The Steamboat Pilot & Today: Our View: Housing policy impact on nonprofits should be reviewed

Contribute

Steamboat Springs — The Steamboat Springs City Council should reconsider aspects of its new community housing policy before approving it Tuesday.

Specifically, we are concerned the ordinance requires nonprofit organizations to pay linkage fees at the same rate as commercial development.

The council approved the first reading of its revised housing ordinance May 22. The ordinance regulates how the city provides affordable housing in Steamboat’s real estate market and will increase building requirements and fees for developers.

To its credit, the council has held months of public debate on the topic before casting its first vote. A second and final vote on the ordinance could come Tuesday.

Central to the ordinance is its linkage policy. Under linkage, developers are required to compensate the city, either by a fee or by construction of affordable homes, for a percentage of the new work force housing need the development theoretically will create.

The city has developed a formula for determining how much a developer has to pay in lieu of building homes under the linkage policy. The formula factors in the number of jobs created per 1,000 square feet of development and the number of workers and housing units needed per new job. The net result is a fee of about $18,600 per 1,000 square feet of new development.

That means a new 50,000-square-foot commercial development would be required to build 7.1 affordable housing units or pay the city a fee of $931,000.

The city has decided not to exempt nonprofits and government agencies from linkage, arguing development in those sectors requires new jobs just like commercial development.

But the fees are harder on nonprofits, which cannot pass them on to buyers or clients the way commercial developers can.

The new Lufkin LIFT-UP Center built last year is 8,000 square feet. Under linkage, the nonprofit agency that provides food and clothing to needy residents would have been required to pay the city almost $150,000. As it was, the agency struggled with increasing construction costs. An additional $150,000 fee could have jeopardized the project, LIFT-UP Executive Director David Freseman said.

“The concern is that not-for-profit organizations are reliant on agencies like the United Way, government and charitable groups because nonprofits have no income to use if they must expand to meet a community need,” said Karl Gills, the chief executive officer at the nonprofit Yampa Valley Medical Center.

Gills, Freseman and other nonprofit directors plan to address the council Tuesday. If they can’t get nonprofits exempted from the linkage requirement, they will ask the council to consider evaluating nonprofit projects for exemption on a case-by-case basis.

“I would hope that the members of the City Council who support the community housing ordinance would take a moment to consider the unintended consequences on some of the community agencies that provide vital services to our residents,” Gills said.

The city’s efforts to spur the creation of workforce housing in our community are noble; however, doing so at the expense of agencies that provide equally important services to those workers is counterproductive.

We have broader concerns with the housing policy such as how the funds will be used and whether the policy will serve as an impediment to, rather than a catalyst for, work force housing. But we have hammered those points before to no avail. The nonprofit issue is an easy fix that we urge the council to make Tuesday night.

Try the Steamboat Pilot & Today for 45 days FREE
Click here for details or call 970-871-4232

Community comments

Note: The Steamboat Pilot & Today doesn’t necessarily condone the comments here, nor does it review every post. Read our full policy.

boatski (anonymous)
June 3, 2007 at 8:56 a.m.
› Suggest removal

“That means a new 50,000-square-foot commercial development would be required to build 7.1 affordable housing units”

Let's see 50,000 sq ft = 7 units, Let's just say we have a 100 workers that need to be in affordable housing, just to fill the jobs that are in the paper now.

At 2 workers per unit we would need at least 50 units. That means we need developers to build 357,000 sq ft just to house those workers.

To bad the council didn't get it's act together sooner, before all this new development came along. Anyone know how much new sq footage is in the works that is not included in this linkage formula?

So let's approve more development and get those affordable units built! Sounds like a good plan to me, NOT!

Books (anonymous)
June 3, 2007 at 12:56 p.m.
› Suggest removal

The Town Council in Crested Butte is considering an ordinance to limit the real estate companies on their main street (Elk Ave). The commercial rents have gotten so high that the only businesses that can afford the rent are the realtors. Small shops are getting squeezed out by the high rents. Will this happen here to? Our City Council should go ahead and get it over with and include a realtor limitation in their ordinance. Linkage will only make the high rent situation even worse.

Matthew Stoddard
June 3, 2007 at 1:19 p.m.
› Suggest removal

Big Box Real Estate Office? Based on Jim Cook's blurb:

“Bob’s Conoco presents a distinct hurdle for extending the downtown shopping corridor, Cook said, because when shoppers reach the gas station, they stop and turn around.
***that's funny- Riggio's and Old West Steakhouse are past Bob's Conoco and people still go there…or were they coming from the west side, and turning back west at Bob's?***

“While it provides a valuable service in the community, it’s not retail,” Cook said. “What we want to see is a lively retail environment from one end of town to the other.”

There is an appropriate place for businesses like Bob’s Conoco in downtown, Cook said, but not necessarily on Lincoln Avenue.”

www.steamboatpilot.com/news/2007/jun/03/…

Wonder if Cook is taking his own words into account when he occupies a Lincoln Ave. address and isn't “retail” as most people think of it. Retail to me means something I pay for in one stop and take home with me from there, or if there is a need to frequent the business for day to day items. To me, buying a house doesn't constitute a retail transaction in the general sense of the word.

thecondoguy1 (anonymous)
June 4, 2007 at 7:35 a.m.
› Suggest removal

kielbasa, Matt,,, Riggio's, Old west, Giovanni's etc, are well patronized, (I love um), but I do see people wanting to park down there, and pedestrians crossing the street or turning around at or before Bob's. I do wonder if they would continue on to those stores if there was more continuity.
I also agree with your definition of a retail transaction, including food and drink consumed on the premisis.
good luck at all you do………

Matthew Stoddard
June 4, 2007 at 8:32 a.m.
› Suggest removal

Thanks! Still, there's a parking lot right across the street from Bob's, just before the Old West Bldg., so that helps a bit. I also remember an oil spill under that ground at one time. Correct me if I'm wrong, but wouldn't that also preclude building anything else on the land for a long time?

Plus, as stupid as it sounds at first, if you put in a stoplight at 11th (take the 8th St. light out), that would be noticed by pedestrian traffic. A bigger plus out of that (maybe) would be to help keep traffic slower in the 25mph zone, since the racing westbound at 40-ish mph starts around 10th St.

thecondoguy1 (anonymous)
June 4, 2007 at 9:04 a.m.
› Suggest removal

I don't think so Matt, they would excavate the area until it was free of pollutant material and find a legal place to dump it of course.

routty (anonymous)
June 4, 2007 at 10:58 a.m.
› Suggest removal

On the linkage discussion: if the policy & the ordinance adopted by city council is crafted to exempt some people and not others, then doesn't the nature of it change from a FEE to a TAX? If so—and I'm not sure, I'd like to hear some expertise out there on this—then the whole thing would require a public vote under CO state law as a tax issue, wouldn't it?

elphaba
June 5, 2007 at 10:31 a.m.
› Suggest removal

I'm curious - does Ken Brenner get free housing in this somewhere? If not, why is he in favor of it?

another_local (anonymous)
June 5, 2007 at 5:31 p.m.
› Suggest removal

Bob's is primarily a service business, not retail. His revenue stream is repairs more than gas which, I would bet, is what Cook is talking about.

Regarding realtors on Lincoln, we already have that ordiance. Office use of ground floor space (any office, not just realtors) is considered a “conditional use” under our current rules and requires an approval process. This is why you have not seen any new realtors on Lincoln in some time. The ones that are there are “grandfathered”.

sickofitall (anonymous)
June 6, 2007 at 7:07 a.m.
› Suggest removal

It's nice having a friendly downtown gas station. Alot of benefits.

portagetheyampa (anonymous)
June 8, 2007 at 12:25 p.m.
› Suggest removal

Bob's Conoco has been on Lincoln for many years and certainlyd deserves to remain right there. Isn't selling gas a retail service?

Who is Jim Cook, an obnoxious soul, anyway, to dictate who does and does not belong on Lincoln Avenue??

another_local (anonymous)
June 8, 2007 at 5:57 p.m.
› Suggest removal

portagetheyampa, Bob is the one trying to sell, this is not coming from anyone else. Nobody is pushing him anywhere or saying what should be there.

Yes, selling gas is a retail business, but most of his revenue comes from fixing cars which is not a retail business, so it is mixed in that sense. In any case it does not draw shoppers.

The point being made was that people shopping the district on foot do not go past the 900 block since they run out of retail businesses on that side of the street when they get to the gas station. If Bob is succesfull selling his property and it is redeveloped that will help other buinesses beyond 10th on both sides of the street because more foot traffic will go there.

cheesehead (anonymous)
June 8, 2007 at 8:03 p.m.
› Suggest removal

The article said Bob was approached three times….
It doesn't matter if a tourist walks by a gas station or a really cool shirt shop, if all they see is a parking lot and motel they're not gonna go much further. People walk to Bob's for smokes all the time.

Matthew Stoddard
June 8, 2007 at 10 p.m.
› Suggest removal

Cheesehead- Not if they happen to look across the street and see the businesses between 10th and 11th. As it has been said- Riggios, Old West Steakhouse and the rest of the Old West Building seem to do a brisk business already. I don't think Bob's Conoco has hurt them. If he decides to sell, bully for him. Monopoly House #? goes in with some store fronts. If not, as the only gas and or service station in downtown, I'm sure business will thrive.