Mailbag: Costa Mesa dials back its affordable housing plans

The Costa Mesa City Council promised us affordable housing if we voted for Measure K. It was a lie.

At midnight Jan. 16, all council members talked about was cutting affordable housing to accommodate developers. Strategically placed as the last item on the agenda, this Affordable/Inclusionary Housing Ordinance (IHO) has about as much to do with inclusion and affordable housing as the Peacekeeper missile is about peace. At that late hour the last veil fell, as council members openly agonized over how to meet the requirements dictated by the developers. They want market-rate housing, so the answer was simple and reached with great ease. Cut affordable housing even more.

Sacramento requires Costa Mesa to plan for almost 12,000 housing units. And 40% of them must be low or very low income units. According to the city staff report, approximately 47% of residents in the city earn a lower income and approximately 29% qualify for very low or extremely low-income housing. Costa Mesa residents have long been asking for affordable housing. In 2022, the City Council said the only way to accomplish this was for residents to vote for Measure K, ceding their power on development to the City Council. Since then they have sat on the dais listening to the working poor constantly beg for help with housing, but all they hear are the voices of land owners and developers.

Instead of 10% to 15% affordable units in projects over 10 units, it’s down to as little as 4% to 6%, and that only applies to projects under 60 units per acre or to parcels of 2 acres or more. To skirt this is child’s play. Also the IHO does not apply to for-sale housing, and the in-lieu fees that developers pay no longer go to a first-time homebuyer’s program. There will be affordable units going in north of the 405 at One Metro West, but that was decided before this ordinance. The coup de grâce is the accommodations that allow developers to either pay in-lieu fees, agree to off-site affordable units or swap land instead of including affordable units in their luxury complexes. Rarely is this affordable housing ever built.

So, the only affordable housing in Costa Mesa will be restricted to the Fairview Developmental Center, near other low-income minority neighborhoods, next to the Emergency Operations Center with its 10-story tower of flashing lights clad in plastic to look like a tree. It will be Costa Mesa’s version of the Watts Towers. No luxury homes will be built here. The air pollution is unhealthy and will only worsen when the EOC trucks arrive filling the warehouses with supplies — and the helipad is still in play. The high-density concrete high-rise next door will be affordable housing. And don’t expect green space, trees, and parks, because developers can avoid those too with in-lieu fees. The term for this is redlining, and it’s against the law.

Priscilla Rocco
Costa Mesa

What do the Huntington Beach City Council majority and the U.S. House of Representatives majority have in common? Yes, there are conservative Republicans in charge. Yes, they have been committed to tilting at ideological windmills. Yes, they are beholden to MAGA extremists supporting former president Donald Trump. But, the most devastating thing these deliberative “do-nothings” have in common is dropping the pretense of actually representing their constituents.

Naturally, the Republican leadership in the House has not addressed the pressing issues of the budget, foreign aid, immigration reform, voter rights and a multitude of others. They are off on their own witch hunts and investigations which only serve the interests of their base.

Not to be outdone in comparison, the vote-as-a-block council majority in Surf City is focused solely on their irresponsible and ruinous charter amendments, which only advance their authoritarian agenda. Their stated aim is to beat the “wokeness” out of the community by any means possible while ignoring real solutions to any of the city’s pressing local government needs. This is in addition to taking on the county and state in losing battles over elections and housing. In the meantime, they have been busy crushing societal norms in the community and acting to benefit the special interests who installed them in power.

Yes, a critical thing these two government bodies have in common is a disrespect for democracy and a zero-sum game of their winning and everybody else losing. That can only change when both of these majorities are out of power. It cannot come soon enough for both Huntington Beach and the country.

Tim Geddes
Huntington Beach