Months after the state housing department deemed the city of San Mateo’s housing plans “substantially compliant,” the City Council voted this week to unanimously adopt the latest round of revisions before sending it back to regulators for final certification. The city is planning for 10,000 new units, about 40% more than its 7,000-unit regional housing target, with a significant portion planned along the busy El Camino Real thoroughfare. Every eight years, local governments are required to submit a housing element, a document that outlines how cities will add a specific number of homes at various price points.
The city’s housing plan is already more than a year overdue. Not having a certified housing element means that a city could be subject to consequences like the builder’s remedy, which allows developers to ignore a city’s zoning rules as long as 20% of the units are set aside as affordable. In recent years, state regulators have been scrutinizing cities’ housing plans more closely than ever before, as the state struggles with soaring housing costs and a housing shortage.
“I think it is a very strong document. You never know what’s going to happen in the future, but we’ve got a very good plan for the 7,015 units, and we’ve got a 40% buffer,” San Mateo Mayor Lisa Diaz Nash said of the latest revision. “While we can’t tell developers where to build or how to build, we just have to demonstrate it’s feasible.
” Some residents and community organ.
