Tag: BMR

By Posted on Posted in Issues
Durant-Project
Other apartment buildings will be at risk if the Durant demolition is permitted.

Mayor Bates would like to us to give up, and stay out of important City business. Berkeley City Council has two meetings on Tuesday December 1st, and both agendas are packed with issues concerning housing, renters, and poverty. The meetings will be held at Longfellow instead of old City Hall: 1500 Derby, at Sacramento Street.
The already burdensome agendas now also include items held-over and postponed from the last couple of meetings, including several issues which tenants have already waited hours to see discussed:

► Demolition Appeal (7 pm) Item 24
SUMMARY: Allowing the demolition presents dangerous precedents: This would be the first time Berkeley has allowed an owner to claim he can’t make a fair return on a rehabilitated building. The developer invited the Berkeley Fire Department to tear out walls and cut holes in the roof!! To grant this project as requested is to condone willful destruction of housing.
ACTION: Come to the hearing on December 1st and hold signs showing support.
More Info: https://www.berkeleytenants.org/?p=1477
Berkeley Citizens Action: BCA-letter-111715

► Rental Housing Safety (7 pm) Item 28
SUMMARY: Landlords are letting their housing fall apart. Besides proactive inspections and confidential complaints, this would also make mold and mildew a public nuisance, and require landlords to actually turn in the self-inspection they are supposed to do each year.
ACTION: Take a photo of unsafe conditions and send to Council by November 30.
More Info: https://www.berkeleytenants.org/?p=1456
Wellstone Democratic Club: Wellstone-letter-111715

► Affordable Housing (5:30 pm) Items 2a, 2b, 2c, 2d, 2e
SUMMARY: Common-sense measures to make city funding for affordable housing easier.
ACTION: You already signed the petition, but did you ask your friends?
http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/fund-affordable-housing-2.fb48?source=c.fb&r_by=9240326
More Info:
Sierra Club Letter: Sierra Club 10-27 Berkeley City Council Items on Affordable Housing
Daily Cal: http://www.dailycal.org/2015/11/08/housing-advisory-commission-talks-assessment-of-affordable-housing-mitigation-fee-predevelopment-funding/
Cool Map: http://ww2.kqed.org/pop/map-where-can-you-find-an-affordable-one-bedroom-near-bart-san-francisco-bay-area-oakland

See You Tuesday December 1!
Longfellow Middle School, 1500 Derby

Also on the 5:30pm Agenda:
Below Market Rate Housing Report; Housing Trust Fund Status Update; Use of Predevelopment Funds by Nonprofit Housing Builders; Report from Berkeley Housing Authority.
http://www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/Clerk/City_Council/2015/12_Dec/City_Council__12-01-2015_-_Special_Meeting_Agenda.aspx

Also on the 7:00pm Agenda:
Accessory Dwelling Units; Appointment to Human Welfare Commission; Police Crowd Management Policies; Lien for Noncompliance with Seismic Mitigations 1734 University; 2nd Reading of Anti-Homeless Laws.
http://www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/Clerk/City_Council/2015/12_Dec/City_Council__12-01-2015_-_Regular_Meeting_Agenda.aspx

 

Update from the Windfall Profits Tax Special Workshop November 17:

FundAffordableHoudingThe City Council gave the new landlord PAC, the Berkeley Rental Housing Association, a seat at the table for their very own PowerPoint on how it must be somebody else’s job to fund affordable housing. However, the Council seemed receptive at the workshop since the measure has what passes for bipartisan support, Berkeley-style: both Arreguin and Capitelli want to fund affordable housing through a reasonable increase in the business license fee. Only Mayor Bates asked aggressive questions which betrayed his ignorance of the process of crafting Council ballot measures.

Contra Costa Times Covers Landlord Tax
“Satellite Affordable Housing Associates Executive Director Susan Friedland said $4 million annually would mean construction of 40-to-50 affordable units every year given that nonprofit housing developers must get about 25 percent of their funding from local sources to leverage other funds….Barton proposed a number of exemptions, including one- and two-unit and nonprofit-owned properties; rent-controlled properties with pre-1999 tenants (before vacancy decontrol allowed landlords to set rents of rent-controlled units as high as the market will bear when units are vacated); low-and-moderate income landlords; and units with federally subsidized tenants.”
http://www.contracostatimes.com/breaking-news/ci_29134727/berkeley-tax-proposed-fund-low-income-housing

Affordable Housing Panel November 14
Amy Davidson, community project coordinator for the City of Berkeley, said it takes $500,000 to develop one unit of affordable housing and then discussed the city’s $28,000 fee for developers with a complete lack of irony.
http://www.contracostatimes.com/bay-area-news/ci_29124916/berkeley-few-prospects-affordable-housing-panel-says

By Posted on Posted in Issues

Berkeley’s Below Market Rate rentals program needs a lot of tweaks, but BTU is excited to share the city’s announcement that 20 newly-constructed units are opening for applications. A building on San Pablo in South Berkeley is accepting applications for 15 units this week, with three more units opening in September on MLK and Dwight and another four offered on University Avenue near 4th Street.

Apartment owners handle applications themselves, although BTU and Councilman Arreguin have called for a city-wide waitlist for the future. A studio at the Higby on San Pablo will rent for $2200 at market – but a one bedroom will rent for $1,345 to renters who make less than $59,520 a year. Tenants who meet the income limits are encouraged to apply to all three projects, and share info with BTU about how the process really works.

Here is a sample chart with rents and income limits, although some units also are being offered to renters at lower income levels than these.

Screen Shot 2015-08-06 at 2.51.38 PM

The first deadline is Monday, August 10!

Follow this link for details: http://www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/ContentDisplay.aspx?id=110963

By Posted on Posted in Actions

Household-Income-DistributionOn Wednesday February 18 the Planning Commission will hold a public hearing on the Housing Element of Berkeley’s General Plan. The hearing is at 7 PM at the North Berkeley Senior Center. BTU needs tenants to come speak out!

Berkeley’s 2015-2023 Housing Element is the basis for housing goals and policies for the next eight years. It is important that renters comment on this draft now, in order to maintain tenant protects and expand development of actual affordable housing.

Your Berkeley Tenants Union has written an extensive critique of the draft, linked below. We hope you will attend the hearing or write the Planning Commission right away supporting our goals:

  1. Demo Ordinance: Rent controlled housing must remain protected from demolitions.
  2. The Affordable Housing Mitigation Fee charged to developers should be high enough to actually mitigate the lower-income housing needs created by new development.
  3. “Illegal” Units: City should provide path to legalize 4,000 rent controlled units which do not have permits – San Francisco’s program could be our model.
  4. Code Enforcement / Habitability: Increase proactive inspections; allow anonymous complaints.
  5. Better monitoring of Below Market Rate “Inclusionary” Rentals

Write to planning: JHarrison@cityofberkeley.info; aamoroso@cityofberkeley.info–

Full BTU Letter to Planning
2015.Planning Commission Feb 18.BTU

Article on first Housing Element hearing:
http://www.contracostatimes.com/breaking-news/ci_27491384/berkeley-commission-examines-housing-issues

Draft Housing Element itself:
http://www.ci.berkeley.ca.us/housingelement/

By Posted on Posted in Issues

Screen shot 2015-03-09 at 7.55.51 PMThis is from John’s letter to the Planning Commission for the February 18 hearing:

It is clear from the Draft Berkeley Housing Element document that Berkeley is falling short of providing a mix of affordable housing for lower income AND middle income residents. I will focus on middle income residents, and particularly in my view an acute need for additional family housing within the City of Berkeley. Recent projects within the City have included a limited mix of primarily studio rentals and high-end rentals and condos, but units falling in the middle of these two extremes are, in comparison, few. I cite Table 1-1 as an example, which indicates that between the years 2000 and 2006 Berkeley provided only 4% of the Regional Housing Needs Determination as set by ABAG for moderate-income residents. Further, Table 2-14 indicates a lack of Renter Occupied 3 and 4 bedroom units, units which could be utilized by moderate to large size families.

I quote from the Objectives section of the Draft: “Berkeley residents should have access to quality housing at a range of prices and rents.Housing is least affordable for people at the lowest income levels, and City resources should focus on this area of need.”

I do not argue with the egalitarian goal of this statement, but in reviewing the documentation in this Draft it is clear to me that the middle class, and particularly moderate-income residents with children (i.e., families) are the ones primarily being squeezed for housing in Berkeley. I do not see that trend reversing without an emphasis on strategies and programs to address this essential need.

John T. Selawsky
Member, Berkeley Tenants Union
Commissioner, Rent Stabilization Board