City Planning flap over voting on housing rate

The Planning Commission is expected to weigh in Thursday on the highly charged fight over how much affordable housing builders should be required to include in market-rate developments.

But before the hearing could even start, a pregame skirmish broke out over whether one of the seven commissioners should be allowed to vote.

Critics say that Christine Johnson, one of four commissioners appointed by Mayor Ed Lee, should recuse herself because she recently took a job with SPUR, the urban think tank that mostly, but not always, takes positions favored by the city’s development community.

Johnson told Lee in February that she planned to step down from the commission, but she agreed to stay on until the mayor found a replacement. In the meantime, she sought the advice of City Attorney Dennis Herrera, who sources say has determined that there is no conflict that would prevent Johnson from voting on the affordable housing policy legislation.

In an unusual act, the San Francisco Ethics Commission on Monday voted to send a letter asking that Johnson recuse herself. The vote was taken despite the action being a violation of the Brown Act, which regulates open meeting laws for legislative bodies in California. Under the Brown Act, those bodies are forbidden from taking action on items not on the agenda — the Johnson matter was not on the agenda.

During the hearing, Commissioners Peter Keane and Quentin Kopp both said the Brown Act violation was justified because with the Planning Commission vote Thursday it was imperative the letter be sent right away.

Ethics Commission Executive Director LeeAnn Pelham cautioned the commission against violating openmeeting laws, suggesting individual commissioners write personal letters to Johnson. Those letters would get the same message across “without compromising the commission’s commitment to open government processes, which we do believe is important, of course.”

Johnson did not return calls or emails, but sources said she would release a statement Thursday at the Planning Commission meeting.

As for the inclusionary housing vote, it pits a group of moderate supervisors — London Breed, Katy Tang and Ahsha Safai — against stalwarts of the progressive wing Aaron Peskin and Jane Kim.

The vote is a follow-up “trailing ordinance” triggered by Proposition C from June 2016, which required developers to make 25 percent of units affordable. Peskin and Kim favor a law that requires developers of big projects to designate 24 percent of rental units as affordable — 15 percent for low-income earners and 9 percent for moderate-income earners.

Breed, Safai and Tang want to require builders to make 18 percent of on-site units affordable, but want to make a higher percentage of units available to moderateincome households.

Planning staff support the more moderate plan, which is in keeping with a city controller report on the percentage of affordable units that is economically feasible given the cost of land, labor, materials and capital.

“We agree with the controller’s analysis, which we think was a solid piece of work,” said Planning Director John Rahaim. “We have had a number of developers say that 25 percent doesn’t work, that it’s too high.”