2 Cities Warned to Furnish Affordable Housing Plans : Regulation: Manhattan Beach gets notice for being tardy in sending its plan to Sacramento. Palos Verdes Estates has not bothered to draft a plan.
The state attorney general’s office has warned two South Bay cities that they have failed to meet state deadlines for filing plans showing how they will provide their share of affordable housing.
Officials in Palos Verdes Estates and Manhattan Beach were notified by Deputy Attorney General Kathleen Mikkelson that within 30 days they must submit a schedule for compliance to the state Department of Housing and Community Development or face possible legal action.
State law requires that cities have an affordable housing component, called an element, in their general plans. Cities that don’t are “extremely vulnerable” to litigation by citizen groups and developers, and may have trouble securing government funds--such as community block grants--that are tied to affordable housing requirements, Mikkelson said.
Ideally, cities will come up with the plans so further action will be unnecessary, she said. But if they continue to ignore the law, the attorney general’s office may ask for a court-ordered timetable to get the plans, or may file a lawsuit.
“We’re not even at the state of seeing if these reports are adequate,” she said. “The basic thing now is coming up with a plan.”
The state requirements are aimed at getting all cities to provide a certain amount of affordable housing, thereby avoiding a clustering of impoverished families in inner-city areas. In Los Angeles alone, the waiting list for apartments has 20,000 applicants.
Some communities have developed housing elements but have either let them expire or--as in the case of Manhattan Beach--have failed to update them on time. Others, like Palos Verdes Estates, have not bothered to draft a plan since the state affordable housing requirements took effect in 1980.
James Hendrickson, city manager for Palos Verdes Estates, said the city has little space left for further development. And what little room there is has been earmarked for single-unit development or open space, leaving little land for the type of planned subdivisions that would lend themselves to affordable housing.
“Our council has not felt that it’s worthwhile to pursue because basically our city is built out, and we have over 5,000 residential units already with only 150 vacant lots yet to be developed,” he said. “So our capacity to address the issue is limited.”
Hendrickson said the city does not apply for community block grants, the government funds most often tied to affordable housing plans, because the city does not need them. He also pointed out that 60% of California cities have failed to comply with the law, and that noncompliance was not unique to Palos Verdes Estates.
“In growing cities affordable housing can be incorporated into development plans,” he said. “It’s a much easier problem to deal with in a growing and developing city than one that’s built out.” He said the city attorney is examining the issue and will report to the City Council at the next meeting on Tuesday.
In Manhattan Beach, senior planner Maxine Woerner said the city updated its affordable housing plan in September and has since sent it on to Sacramento for review. The state, however, says the city was issued a warning because the update is late, pointing out that the city’s revised plan was due in 1989.
Woerner said Manhattan Beach has a number of initiatives to promote affordable housing and is now examining a proposal from a private developer to build about 140 units of affordable housing for senior citizens.
In all, 47 communities received warnings from the attorney general’s office, including Beverly Hills, South Pasadena, Claremont, Covina, Sierra Madre, Cerritos, Claremont, Walnut, Monrovia and Norwalk.
The housing plans run in five-year cycles and are developed by cities in response to guidelines set by the Southern California Assn. of Governments, an agency responsible for half of the state’s population and housing stock. SCAG analyzes demographic data and other information to come up with the number of units a city should have in each of four income ranges.
State planners acknowledge that cities have a tougher time devising affordable housing plans in an economy wracked by recession. But they say they are willing to work with cities in creating the plans.
