The term "affordable housing" has become an oxymoron in Los Angeles. Experts and commentators agree that truly affordable housing may not be habitable or near where residents work, and habitable housing near employment is often unaffordable to the average family.
The Los Angeles County market needs 100,000 new units to meet existing demand. Unfortunately, Los Angeles ranks at the bottom of every major city in the country in the number of units permitted last year.
As an experienced developer, I would suggest that this is not a crisis that can be solved only though government subsidies but a planning challenge that could be met if Los Angeles allowed builders to implement existing city policy.
Agreement is near universal on key elements of the issue: First, there is a shortage of affordable housing; second, the city ought to encourage building more affordable housing; third, given the scarcity of vacant land, building any new housing in quantity will require redevelopment of existing underutilized properties.
Infill development is the term for this activity, and it is supported by planners, architects, elected officials, developers and environmentalists. It is preferred city policy and it means that progress occurs when, say, 50 aging units are replaced with 75 modern ones, of which some are reserved as affordable housing, all on the same property. L.A. officials promote the policy and builders accept it so the ingredients are present for a meaningful assault on the problem.
That's the theory. Unfortunately, it doesn't always translate into practice. Consider my firm's experience in trying to develop infill housing in Sherman Oaks.
Our Chase Knolls proposal is a textbook case of good infill design. The plan calls for replacing 260 aging apartments--which don't meet building and safety standards--with 362 modern, market-rate apartments and 40 one-bedroom low-income units for seniors.
The new complex, which would increase the housing on this property by 56%, would exceed all city design requirements, and current senior tenants would have first choice on the new affordable units.
Existing zoning permits 309 units of market-rate housing without requiring the affordable component to be built. We could just do it, as they say, with no site plan review or additional city approvals. Instead, my firm, Legacy Partners, decided to go the extra mile--to build something more inclusive and, we think, more responsive to the city's policy goals.
