Suddenly Seabright? Where has Ryan Coonerty been on development all this time?

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Ryan Coonerty, my opponent in the Santa Cruz mayoral race, has suddenly expressed discontent with Workbench’s proposed Seabright-Soquel project, and called me “late to the game” in taking a stand on it.

He even held a public rally about it on the same evening as my campaign launch.

My question is: Where has Coonerty been all this time on intensifying development in Santa Cruz?

First, politics is not a race to be first to issue a statement. I wanted to understand the Seabright proposal before taking a position. I have been talking with the developer, asking questions about the site and exploring alternatives.

SANTA CRUZ MAYOR’S RACE: Read more Lookout news and Community Voices opinion coverage here

I oppose the project as submitted because I care about the businesses that operate in the lot, and because its scale seems massive.

Nonetheless, being a mayor is not about being reactionary to each individual project, but about what kind of development we want overall in Santa Cruz and whether we are willing to use local tools to shape it.

The community has every right to be concerned about the future of cherished businesses and an iconic intersection. I’ve been asking the developer: Can the project be moved? Is there another lot that could work? Can commercial space be preserved or redesigned? The project is still in pre-application. Square footage and other design elements are not set in stone.

A private developer purchasing property from a private owner who wants to sell cannot be stopped by elected officials. But the city has leverage. It can support existing tenants in relocating and advocate for first rights to leasing.

I believe Coonerty knows this.

In fact, according to the developer, Coonerty knew about the proposal in July, before it became public, and discussed it with him. The developer told me Coonerty said he needed to be “anti-development” to get “Eastside votes.”

Is Coonerty’s opposition to Seabright driven by the project itself, or by the politics of this election?

While on the city council in 2012, Coonerty supported general plan changes that allow for a project just like the one at Seabright and Soquel.

Since 2020, Santa Cruz politics has been dominated by Santa Cruz Together (SCT), the real estate-and-developer-driven political action committee (PAC) in town. Coonerty is deeply embedded in and supported by SCT.

If you think RiverRow is massive, wait until the six-story Cruz Hotel gets built next to it. It’s a project Coonerty supports that turned two city-owned parcels over to a New York-based developer – organized by Owen Lawlor, a Coonerty donor.

By contrast, I have been pushing back on state mandates for development and the YIMBY (Yes in My Backyard) movement. With Our Downtown Our Future, I was opposed to the downtown library project because I worried downtown would soon be consumed by massive developments. I supported keeping one open plaza, with affordable housing, and Measure M to maintain local control over development and building heights. 

Coonerty, individually, as a supervisor and as a member of SCT, opposed these. 

Coonerty worked for and endorsed San Jose Mayor Matt Mahan, who ran for governor. Mahan was one of the most YIMBY candidates in the primary. Alliances between YIMBY proponents and tech authoritarians, along with outright racists, trouble me.

We must always be vigilant about the overlap between policy, politicians and money, and I will be. 

Our housing crisis is real

My thinking evolved on housing when I ran for supervisor in 2022. Voters convinced me we are in a dire housing crisis. 

The YIMBY argument is to build, build, build, and we do need more housing. I support some YIMBY laws, and oppose others. I support tenant protections and ensuring that locals and workers get preference in the affordable units we build. 

I seek to advance affordable housing policies our council can pass. I will lobby the state for increased local control in Santa Cruz and work diligently on our “objective standards” (our design guidelines) and the city’s housing element, to create the most attractive, properly scaled buildings we can build.

But we still face a housing crisis. 

We urgently need to build truly affordable housing for locals. We also need to build in areas least impactful to neighbors. While we are on course to meet and exceed our Regional Housing Needs Allocation numbers, “market-rate” housing is not going to meet the needs of our most vulnerable, essential community members and children. With federal health cuts looming in 2027, the housing crisis will only get worse. 

To prevent a further homelessness spike, we must protect low-income housing, support tenants, and create a residents’ oversight committee for Measure C affordable housing funds.

Our RHNA numbers have multiplied by five what they were in the previous cycle. I will fight to keep these numbers at reasonable levels, and not overbuild – I will aim to keep projects in neighborhoods to scale (three or four stories).

Coonerty was a consultant to developers whose family owns a building downtown (to be developed). His donor list reads like a who’s-who of real estate players – with funds from executives at OpenAI, Meta, Google and Coinbase – the same companies that have pushed San Francisco housing into the stratosphere.

My campaign is people-powered. On the Seabright project, my job is to listen to community concerns and take them to the city and developer. My focus as mayor will be on truly affordable housing, protecting tenants and working hard on our city’s design standards. I ask you to join me. 

Ami Chen Mills is a candidate for mayor in Santa Cruz. She encourages the community to become educated and get engaged and involved.