Quick Take
Retired urban planner Frank Barron makes the case for Santa Cruz’s ballot Measure M. “The voters should be allowed to have a say when developers want to build high-rises taller than the already generous height limits under current zoning,” he writes. He refutes arguments against M by progressive economist Richard McGahey, who studies cities and equality and is a senior fellow at the New School’s Schwartz Center.
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I’d like to take a moment to respond to economist Richard McGahey’s op-ed against Measure M that appeared in Lookout on Jan. 11.
McGahey says he cares about what happens here, but he doesn’t seem to trust the judgment or “attention span” of the voters who live here. He seems to think we can’t make the right decisions about what’s best for Santa Cruz. We, the proponents of Measure M, trust and respect the judgment of city voters when it comes to major decisions about the future of our city.
The voters should be allowed to have a say when developers want to build high-rises taller than the already generous height limits under current zoning (i.e., five to eight stories in most of downtown and south of Laurel Street). There are plans currently in the works to upzone the south of Laurel area to allow multiple 12-story high-rises, and this is just the beginning. City staff had previously recommended that a 22-story skyscraper, surrounded by three 18-story towers (plus another 14-story one), be built south of Laurel (see staff recommended “Development Scenario 3.1” at the June 14, 2022, city council meeting). Measure M would put this type of upzoning to a citywide vote. Without Measure M, the city council powers-that-be will not be checked, and they will allow taller and taller buildings to spread throughout downtown and beyond in the coming years.
Measure M will also modestly increase the percentage of affordable housing units developers must provide in larger projects from the current 20% to 25%. McGahey, who splits his time between New York and a mobile home in Santa Cruz, says we shouldn’t “blindly” mandate an “excessively high” affordable housing rate of 25% of new units in large housing projects (of 30-plus units). But had he been paying attention in 2021-22, he might have known that our city planning commission thoroughly researched and vetted a similar proposal, and recommended its approval by the city council. Our developer-friendly-majority city council refused to take it up. Now, the voters can pass it.
The reason the planning commission recommended boosting the city’s current 20% rate is because it gets watered down to only about 12% affordable when developers utilize the state density bonus law, which they almost always do on large projects. Measure M would bump the rate up by 5% to a more reasonable (but still too low) 17% affordable with the density bonus. The developers and investors of these large 30-plus-unit projects are making ample profits in this very lucrative market. Surely they can afford to make a measly 17% of the new units affordable to low- and moderate-income folks.
New Yorker McGahey seems to really want to see very tall buildings here, too. He might not realize that downtown and the south of Laurel area are already zoned for five to eight stories (or even more in some places), when the state density bonus rule is utilized. That is very dense for a medium-sized town like Santa Cruz, and is comparable to the density levels of much larger European cities such as Barcelona or Paris. Measure M’s election provision would only kick in when developers want buildings taller than five to eight stories in most of the downtown area, and above two to three stories in most of the outlying neighborhoods.
Also, McGahey doesn’t seem to understand how our housing market is not “normal,” in that the normal laws of supply and demand don’t work the same here. The demand for housing in Santa Cruz is nearly insatiable because we are one of the most desirable beach towns, not just in California but in the world, located only 45 minutes away from the largest economic engine in the world. The median wage at Silicon Valley employer Google, for instance, is $280,000 per year, and Google has three buses every weekday morning going from Santa Cruz to its Mountain View headquarters. Many of the multitudes of Silicon Valley tech workers have no problem paying the almost $4,000 a month rents being charged for a one-bedroom in these new developments. For them it’s a bargain – and they get to live (and work at home) in Santa Cruz instead of Cupertino.
Then there’s the ever-growing number of UCSC students, more than a few of whom have well-to-do parents who can afford the exorbitant rents that will be charged in these new developments. Not that there’s anything wrong with newly arrived students or tech workers, just keep in mind that those are the folks who will be moving into the bulk of the new units in the high-rise towers being built – not moderate- and low-income locals.
Measure M is not about stopping growth. There will be plenty of new housing under existing zoning. There already are some 1,200 new units that can potentially be built in the south of Laurel area alone, with no need to upzone. Measure M elections on rezoning to raise building height limits will only occur rarely, not when a conditional fence permit is needed for an over-height fence, not when a variance is needed for a slightly taller than usual ADU (accessory dwelling unit). These are intentional falsehoods being repeated by the opposition, apparently because they realize with such a weak argument they have to stray from the truth.
Measure M will increase the amount of affordable housing developers must provide, decreasing their profits slightly – hence their vociferous opposition.
Don’t be deceived, the opposition to Measure M is likely to be very well-funded. They won’t tell you who is funding them, but you can probably guess. Your mailboxes, social media and the airwaves are about to be filled with falsehoods and misinformation ahead of the March 5 election.
Follow the money. Don’t fall for their scare tactics.
Measure M will offer direct democracy, allowing you, the voter, to decide when and where high-rises, taller than what is currently allowed, can be built in Santa Cruz. And, by modestly increasing the amount of affordable housing developers have to provide, bumping the requirement up from 20% to 25% of new units in large 30-plus-unit projects, Measure M will increase the amount of affordable housing in Santa Cruz.
Frank Barron has lived in the county since 1969, and in the city of Santa Cruz most of the time since 1980. He is a retired urban planner, with 30 years’ experience working in the Monterey Bay region. He holds a master’s degree in urban planning from San Jose State University (1992) and a bachelor’s degree in environmental studies from UC Santa Cruz (1985).