Urban community in Santa Clara is launched near train stop

SANTA CLARA >> Nearly 900 rental and for-sale homes are being offered in Santa Clara, part of what’s described as an urban town within walking distance of a rail stop.

The Nuevo complex will consist of 868 homes, along with 40,000 square feet of retail and restaurant space, a 4,000-square-foot community center, six acres of parks and a neighborhood garden.

The homes consist of 537 rental apartments and 331 residences of varying sizes that are for sale, according to project developer SummerHill Homes.

“Located in the global center of technology, Nuevo will cater to the needs of the modern home buyer by meeting the growing demand for centrally located housing in close proximity to major job centers, entertainment and retail,” said Robert Freed, president of SummerHill Homes.

With its location a few blocks from Sunnyvale’s Lawrence Station, which is served by Caltrain, the Nuevo complex will have the draw of being near a rail stop.

Prices for the homes range from $1.2 million to $2 million range. At the end of 2018, the median price for a Santa Clara

County home, excluding condominiums, was $1.15 million.

The homes have two, three, or four bedrooms, depending on the floor plans. The apartments are one and two bedrooms, although pricing and precise sizes are yet to be revealed for the rental units.

The project at some point will also include a 126-unit condominium building that will be developed by veteran home builder Toll Brothers.

SummerHill homes recently obtained a pair of loans from Wells Fargo totaling $266 million that will be used for the project’s construction.

People should be able to start moving into the first groups of homes by late this year, SummerHill said.

The parks in Nuevo are slated for completion before year’s end. The community center is due to

the same spot in two years, which is looking for someone else. We have a responsibility to consider some alternative approaches if there’s a good chance we could do better.”

Filseth said the City Council should fundamentally change the auditing process and bring focus back to high-risk public safety and public money matters since it is “pretty clear” that a substantial amount of work the auditor’s office has been doing over the past three years doesn’t fall within that.

A report on database usage by the city, Filseth said, could easily have been done by the IT department. And a report that outlined the failures of the city code enforcement office to prosecute violations only showed what the council already knew.

“It’s not that it wasn’t a good study, but we didn’t need a $274,000 report to tell us that it’s really shortstaffed,” Filseth said.

Having served three terms as a Santa Clara County supervisor and as board president twice in 2005 and 2009, council member Liz Kniss said she was aware of the role of the auditor and felt the city was making the right move.

“This moves us in a positive direction,” Kniss said. “We have been somewhat in a state of uneasiness around this for a period of time.”

Swayed by her colleagues’ concerns about the city auditor, council member Alison Cormack said she changed her mind about Monday’s vote.

“My instinct had been prior to this evening to retain what we’ve always had,” Cormack said.

“But in listening to council member Filseth describe the turnover and from council member Liz Kniss, whose experience exceeds all ours put together, I am persuaded this is worth trying.”