Affordable-housing rules are tightened

Affordable-housing advocates maintain that a city proposal for interim housing requirements for projects with zoning exemptions in transit-oriented development areas does not go far enough to meet Oahu’s housing shortage.

The city’s Interim Planned Development-Transit permit allows developers to seek zoning variances, including additional height and density allowances, in exchange for providing community benefits, such as affordable housing and open space. The permit is used on an interim basis until TOD zoning is adopted. Once zoning is adopted in TOD areas, developers would follow another set of zoning regulations, which is pending before the City Council.

The Council’s Zoning and Housing Committee agreed Thursday to amendments to Bill 15 that would place stricter regulations on affordable-housing requirements for community benefits.

The proposal by the city’s Department of Planning and Permitting calls for developers seeking bonuses to provide 20 percent of all for sale units at up to 120 percent of the area median income for at least 30 years. If developers build those units off-site, 25 percent would need to be offered at up to 120 percent of AMI.

For rental projects, 15 percent of units would need to be kept at up to 80 percent of AMI for at least 30 years. DPP’s proposal also includes an in-lieu fee of $45 per square foot of total residential floor space for developers choosing not to build affordable units. The fee would be paid to the city and updated annually.

Harrison Rue, TOD administrator, said the proposal is based on extensive research but added that “selection of the percentages is up to them (Council).”

Councilman Brandon Elefante proposed an amendment that would increase the affordable-housing requirement for projects with zoning exemptions to more than 30 percent of units offered at affordable rates. Additionally, for IPD-T permit projects with more than 10 residential units, his amendments would require at least 30 percent to be offered at up to 120 percent of AMI. He also proposed to eliminate the in-lieu fee for community benefits. Those changes were included in the bill that was reported out of the committee for second reading on Thursday.

Catherine Graham of the Housing Now Coalition and Faith Action for Community Equity Hawaii said there need to be more options for those earning 30 to 60 percent of AMI. She said the in-lieu fee is “a great idea in theory” but that she has not seen the fees used to provide affordable housing.

“The community benefits must be actual benefits to the community and affordable housing is the number-one benefit,” Graham said in written testimony.

Habitat for Humanity, the Office of Hawaiian Affairs and the Hawaii Appleseed Center for Law &Economic Justice also submitted testimony supporting stricter affordable-housing requirements.

But Jay Fang, developer of the Hawaii City Plaza in the Ala Moana area, said he has agreed to offer 15 percent of the 26-story tower’s 163 units at up to 80 percent of AMI but that 30 percent is too much. The Council deferred a measure that would approve an IPD-T permit for the project in February.

Committee Chairwoman Kymberly Pine said after the meeting that the Council needs to work on finding a balance.

“We certainly need to find a way to have more affordable housing in our TOD areas,” Pine said. “(But) the last thing that we want to do is make restrictions so rigid that no one’s going to build at all.”