Okay, good afternoon everyone.

This meeting will come to order.

Welcome to the October 28th, 2024 regular meeting of the Land Use and Transportation Committee of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors.

I am Supervisor Mirna Melgar, Chair of the Committee, joined by Board of Supervisors President Aaron Paskin, and the Vice Chair, Supervisor Dean Preston.

The committee clerk today is John Carroll, and I'd also like to thank Sus Enos from SFGov TB for broadcasting this meeting and making it available to the public.

Mr.

Clerk, do you have any announcements?

Yes, thank you, Madam Chair.

Please ensure that you've silenced your cell phones and other electronic devices that you've brought with you into the chamber today.

Public comment will be taken on each item on today's agenda when your item of interest comes up and public comment is called.

Please line up to speak along your right hand side.

Alternatively, you may submit public comment in writing in either of the following ways.

First, you may email your comments to me at J-O-H-N period C-A-R-R-O-L-L at SFGOV.org.

Or you may send your written comments via U.S.

Postal Service to our office in City Hall.

The address is one Dr.

Carlton B.

Goodlit Place, room 244, San Francisco, California 94102.

If you submit public comment in writing, I will forward your comment to the members of this committee and also include your comments as part of the official file on which you are commenting.

Items acted upon today are expected to appear on the Board of Supervisors' agenda of November 5th, 2024, unless otherwise stated.

Thank you so much.

Agenda item number one is an ordinance amending the planning code to allow certain below market rate owned units to be resold at a price affordable to households at an increased area median median income level.

Increase the qualifying AMI limit for BMR purchasers and require BMR owned units originally purchased with parking spaces and other amenities to be resold with the same parking and amenities.

It affirms the planning department's secret determination and makes findings of consistency with the general plan and the eight priority policies of planning code section 101.1 and findings of public necessity, convenience, and welfare pursuant to planning code section 302 by arrangement between the chair and the clerk's office.

This item is on our agenda as a potential committee report.

It may appear, I'm sorry, it may be acted upon at tomorrow's board meeting, October 29th, 2024.

Thank you so much, Mr.

Clerk.

Um colleagues, uh, this is my legislation.

Um I do have some amendments uh stemming from uh the feedback that we got from the planning commission uh when this went in front of them uh and some from some of the advocates and members of the public.

But I just wanted to uh back up and uh tell you where this uh came from a little bit.

Um this seeks to uh fix a very small thing uh within our inclusionary homeownership BMR program.

Uh President Peskin, you will remember that uh many years ago uh we had issues with um some of the below market rate units that were produced through the subdivision code um when the condo conversion ordinance was codified many, many years ago.

Uh and I'm reminding you of this because um we didn't always know how to administer BMR units in San Francisco.

So before 2002, when then Supervisor Leonard codified um our inclusionary uh program into the planning code, we had played around with that idea of uh below market rate units.

Um we did it when we uh did the subdivision code through DPW, and then with development agreements for several buildings before 2002.

Um and you know, when the procedures manual was written, um the first time it's been amended several times since then.

We didn't quite get every detail uh because we just didn't know.

And I think that's the evolution of government.

It's always been that way.

So uh what um this legislation is trying to fix is that at one time um the affordable the maximum affordable price and the area median income eligibility were not one and the same.

And so at the beginning, that may have been okay, but over time, the maximum resale price for some units, a very small minority of units, um, is higher than what the area median income is uh for those units.

And over time that has grown.

So about a year and a half ago, there was a article in Mission Local about this family, the Jansucks, who had bought their unit at the maximum resale price, they had bought it.

They did not know that the maximum resale price and the affordable price were not the same for their unit.

And when they got a new job, they tried to reset, you know, they had to sell, they had to do something about their situation.

Um they came across this problem and facing, you know, having to lose about a hundred thousand dollars uh of their equity, their income.

And you know, I say this because uh it's very different with a down payment assistant loan program than it is with a BMR program, that when inclusionary units um are created, they're done so through the entitlement process.

And so the developer um, you know, sort of it meets this obligation to the city by making these units.

The city doesn't pay for this.

You know, we hold that silent second mortgage that makes it affordable for the next 90 years.

But for these folks, once a unit gets sold for the home buyers, it is actually real money because they have to go out and get a mortgage and make monthly payments.

So when we are adjusting the price, we don't actually lose any cash.

We're adjusting, you know, the eligibility uh, you know, field for folks who can buy these units.

But for the individual families that you know buy and sell these units, it's actually real cash money.

So what we are trying to do is to give the mayor's office of housing folks the flexibility when there's that discrepancy to increase the eligibility AMI for the folks who can buy those units, we're not raising the price of the unit.

So, you know, it is it is a distinction that I want to make that in this instance it's a very small universe of uh BMR units that we're dealing with that have this discrepancy in an even smaller fix that doesn't go outside of the range of uh eligibility that the planning commission has already approved, and so has this body.

So I wanted to give you that um as explanation.

Um we went to the planning commission, a couple of commissioners feared, and and it was confirmed by some of the advocates that this could be a slippery slope because uh units uh would go uh, you know, many units could go higher and higher in terms of the income eligibility for the buyers.

That is uh not the intention of the legislation.