Low-Income Housing Draws Support From a Distance
Controversy inevitably seems to follow Saticoy-based Cabrillo Economic Development Corp.
The nonprofit company has become Ventura County’s largest private builder of low-income housing. But while most people publicly support low-income housing projects, few actually back these projects when they are proposed in their back yards, said Rodney Fernandez, Cabrillo’s executive director.
In Ventura, Cabrillo wants to build 80 apartments and 66 single-family houses on a 23-acre lot just north of the Santa Paula Freeway and east of Saticoy Avenue. The apartments would be rented to families earning between $20,000 and $40,000. The houses would be set aside for families making $35,000 to $45,000. These families may be low-income, but not necessarily poor.
Still, nearby residents have criticized the proposal. “There are people who don’t want any growth, and there are people who think lower-income construction will hurt their property values,” Fernandez said. “There are a lot of bad examples of public housing,” he conceded, adding, however, “We look to develop smaller projects that don’t intrude on a neighborhood.” Cabrillo has taken to knocking on neighborhood doors to solicit support.
Cabrillo finally won approval in March for 32 low-income apartments in Oxnard. The Villa Solimar project will be built on land purchased from the city’s Redevelopment Agency. The city also is providing Cabrillo with more than $340,000 that will be used to help cover construction costs. Three-bedroom apartments--which cost an average of $156,250 to build--will rent for $600 to $700 a month.
The neighbors haven’t exactly been thrilled by the prospect of low-income housing nearby. Residents complained to the Oxnard City Council about projected traffic, security problems and even crying babies that would move into the project.
Another battle involving Cabrillo centered on a recently completed project for poor farm workers east of Fillmore. Residents pay between $200 and $590 a month for two- to four-bedroom townhouses. One family of four residing at the Rancho Sespe apartment development near Fillmore has an annual income of just $6,700. Local farmers opposed the project, arguing that it didn’t belong in the area.
The not-in-my-back-yard (NIMBY) syndrome is rampant, said David A. Ferguson, vice president of Thomas Safran & Associates, a for-profit, West Los Angeles-based housing developer that recently completed the rehab of 25 low-income housing units in Sunland with some public assistance. “Residents near low-income housing projects are concerned about crime, graffiti and property values,” Ferguson said. “They also don’t want a bunch of junk cars on their streets.”
Ferguson said his company is now involved mostly in rehabbing buildings that already are a community problem. The reaction of most nearby residents is relief that the buildings are being repaired and renewed, he said. The developer also takes neighbors on bus tours of its other low- and moderate-income projects to help get the neighbors on their side.
Ferguson also likes to remind people that low- and moderate-income renters aren’t for the most part criminals or unemployed. Most are blue- or pink-collar workers. In Los Angeles, median income for a family of four is $48,300. To qualify for low- and moderate-income units, renting families must make 80% of that figure or less.
“If you are going to build low-income housing, you are going to have trouble from nearby residents in single-family homes because of their fears about property values,” observed Linda Parks, a planning commissioner for the city of Thousand Oaks. Often people don’t realize, though, that low-income residents may be schoolteachers or nurses, Parks said.
The answer to making lower-income housing more palatable, she said, is rehabbing existing structures instead of building new ones and keeping affordable projects low-density. “It’s not good to have high-density, low-income projects segregated from the rest of the community,” Parks insisted.
The city of Los Angeles has for the most part avoided the so-called NIMBY phenomenon when funding new low-income housing by choosing sites in neighborhoods that have a variety of problems, said Gary W. Squier, general manager of the Los Angeles Housing Department. So neighbors in this type of area, Squier said, usually welcome publicly assisted projects because they are new and kept up better. They inject hope into the area.
In Sherman Oaks, Squier recalled, his department encountered more opposition than usual with a project near Woodman Avenue and Ventura Boulevard. The neighbors’ concerns were allayed, however, by the fact that the units would be rented to seniors and the size of the pending development was scaled down.
Since 1991, the Los Angeles Housing Department has invested $71 million for the construction of 1,831 new low- and moderate-income rental housing units that had a total development cost of $182 million. As of January, 1994, fewer than 10% of the funded units were completed--the rest were either under construction or in the “pre-construction” phase.
When the Housing Department helps fund a low- or moderate-income rental housing project, a certain percentage of the units essentially come under a strict form of rent control, and those units are usually reserved for individuals and families earning significantly less than the median income for the area.
