Organizers hand off signatures for housing initiative
Group gathered about 6,800 signatures
SANTA CRUZ >> The citizen-led group known as Housing for People Not Unaffordable Towers, or Housing for People for short, is one step closer to having its initiative placed on the city of Santa Cruz election ballot this March after submitting nearly 7,000 petition signatures to the Santa Cruz City Clerk's Office Monday afternoon.
“We got off to a late start and did not have the traditional 180 days to gather signatures,” said Housing for People member and retired state water regulator Susan Monheit. “In order to make the March 2024 ballot, we had about three and a half months.”
Within that time frame, the group gathered about 6,800 signatures. For the citizen-led initiative to move forward, 3,693 of the signatures the group gathered need to be validated by the City Clerk and Santa Cruz County Elections Office.
“That should send a very loud and clear message to the City Council and Mayor Keeley that they're out of touch with what the people want,” said Monheit.
The Housing for People initiative was inspired by the city's proposed downtown expansion plan, and has two components. The initiative would prevent the Santa Cruz City Council from amending the city's general plan or zoning ordinances that increase allowable height limits or floor area ratios for new developments greater than the limits already in effect for the city as of June of this year without a citizen vote approving the increase.
“One misconception that would be good to correct, is that every large development, or every tall building would go before a vote of the people, but that is not true,” said Monheit. “Only high-rises that are higher than current zoning limits would go before the people for a vote.”
Secondly, the measure would increase the inclusionary affordable housing requirement from the existing 20% to 25% for developments with 30 or more housing units, which is similar to the recommendation made to the Santa Cruz City Council by the city's Planning Commission in 2022.
At that time, the commission recommended that the inclusionary housing requirements for proposed developments with 50 or more units be increased to 25% and those with more than 100 units would require a
30% inclusionary rate.
“It's pretty simple,” said Monheit. “It increases the baseline affordable housing component and it gives citizens a right to vote before the City Council can rezone any part of the city.”
The City Clerk and County Elections Office have 30 days to verify the residency and voting status of at least 3,693 petition-signers in order for the initiative to move forward. It would then go before the Santa Cruz City Council who will vote to either formally place it on the ballot or adopt the measure without alteration. If ultimately placed on the March ballot, the group's initiative would need a simple majority vote to pass.