Follow-up to Affordable Housing Teach-In

Photo from Berkeleyside by  Kathleen Costanza.

Thank you for attending the Teach-in on the Housing Affordability Crisis in Berkeley.
As activists working for fair housing for all Berkeley residents, we will sendyou emails
now and then about important issues.

The Housing Teach-In was videoed. Here is a link to all the talks that day.
Each speaker can be seen separately or all of them together.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5SsD0Q02p8&list=PLS2O9Gttsg5cwvAjJi-VMccKBLLu3-Iun

There is an important council meeting on Tuesday, December 15th.
We hope you can come and speak out. See below for more information.

SPEAK OUT FOR AFFORDABLE HOUSING AT THE BERKELEY CITY COUNCIL
Tuesday, December 15, 2015 at 7:00 P.M.

The Council is again considering actions for creating more affordable housing in Berkeley.  We activists must be there to speak. Let’s demand Council action on proposals made at the November 22 Affordable Housing Teach In.

The Agenda: More Funding for Affordable Housing

Three actions the City Council must take to generate $10 million and fund around 100 affordable units each year:

Increase the business license tax on large landlords in Berkeley; each 1% increase in the tax could bring in $2 to $3 million annually.

Increase the housing impact fees on market-rate development to at least the $34,000  recommended by the Nexus study . Developers should be allowed to avoid paying the fee by providing 20% affordable units (5 affordable units for every 20 market rate units built).

Tax short term rentals such as AirBnB rentals and use the new revenue for affordable housing.

These funds could also be used to create affordable home ownership through
limited equity coops and other resident-controlled cooperative housing. In addition, the Council
must:

Provide $1 million in loans to non-profit housing developers to finalize their plans for affordable housing and allow them to apply for available federal grants and tax credits. These funds are less than 25% of the surplus the City currently has available.

We must maintain the supply of existing Rental Housing. We need to insure that  affordable housing is not taken off market. Ask the Council to:

Strengthen Berkeley’s Demolition Ordinance to protect the existing supply of rent controlled housing.  Each rent controlled unit must be replaced — one for one — with housing that is permanently affordable to low and very low income households.
Continue to support reassessment by ZAB of demolishing 18 rent controlled units at 2631 Durant. There is no provision for inclusion of a similar number of replacement units in the proposed building.
Improve monitoring of affordable inclusionary units in market rate housing developments, create a City-maintained waiting list and establish priorities for housing those who currently live or work in Berkeley.

Mike yielders needed here as well.  If you can’t attend the meeting, please write to the Council to express your support for making funding and maintenance of affordable housing a priority.

Send e-mail to council@cityofberkeley.info; write “affordable housing” in the subject line.
Individual council e-mail is as follows:

Mayor Tom Bates        mayor@CityofBerkeley.info
Council District
Linda Maio            1    lmaio@CityofBerkeley.info
Darryl Moore         2    dmoore@CityofBerkeley.info
Max Anderson       3    manderson@CityofBerkeley.info
Jesse Arreguin       4    jarreguin@CityofBerkeley.info
Laurie Capitelli      5    lcapitelli@CityofBerkeley.info
Susan Wengraft      6    swengraf@CityofBerkeley.info
Kriss Worthington  7    kworthington@CityofBerkeley.info
Lori Droste             8    ldroste@CityofBerkeley.info]

From activists in the Berkeley Progessive Alliance, Sustainable Berkeley Coalition, Berkeley Citizens Action, the Berkeley Tenants Union, CALPIRG, the Berkeley NAACP, Black Student Union of Berkeley City College, and the Better Berkeley Working Group.

CONTACT
Kate Harrison
Owner/Principal
Kate Harrison Consulting
kate@kateharrisonconsulting.com
www.kateharrisonconsulting.com | (510) 593-9591