Zoning or in an R1 zone location to SUPER HIGH DENSITY Housing. The lack of non Governmental Agencies to obtain similar zoning and provide low income and moderate income housing in the open and competitive market place is problematic to this reader.

The location suitability is not one that can be addressed by this reader as in GT where the General Plan had indicated a location for Senior Housing and then this is Not where it is being located.

The State Housing Authority has already indicated that for them to approve the funding of the GT Senior Housing the City has to have additional housing for non seniors. There has been none added, as a matter of fact the City has allowed the need to increase when Jacobeson took out the Mobile Home Park on Michigan and not replace it.

http://www.pe.com/localnews/redlands/stories/PE_News_Local_B_bhousing05.3b73ea2.html

Senior apartments in Redlands hit financial snag
10:00 PM PDT on Saturday, August 4, 2007
By DUANE W. GANG and NAOMI KRESGE

The Press-EnterpriseAn affordable senior apartment complex in north Redlands is on hold as officials from two public agencies wrangle over the details of a deal first approved by the city almost a year ago.
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The city of Redlands in September agreed to spend $4 million in redevelopment money to help fund the $15 million Vista del Sol project in the works by the nonprofit wing of the Housing Authority of San Bernardino County.
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Housing authority officials now say the city's new redevelopment director is trying to renegotiate some aspects of the deal.In an Aug. 1 memo to the housing agency's board, agency Executive Director Dan Nackerman said the city wants to change the funding plan -- even though the money already had been committed through signed documents.
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"It looks like they have dug their heels in," Nackerman told board members during the authority's monthly meeting last week. "It looks like we are going to lose some. It is just unfair.
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"Housing authority officials said the $4 million from the city initially would have been forgiven after the complex was fully occupied. Instead, the city wants the money to be forgiven after 55 years, when the affordability requirements on the apartments expire.
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Redlands Interim Redevelopment Director Steve Dukett said he doesn't view the changes as renegotiating last September's deal, because the $4 million in funding remains the same.
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"No one is trying to submarine them. We're trying to be advocates of the project," Dukett said after being read the housing authority memo. "I am absolutely flabbergasted.
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"He said the memo mischaracterized the situation but declined to say why. He declined to discuss the specifics of the city's discussions with the housing authority before the deal is finalized. He said he met the first time with county officials about the project after it was approved last fall.
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"I'm telling you the truth is not what they wrote, but I'm not going to tell you what the truth is, because we're in negotiations," Dukett said.
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The initial agreement between the two agencies was inadequate, he said. The city wants assurances that 11 of the project's 53 affordable units will be priced for very low-income seniors, he said. It wants to ensure that the units remain affordable by structuring its contribution as a loan that would be forgiven only after the affordability covenants on the units expire in 55 years.
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The original Vista del Sol agreement sets aside 53 of the 71 units in the complex for low-income seniors -- people whose annual income doesn't exceed 80 percent of the county median. Rents were expected to range from $125 to $279 a month.
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City officials were pleased with the deal because they were funding only a quarter of the $15 million project but ensuring that three-quarters of the units would be affordable, said Don Gee, the city's redevelopment director then and now deputy director of the San Bernardino Economic Development Agency.
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Though the project would add apartments to a single-family neighborhood around Texonia Park, it won broad support from neighbors and north Redlands activists. The delay is troubling to residents who are counting on the redevelopment agency to help them revitalize their neighborhood, said Mario Saucedo, chairman of the North Redlands Visioning Committee and a housing authority board member.
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"It would really be felt if this were delayed any longer. There are already seniors that are inquiring about it," Saucedo said.Susan Benner, the housing authority's assistant executive director, said Thursday she agrees with Dukett that changes in how the $4 million deal is structured will not affect the project's overall funding.
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The housing authority viewed the money as a grant, since the agency has no intention of selling the complex, which would trigger requirements to pay back the $4 million, she said.She described the changes as housekeeping but said the switch to a 55-year term on the $4 million is more cumbersome.
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Other assurances the city is seeking, such as requirements that a portion of the units be for very low-income residents, always have been part of the plan, Benner said.
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But Benner said the housing authority, through the nonprofit Housing Partners, cannot break ground on the project until the city approves a density bonus agreement to which it is legally entitled.Because the project includes affordable housing, authority officials said state law allows them to build more densely than the neighborhood's single-family zoning would allow.
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The housing authority believes the changes to how the deal is structured are separate from the density bonus agreement, Benner said.The redevelopment agency insists on tying them together and refuses to take the density agreement to the City Council until the changes in the deal are approved, Benner said.Dukett said the project is unlikely to appear before the council until Sept. 4.
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What bothers housing authority officials, Benner said, was how the proposed changes came about."It is one of those things, you enter into an agreement, you sign it, it is recorded, and all of a sudden the terms change," she said. "It seems kind of odd."
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Reach Duane W. Gang at 909-806-3062 or dgang@PE.com
Reach Naomi Kresge at 909-806-3060 or nkresge@PE.com