Councilmember Ervin talks about ZTAs, Affordable Housing and a new Lifestyle Safeway
By Silver Springer • Oct 24th, 2007 • Category: Business and Economic Development, Government and Politics, Real Estate
Councilmember Valerie Ervin spoke at the South Silver Spring Neighborhood Association meeting Monday night giving updates on development, pedestrian safety, transportation and the annual growth policy.
Afterwards residents asked question and Ervin answered. The night ended with the association voting for a letter in support of Zoning Text Amendment 07-14. The ZTA’s intent is to allow for 200’ft buildings in the South Silver Spring/Ripley Street Districts under Optional Method of development.
Currently buildings can only be built up to 143’ft unless they are within 800’ft of the metro station entrance. There are already several existing buildings, like some at the NOAA complex that are 200 plus feet.
Back in May the Silver Spring Scene reported that the Ripley Street District could be a possible headquarters location for NPR. 40% of NPR’s workforce lives in Montgomery County according to Ervin.
Ervin said she’s talked with developers about affordable housing in the Fenton Village area and there are opportunities to double the green space at the Fenton Street Park. But the developer also wants to build a pocket park as part of the public use space requirement. The public use space requirement is in debate since virtually all optional method projects submitted by developers include a pocket park. Ervin said she told the developer that this was not acceptable encouraging them to go for ‘real’ green space.
The Silver Spring Scene reviewed the majority of the Silver Spring developments in the†Rating the Projects†series last year; revealing that virtually all of the public use space submitted by developers were small unusable pocket parks.
Ervin also said other big plans are slated for the Fenton Village area. She noted that the Safeway on Thayer ave (the worst Safeway of all time) has plans to be demolished and replaced with a new “Lifestyle†format.
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The rabid pro-Gentrification crowd hates these TWO words: Affordable Housing. They would rather have condos priced for lawyers than for a federal government worker. Leave no young affluent professional behind, indeed.
Hey IHY — check out the Moderately Priced units — maybe Silver Spring will get more of those:
http://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/dhctmpl.asp?url=/Content/DHCA/housing/housing_P/mpdu/resale.asp#Silver
Yes.. indeed IHateYuppies… in wildly liberal Montgomery County, we hate the words affordable housing - Have you checked the political demographics of MoCo lately?
Pro-smart-development is a completely different point of view than pro-gentrification. And pro-smart-development certainly, as I would characterize it - myself at least, does not dislike the term affordable housing. The economic diversity of silver spring is great and we should be doing everything we can to support it. 12.5% of all new develpement is allocated as MPDU’s which is a good start. Unfortunately, projects do still need to be economically logical for developers, this means in highly desireable area, that other units get priced higher for them to recoup their expense of offering 12.5% as below market rates - which, I think, has caused a gap in affordability for middle class residents that are above the MPDU income limit, but can’t afford the higher market rates - that in fact is why I still am renting. I agree that this is a problem that the county must acknowledge. But, failing transforming into a communist state, we can’t force developers to sell things below market rate, all we can try to do is drive the market rate. And the solution for that is in fact, more, not less, development - simple supply and demand. But without real discussion and offering real solutions, saying “I hate yuppies and the whole world is clearly against me” really doesn’t do very much. So as I’ve requested of your anti-development comments on here before, please offer some proposed solutions. What approach would YOU take if you were the county? How, as a free market democracy, do we solve these problems?
Developers can be forced to provide below-market units. Check out the housing programs in any city/county. It’s the trade-off for getting permission to build:
http://www.montgomerycountymd.gov/dhctmpl.asp?url=/content/dhca/housing/housing_P/workforce/index.asp
He never offers solutions. Instead of using his posting to sing the praises of the potential for affordable housing, he simply complained about how those with more than him wouldn’t like affordable housing. As usual, IHY rambles on about how those with means have their foot on the neck of those without. Let it go, dude.
SSPaul:
What are the solutions? How about voting with your feet? If the real estate market remains unaffordable, people will simply leave the county. People who have valuable economic skills. People who can make contributions to the community. The county loses out. I think there might be a market solution here since the RE developers will have to re-evaluate their pricing strategies and investment returns down the road. Whether they price down in the end…I remain doubtful.
I think the 12.5 percent threshold is too friendly to developers. I would increase the the limit but I think the county should offer some subsidization assistance so the developer doesn’t take a complete bath. That’s right: your tax dollars should help the Metro bus driver or the University of Maryland janitor afford a slice of property in Silver Spring.
Right now in Silver Spring, we have an OVER-SUPPLY of available housing. Many new condo units are available all over. Yet, you would think the real estate developer would slash prices so they can get more buyers? Nope. The developer would rather have an empty unit for the next 2-3 years until the market turns UP again. Reducing prices by more than 20-30 percent would be a huge investment loss for the developer. Don’t sell to a middle-class guy today; wait for the young affluent professional (YAPpie) to buy 3 years from now. Adjustment rate mortgages and other seedy loan arrangements will be either out-lawed or severely curtailed in the market place. This hurts the potential lower-income RE buyer. However, the YAPpie doesn’t need this stuff because he could afford to place a 20 percent down payment and make $3,000 per month mortgage payments. The perfect buyer!
If condo prices in downtown SS for a one-bedroom unit dropped to say $200,000; you would have potential buyers lining up by the thousands. Buildings get full. New buyers are happy. The county gets an influx of new property tax money. The real estate developer SHOULD BE happy. In reality, this won’t happen because the real estate developer is making BETS that more high-income people are coming to Silver Spring. Should this kind of behavior by a business be punished by local governments? No. Because in the long run, making risky bets that affluent buyers will swamp to your marble-countertop, steel appliance McCondo Box will come back to bite you in the ass. This is when a market solution is warranted and hopefully materializes.
SSPaul: “Free markets” are not always free or open as you think. The seller has more resources and better information than the consumer. Just look at the sub-prime loan fiasco. Sometimes government intervention is necessary and some times the consumer should punish the business. We need a little of both in Montgomery County right now.
How about the state of Maryland floating one billion dollars in bonds(paying 3%) that would provide backing for 4% mortgages.
It is a proposal that was suggest during the 80’s and most recently in the County Executive race.
People in Montgomery County support the idea of affordable housing as long as it isn’t in their neighborhood. Housing in Montgomery County is affordable compared to Manhattan and California, yet our community is far more prosperous and desireable. Plus we have vast quantities of affordable housing in PG and Balitmore. Leggett and the rest of you Takoma Park closet racists are the only ones driving the idea of an affordable housing crisis.
Let’s try to build affordable housing in the Ripley District or at the north part of the downtown business area, but watch as the wonderfully liberal NIMBY’s in East Silver Spring and Woodside Park protest the idea. Mark my words. It will happen.
LA said: “Developers can be forced to provide below-market units.”
You can … if the project makes economic sense even after the below market units are included. But if developers can’t sell the market rate units for enough of a premium to cover what they lose on the below market units, they won’t build anything. Given the condo market today, even 12.5% below market units (1 in every 8 units) may be too much to allow new projects to go forward. In a booming market the percentage could be more than 12.5%.
Love they Neighbor said: “but watch as the wonderfully liberal NIMBY’s in East Silver Spring and Woodside Park protest the idea.” As a Woodside Park resident and a participant in the neighborhood e-group, I haven’t heard anyone objecting to below-market housing in new developments. in fact, some people have advocated a higher percentage. The only objections I have heard are to buildings which are too tall in comparison to existing townhouses and single family houses across the street or not set back from the street with a little green space like the townhouses along Second Street near the metro station.
The article above mentions a “lifestyle” supermarket. What is that?
IHYuppies… Thank you for engaging in some debate, it’s greatly appreciated.
A couple of thoughts of my own…
My tax dollars already DO help subsidize bus drivers, UMD janitors, etc… My maryland tax dollars pay for lower/middle income subsidies on low down payment, low interest mortgages. And beyond the maryland programs, my highest-in-the-state MoCo income tax pays for further programs that expand into broader income ranges. Could these programs do more? Perhaps.. I honestly haven’t sat down and analyzed them, but they certainly DO exist. I think the income limit in MoCo is something like 70% of median income or soemthing along those lines. If I recall the income limit for a household of 2 people falls in the 40k range, family of 4 in the 55k range or so for the MoCo programs.
However, even WITH these programs, and even WITH the expansion of these programs every person in the state will not be able to live in any community they desire. That’s just a fact of life… some neighborhoods end up more expensive than others due to demand. And unless the gov’t wants to start into the business of building housing themselves - which would be.. uhm.. communism - that’s guaranteed to stay to some degree.
I think you are absolutely right, that if the surplus of housing stays around for too long in DTSS we will see prices dropping. We’ve seen it in the past year at some new developments. I watched the 1BR+loft units at silverton list at 409k and come down to 309k before they finally sold. Would I love to see condos pop up in the 200-250k range that dropped a few of the nicities like granite counter tops and stainless appliances come on the market? Sure - I’d start thinking about quitting renting if that happened. But what are we going to do to make that happen? Pass county laws to tell developers what kind of counter tops need to go in their kitchens!? I just don’t see a democratic way to do it. Hopefully, the RE market will flatten enough to make that a economically worthwhile solution. Maybe some of the new buildings going up (galaxy, portico, etc..) will see all these “luxery” units sitting unsold and decide to drop the word “luxery” out of their names and market more to “the masses” so to speak, so median income earners can afford them without subsidies and below median earners can do it with. I’d love to see that happen as much as you - but I think market forces have to make it happen, not Ike Leggett.
But reading your thoughts, I stil don’t understand how the “pro-gentrification crowd hates affordable housing”… I consider myself, at the very least, pro-Downtown-development and I don’t hate affordable housing. The developers care about making money, it has nothing to do with affordable or non-affordable - you can’t expect a for-profit business to operate any other way. Affordable housing is something that governments do to make otherwise unaffordable areas more affordable. And if those subsidies mean more potential buyers, I think the developers are QUITE happy about affordable housing. The 1950’s-80’s or so quite successfully proved that large subsidized housing “projects” are a bad, bad idea. Which is why the 90’s, 2000’s approach has been integrated economic diversity (i.e. MPDU’s, subsidized mortgages with low down payements, etc..). Do we need more of those programs? Perhaps. Will that make DTSS affordable to everyone who wants to live there? Nope. Will it help MORE bus drivers and UMD janitors to afford it? Yeaup. But I don’t see how that has to do with the pro-gentrification crowd, developers or ANYONE except elected officials and tax payers.
Penguin,
http://www.consumeraffairs.com/news04/2005/safeway.html
Consumer affairs says its a more “upscale” grocery store that is marketed on quality rather than strictly price - i.e. Whole Foods, Trader Joes, etc…
I hope they do improve quality… but I hope they don’t take it AS FAR as whole foods. Giant is crowded enough as it is, I can’t imagine what chaos would come were it the ONLY non-organic-priced grocery store in town…..
…. When’s that building that’s getting the Harris Teeter on the first floor showing up????
Where are all these allegedly anti-affordable housing liberals? Someone please get specific.
Anyway, I look forward to a new Safeway on Thayer. The current one is awful, and I go there only for selzter (true). I shop in the middle of the day, so the lines aren’t bad, but I think it’s very telling that they have all the empty cashier lines blocked, which prevents convenient pass-through for people entering from the garage. It’s presumably meant to deter crime; perhaps if the store wasn’t so rundown, they wouldn’t attract or even encourage criminal behavior. Then again, maybe there isn’t a big crime problem there, but the managers bring a siege mentality anyway.
One more thing: when will MoCo loosen its deathgrip on the sale of alcohol and let the supermarkets finally sell beer and wine?
It’s a common misperception on these threads that if a developer simply reduces or minimizes the “niceties” in these condo units (like granite, stainless, laminate floors etc.) that the price can drop considerably.
Certainly the extra costs for these amenities are passed on to the consumer, but the difference between the niceties and the basics is minimal WHEN COMPARED TO the overall costs a developer must incur to do business in the Silver Spring CBD and the region in general: land aquisition at astronomical prices, height & density restrictions, inclusion of 12.5% of units as MPDUs, design, engineering and construction expenses.
The kitchens & bathrooms are generally so small in these units that the increase in costs to the “nicer” finishes from what is considered basic/acceptable is a drop in the bucket. They don’t dramatically affect the minimum price a developer must charge to make a reasonable profit (and that is what they do in our capitalist economy/society).