City of Lafayette to move forward with RHNA appeal

In a continued effort to understand the methodology behind the housing unit amounts assigned to the city of Lafayette as part of the regional housing needs allocation of 441,176 units in California, established by the State Department of Housing and Community Development, Mayor Susan Candell and Council Member Gina Dawson met on June 16 with Dave Vautin and Aksel Olsen of the Association of Bay Area Governments/Metropolitan Transportation Commission.

According to a staff report presented by Planning and Building Director Greg Wolff and Housing Consultant Diana Elrod at the June 28 city council meeting, the meeting with ABAG/MTC on June 16 "confirmed that the Lafayette BART station's parking lots - nearly 11 acres in total size and considered `public lands' targeted in one of the strategies - resulted in, at least in part, the increase of 463 units from Lafayette's `illustrative' RHNA allocation of 1,651 to 2,114 units."

Candell, Dawson and staff believe including Lafayette's BART station in calculating RHNA numbers was done in error since the parking lots are 100% within the Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zones as published by Cal Fire. The draft RHNA Plan notes that the Final Blueprint strategies focus future growth away from the highest fire risk zones.

Wolff and Elrod noted that the BART parking lots, if developed according to AB 2923, could result in at least 822 units of housing, which could be problematic since the state attorney general has recently filed law suits against proposed developments in very high fire severity zones in several parts of the state.

The city, as part of its appeal that must be submitted to ABAG prior to July 9, will request the current draft allocation of 2,114 units be reduced by 822 units, resulting in an allocation of 1,292 units. This allocation would come closer to RHNA allocations currently assigned to Moraga (1,118 units) and Orinda (1,359 units). The council voted unanimously to authorize the subcommittee to make any final edits prior to submitting the final appeal.



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