Planning Commission - Regular Meeting

Okay, we are recording officially. Please make sure, if you haven't already signed in, would really appreciate you signing in just so we can have record of the attendees, would be lovely. I think I have the pleasure of knowing most of you. For those that don't know me, my name is Maruja Clancy. I am the Assistant Community Development Director at the city. With me and this fabulous team is Jen Harkey, our Housing Services Manager. senior management analyst Andrea Palmer, and management analyst to Rachel West. We will all be giving parts of this presentation tonight. So we're gonna be diving into what this all means, but really high level. We are only committing to doing as part of this application what we have already in our housing element. Our certified housing element is part of our general plan. It's on an eight-year cycle. The Department of Housing and Community Development of the state certifies it, commits us to programs. This is effectively us getting double credit, if you will, by way of potentially making us more competitive for grant funding. from the state, not only for affordable housing projects, but potentially active transportation projects as well. So this reaches beyond community development. In fact, Public Works was applying for a grant related to active transportation recently. Had they had had this designation to a company, they would have been more competitive in that grant and might have been successful in acquiring money. So beyond just housing, this does have broader reach to bring some great improvements to the community. So with that we will get into it. Today is day one of a 30 day public comment period. So high level feedback, high level questions is great. The document itself is 151 pages long. It is pretty detailed, but that is why the 30 days to get you time to get into it with us, ask us questions, and there are three other opportunities in a public setting to provide your feedback, but you're welcome to give us feedback anytime through this 30-day period. We would love to have those in writing just because that helps support any refinements we make to the application that will be considered by city council at their meeting on August 25th. Now that action before council is to recommend that we submit the application to the state. Then there's a subsequent action that we do with the state where they review and hopefully we receive the designation should our decision makers want to lean that way. All that said, I will now pass the mic to Ms. West who will kick off her presentation.

All right, thank you Maruha for that wonderful introduction and summary of this evening. There we go. All right, so I think one of our big questions tonight is what is the pro-housing designation? So it's a state program that recognizes local jurisdictions that implement housing policies to accelerate housing production and reduce unnecessary barriers that delay housing production. These housing policies come from the city's certified six cycle housing element, which is a state mandated requirement for every jurisdiction in California. The city must enact these housing element policies regardless of a pro-housing designation. However, since we are already enacting the housing element policies, it is a benefit to the city to also apply for a pro-housing designation. As Maruha mentioned, it makes us more competitive for grants and things like that. A jurisdiction must apply to the program, and if awarded, this gives the jurisdiction the added scoring points on those grant applications. If awarded, the jurisdiction must meet any proposed zoning or policy updates within a two-year timeframe. And again, these policies are already a part of our housing element. They're already things that we have to meet. Staff has a long list of housing element items. There are over 32 programs with 91 objectives. And so we've worked on getting quite a few of those across the board through city council, but we do still have a lot of work to do in this housing element cycle, which runs from 2021 to 2029. So these policies will be enacted regardless of the pro-housing designation. All right. So what are the benefits of a pro-housing designation? Again, priority scoring for state housing grants and infrastructure programs. Meruha mentioned this goes beyond just housing grants. This is for capital improvement grants, this is for transportation grants, public works applied to a sustainable transportation planning grant. And it was part of the pro-housing designation program where they would have gotten extra points if we were a pro-housing designation. So it's not just for the production of housing. It's really for a citywide initiative to help the city grow and become the best possible city. It also allows us to have eligibility to apply to certain grants. So right now, the State Homeless Housing Assistance and Prevention Grant, also known as HAP, you can only apply if you're a pro-housing designation. So in the past, the city has actually been awarded a HAP funding grant, and that was for previous rental assistance programs. However, moving forward for this cycle, the seventh cycle, you do have to be recognized as a pro-housing designation. So that already starts to limit us on what grants we can apply to if we're not a pro-housing designation. There's exclusive access to pro-housing incentive program grants. So again, these are just private grants that are from the state and it's for pro-housing designation jurisdictions. And last but certainly not least, it also demonstrates the city's commitment to the regional housing needs allocation progress. So our arena numbers, which are really important. And it also just ensures that we're meeting the housing element, which is again, a state mandate. So there are a number of pro-housing designated jurisdictions already. As of March, 2026, there are 74. So this does include nearby jurisdictions like the City of Santa Barbara, the County of Santa Barbara, SLO County, and part of the Ventura Council of Governments or VCOG was helping assist jurisdictions in the County of Ventura apply for pro-housing designations. So in our own, You know jurisdiction lines of the county of ventura we do have the city of oxnard who's also going for pro housing designation, as well as the county of ventura. And the county of ventura did officially submit their application on June 10 2026 so they're in the process to hear back from hcd and we'll talk more about the review process and things like that, once we submit the application. All right, so the application process, staff created a list of existing proposed housing policies to be monitored and implemented within the pro-housing designation period of performance. Application scores go up to 150 points and jurisdictions only need a minimum of 30 points to be deemed a pro-housing designation. The city of Ventura currently has 75 points. So in our application that we would be submitting, it would be 75 points. And that's a mixture of both base points as well as enhancement factors, which I'll talk about in a little bit more depth in a few slides. The higher the points does not mean higher prioritization. So once the designation status is achieved with those 30 base points, it doesn't matter if you have 150. It's really nice, but it's not needed. HCD reviews the process and that could take about 60 days. So our plan is to submit after city council approval, which we'll be taking this to city council in August. So then we'll be submitting it to HCD. So we'll probably hear back late fall. HCD has assisted us a lot throughout this process. We've done a lot of weekly calls with them. So they definitely have seen what we're bringing forth. They would still have to do that final review. And they'll probably have edits, minor ones, saying let's fix this here. This policy actually might fit better under this category. So we are expecting to still have edits come back to us. And again, the deliverables are identical to those that are already in our housing element. All right, so the application structure. There are seven appendices required for submittal. The first one is a formal resolution that would be signed by city council. Proposed policies would be appendix two. Appendix three is a self-scoring sheet. Appendix four is enhancement factors. Appendix five is the homeless encampment policy. Appendix six is the public participation process. So again, we're trying to be as transparent as possible during this process, and HCD also likes that transparency, so we do have a full public participation process, which includes us emailing all of you guys. So if you're interested, be sure to sign up and say that you are interested for us to contact you, as well as all of our public hearings that we'll be taking this to and our 30-day public comment period. And then finally, Appendix 7 is just additional information and supporting documents. So a lot of these show exactly where it is in our municipal code because a lot of these things already do exist. So we just have that highlighted throughout in Appendix 7. To meet the state threshold requirements, we have to be compliant with our housing element, which we are. We have to ensure that we have our annual progress reports completed, which we do. We'll be taking the 2025 annual progress report to the Housing and Homelessness Subcommittee on Monday, and then that will go to City Council when we're back from break. And then we also have to be compliant with state housing laws as well as complete any necessary rezoning. And just to give you guys a little snippet, because as we mentioned, it's over 150 pages. And this is all online, so feel free to also look at it online. But Appendix 3 is the self-scoring sheet. So you'll see in Category 1A, we have dashes. We did not enter information for that category. However, we did enter information for category 1B, and so we have a little synopsis of how we're meeting it. You'll see in the full online document and application what the questions are and how we answered it that ties it in together. You'll also see that we have three base points for 1B. This one, we did not do an enhancement category. If we had, then we would have filled out that number, and then it would have changed our total points. Alright, so a little bit about enhancement factors. And what they are. So again, like I mentioned, we kind of have those base points and then we're also able to do enhancement factors which emphasize project policies that are already in place and we are going to highlight some projects that we've seen and that we submitted on our or will submit on our application. And this is really how we got all these enhancement points and the enhancement factors look at. multifaceted strategies to promote multiple planning objectives such as affordable housing transit transit land use and hazard mitigation so for example we have Westview village 2 which is a hundred percent affordable project this is over on the west side this was an example of efficient land use and infill first strategy as it converted 10 substandard public housing units into 50 apartments This project was also significant for the city because it did provide significant improvements to the infrastructure on the west side, including creating sidewalks, keeping all the crosswalks. They also ended up putting shelters on all the bus stations nearby on the west side. This helped impact over 320 residents. So this project is one of our greatest enhancement factors because it did have this public improvement aspect of it, efficient land use, along with that 100% affordability. Next is Pasture Courts, which is also 100% affordable. This one is geared towards households experiencing homelessness. They did utilize Assembly Bill 2162 to streamline their application, and so Assembly Bill 2162, it's for supportive housing use, and so it's to ensure that in by-right zones that the application is streamlined. And so that's a good example of how us as the city, we don't have that codified in our municipal code, but it is a state law and we do recognize that. So we still honor that. And that got them through the process very quickly. It is also efficient land use as it was a vacant lot. It was last used in like 1983 as a gas station. And since then has been vacant. So now it's gonna be 34 apartment buildings, which is fantastic for the city. And we did also ministerially process their development impact fees, so we're going to defer those. And that process was done ministerially, so it was also really quick on that end. And just a couple more projects to highlight. The Victoria Flats or Arrive Ventura project, it's a mixed use project that plans on producing 297 units. Of that, 104 units will be affordable. There's also commercial space. The city worked closely with this project as well, and we deferred their development impact fees only for the affordable buildings. So those 104 units that are all 100% affordable, those are the impact fees that we deferred. This project's also great because it's producing very large affordable units. It's producing four bedrooms as some of the units too, which is great for larger households. We don't see that often as it's usually easier to produce more like two or one bedrooms. This project had to have their development impact fees defer to be financially successful in their endeavor. And so that was our city contribution to them. So we also have that financial subsidy in there. And this is also an example of efficient land use and then fill first strategy because it's a vacant lawn on the corner of Victoria and Olivas Park. And last, certainly not least, is the Maple Quartz project. This project has only been entitled, but it is a mixed-use project that will have four cell townhomes as well as rental apartments. There will be six four cell units to moderate income households, as well as 27 units for lower income households for rent. And this is located within a half mile of a major transit stop. It's right across the street from the Pacific View Mall, which is also the bus hub. So this is a great way to get around town. Also walking distance are major retailers, grocery stores, and businesses. So this is really a great project that's kind of in the center. It also shows how this was originally commercially zoned with mixed use. And then we have this residential component that's really going to overtake the majority of it. So it's going to be primarily residential with just this limited commercial space, which is great. And up next, I will introduce Jen Harkey to talk a little bit more about the homeless encampment policy.

All right. Well, good evening, everyone. My name is Jen Harkey. I'm the current housing services manager. I joined recently from the county of Ventura, where a lot of my expertise is addressing homelessness and encampment response. This particular slide talks about our response as a city and what we're doing to address encampments. We currently have several contracts with Downtown Ventura Partners, the Human Services Agency, First Street Outreach. We also work directly with the Police Department, Patrol Task Force, and we are working with the County of Ventura, Behavioral Health, as well as Social Services. The state, in order for us to be designated under pro-housing, we must have an encampment policy and a response to how we are operating as a cross-sector approach. Some of this has to do with how we are doing outreach in the field and making sure that we're offering shelter and resources to people. It's happening regularly in the community. We are working directly with county response efforts as well for basic needs like backpack medicine, street outreach services, work with patrol task force when posting notices. So for example, if we are responding to an encampment that needs to be closed for safety or health reasons, we post notices with resources and information on how to get help. And we also make sure that outreach is conducted regularly. We comply with the constitutional rights of people experiencing homelessness as we are doing this and approaching individuals to make sure that we are offering support. We also follow the county continuum of care encampment guidance policy, and that's part of our response to the state on this, to make sure that we're aligned with state best practices. A couple things to note is that we also offer sheltering through the Mercy House contract. There's 55 shelter beds that are offered through the city. and five are designated for our law enforcement partners to respond quickly to those who want shelter immediately. I'm going to turn it over to our management analyst, Andrea Palmer, to talk about public outreach. Thank you.

Can everybody hear me? Oh, for the recording.

Okay. So I'm here to discuss Appendix 6 of 7, so we're almost at the finish line. One of our other responsibilities is public outreach. We have several avenues that we have taken to record and get the word out about the pro-housing designation application. We do have, it has its own website. So if you notice here, you'll have another opportunity with a QR code. So get your cameras out or your phones out and take the picture so that you can review all 151 pages of the pro housing application. We have also created digital flyers and we have, if you're following the City of Ventura's Instagram or Facebook page, we have plugged that information or this information on there as well. And as everyone has said earlier, we have a 30-day public comment period. So we have published a 30-day public comment period notice in the VC Star as of today. And we have also emailed our stakeholders from the housing element process. So if you did not hear about it, you're living under a rock. Our 30-day public comment period starts July 8th and it ends on August 8th. And we do ask as of today, or as of the 30-day public comment period, please submit written comments, whether it be by email, whether you're emailing us, whether you're emailing the city council. because today, 151 pages is a lot to get into today, and we know we just issued it, so if you could go home. You know, it's a really great read. It's probably better than Danielle Steele. It has to do with your community. Pass along the message, and email us if you have questions. We're happy to answer them, and we will document them in our results when it comes to submitting the application. I do want to talk briefly about the next comment periods that we have and opportunities for you to consult with your local officials. We have on Monday, so not Wednesday for those of you that do go to the housing and homelessness subcommittee meetings. We have a special meeting on January... I keep saying January, July 13th at 3 p.m. in City Council Chambers. That'll be the Housing and Homelessness Subcommittee. This will be an item that will be presented to them on July 22nd, 2026. Same venue, City Council Chambers. That will be at the Planning Commission meeting. It will be on their agenda. And then we will wrap it up on August 25th for City Council for their adoption of the plan. So you have several opportunities to comment on the application. And then this just is a really pretty timeline of what we just talked about. So here, if you have your phones out, is the QR code. We do encourage and invite and please refer people to these public meetings. We want to hear your input. We want the state to know that we have engaged you and that we're trying to make this a team effort with our community members, our residents, and we're here for you. So any questions that you may have, we'll do our best to answer.

I think I pressed the wrong button.

There we go. These are our emails as well, if you want to email any of us individually. The other one also had a housing email that goes to all of us. But in any case, you can't go wrong.

Sure.

Okay, let me back out first, unless you make me look like Beyonce. You're welcome. Anybody else need a minute on this one? Okay, any questions? Okay. I will bring it back.

So one quick thing to note is on our Pro Housing website, if you follow the QR code, that is where you'll submit your public comment. However, we have a webpage system that can only hold one form at a time. So we have the RSVP link for tonight on there. So tomorrow that will be going away and then we'll have the public comment form, but you can still email us from there and you can even do the RSVP thing again and do a comment, but... I would just wait until tomorrow when we have that down because, again, we can only have one form on a page at one time. Not me. So feel free to email us if you're feeling really passionate about it tonight. Go ahead and email us at thehousingservicesatcityofentura.ca.gov. Email tonight. If not, we'll have that public comment form posted for tomorrow.

I'm losing my voice, sorry. I actually had four questions, but I just thought I'd put them all out there at once. Is this all for affordable housing? Like all of this, is it going to, I mean homelessness, I also get, but is it all for affordable housing or does other housing qualify? Can someone explain the rezoning that has to happen that's mentioned in the first paragraph? Quickly, what percent of Maple Court is affordable? I didn't do the math. And for the public comment, is it all just written comments or is there a survey or we just say what we want to say?

Good questions. So and I don't remember where we landed on. I don't believe it's just affordable housing. There's a heavy emphasis on affordable housing because they're looking at barriers and limited access to housing. So it will be affordable housing heavy. But like with RENA, I think the RENA numbers have different categories that go up to non low mod, meaning non and low moderate income.

We're looking up the affordability of Maple Court right now. She can get the exact percentage. There was, can you submit public via email or will there be a survey? We could look into doing, I think Ms. West mentioned that we can do a public comment like portal form on our website so you don't have, maybe it's more convenient than having to log into your email and then it's in an email. This is, you know, be more of an organic exchange. So we'll have that up. And you had another question. Oh, the rezoning. So there are some plans in our programs, rather, in our housing element that require us to explore and potentially implement certain modifications to zone code or allowances within zones to accommodate certain types of housing. For example, some... that we have transitional and supportive housing manufactured housing tiny homes looking at single room occupancy again that was something that we haven't done in a long time the housing element program and the state has asked us to re-look at that so the rezoning effectively or code amendments that are done are to reflect direction that was given in our housing element to accommodate and explore more types of housing beyond traditional housing that we see today and also to be consistent with state law. We have some code, like for example, program 19 came before the council a few weeks ago. That was to allow supportive and transitional housing in certain zones by right and in other zones by a use permit. That is to bring us compliance with state law. That is an example of a rezone or a zone change equivalent. Not to where we're looking at a granular level like that. It's more like introducing opportunities for the different types of housing in different zones or potentially exploring overlays to accommodate workforce housing, overlays to accommodate special needs housing. I'm trying to think of other opportunities within the special needs, low barrier navigation centers. It really is... a widespread of different kinds of housing accommodations. But again, this is effectively what our housing element is having us do. So it kind of holds us to that line of following through with what we've committed through our housing element. And hopefully, by way of doing that, we may also get some additional potential to be more eligible for grants. correct the question was everything in the housing element could happen we're not adding to no the direction was very clear do not add more than what's beyond our housing element we have to do our housing element and that's already going to be a big lift especially when it sunsets in 2029 which is when our eight-year cycle ends so we got a big push we've done a lot but we still have a lot to do and this is an opportunity to again take advantage of what we've done what we've done and what we plan to do pursuant to our housing element to potentially have this designation and make us more competitive for funding. Yeah, do we have another mic back here?

I want to say, too, that the other one, you know how you can go to the portal for the city of Ventura when you're doing a public comment for city council? You can also use that portal for a comment, if you like. And then, of course, the different... the different agenda items for the different bodies that we're going to present to. So there are ways, you know, you can email, you can use the city's portal to send it, just make sure that the title has like pro-housing in it so we know that that's what it is so they know to send it to us.

Are there other questions?

Okay.

Go ahead. I'm going to walk.

Okay. So get ready. It's a mouthful. But Maple Court's affordability, their base density was 189 units. Our city ordinance requires 15% to affordable units, 5% to very low, and 10% to low. So... They would be required to provide 18.9 for the low income and 9.45 for the very low income. This project did choose to provide 18 and 9, so they're rounding down, and instead they're paying that partial in lieu fee. So we'll be getting units as well as a partial in lieu fee for that project. Thank you. Thank you.

So with those requirements, is there a requirement in they have to be one bedroom, two bedroom studios? Because we see a lot of studios when this happens, right? And we have families that are in need of homes. So it's just not really working that well.

So in our most updated inclusionary housing ordinance which went into effect on July 1st, 2023, we do require and we have it written out in our ordinance that the bedroom counts to the inclusionary units must mirror the bedroom counts of the market rate units. And so what we're doing is we're reviewing these projects that are coming in. Say you have 44 three bedrooms, 42 bedrooms and five studios. You can't have the five studios only being for the lower income households. So what we do is we try to mirror the percentage. So like, hey, you have 44 three bedrooms, so we should be getting as close as possible to those numbers mirroring the inclusionary housing ordinance so it's evenly distributed. And so that is one of our big factors that we're looking at when these plans come in. Now the square footage can be smaller, but we do have to have the bedroom count near the market rate.

So Patty, you're not wrong in that we do see a lot of studio and one bedrooms make up the affordability component. That's a prime example of how this potential designation and future grant opportunities could help offset that in that where if we are able to receive money to assist a project that has an affordability component, Maybe there's an opportunity to contribute to that affordable housing aspect of it and help up either the units or up the makeup of the units where we're getting more of those two bedroom, three bedroom units in that affordable rate. So that's something that we're also thinking about hopefully being able to utilize should we be successful with this designation request.

I just had a question regarding the grants that the city would be able to apply for. So the PIP and you said the housing and homelessness grants, do you have an idea of the amount of funding that we could apply for that wouldn't be available otherwise?

So I can speak to the Housing Homeless Assistance and Prevention Program, which is the HAP program. Typically, our county has been receiving around $6 million every year. and it is competitive. It goes through the continuum of care and local organizations or developers would have to apply directly to the continuum of care to apply for that funding. Typically, HAP funding is for rental assistance programs, homeless prevention programs, permanent supportive housing, and it can also be for affordable development. But it has to target those who are at risk or currently homeless. So that program, because it is focused on homelessness and addressing housing for that particular population, it does go through the continuum of care. We the city could apply, but also organizations locally as well as the Venture Housing Authority can apply for that particular funding. But in order for us as a city or organizations here to develop something here within the city, we'd have to be designated under the pro-housing to be eligible for round seven. And then for the PIP, Let me leave Rachel.

Did you find the dollar figure?

I think we're talking the same thing. There is a pro-housing incentive program, which those cities or jurisdictions, counties that are designated pro-housing are only able to apply to. Those awards are up to $2 million per jurisdiction. So that's another pot of money that if we had this designation, only those cities or counties that have that designation could actually tap into.

And those, the last NOFA that was released earlier this year, eligible uses were for the pre-development, development, acquisition, all of those things of affordable housing, including moderate income households, so it's going from extremely low income to moderate income, affordable rental and ownership housing that meets the needs of a growing workforce, so workforce housing. And so those were kind of the last PIP program NOFA, There was a lot of others, but they all had to do with some type of usually affordable housing.

And we also get priority points for state infrastructure grants. So grants like Public Works will pursue for climate or greenhouse gas reduction projects, alternative transportation, active transportation. But back to the example I noted when we kicked off the meeting, makes us more competitive for those types of grants as well through that program. Any other questions?

Oh, hold on. We've got to get it for the record. It's recording.

How long is that designation? What's the term?

So the term is... Do you want to answer, Andrea? I mean, just because you're...

So it's a three-year term. We have two years. So everything that Rachel had presented in the Appendix 3... Go there so we can show you. So when you do see the information that's filled out in the sections, we have two years to tell HCD that we have progress, we've made progress on those goals. So the whole total period of performance is what we call it when we have either a grant or in this case we have this designation. It's gonna give us a three-year period, so I'm assuming, because this is my first pro-housing designation, but that there's a start-up period, because the two-year period starts in January. So it's gonna give us two years from January to December of the second year. So if we get our designation before the year is out, we can start getting prepared for January. So the whole point is three years.

So as far as the allocation of funding, how does it work if funding is allocated but not totally utilized? Is that expected, or how is the funding going to work?

Most likely, I think your question is kind of asking if we receive a grant but we're not utilizing it quick enough. Like there is for every federal and state, there's usually guidelines how fast we have to get the money out the door. And they do differ quite drastically. Some will give you a three-year timeline. So even if we get the money our third year of being a pro-housing designated jurisdiction, they'll probably tell us you have to spend that within the next five years. So even if we aren't a pro-housing designation,

five years because we had already received the money we'll have we'll be able to utilize it during that time to meet that those deadlines I can also just briefly add we have in our housing services division we have been getting a multiple multiple grants and they have been quite voluminous and we've been finding ways to spend the money so the goal is to not send the money back

Yes.

Yes, we know how to spend money. So when you say you spend the money, if the money is designated for housing, how are you spending the money? And how would that play into the future in these other funding and grant options?

For housing? No, I mean, we're constantly in work with our partners. There's a number of nonprofit partners, some that are even in the room, that build a lot of affordable housing. But we also could do it for projects such as the Victoria Flats Arrive. Technically, they are a market rate project. but they do have that affordable aspect, which is almost a third of the entire project, which is specifically for affordables. If we had that type of money, we would be able to subsidize more than just the deferred development impact fees. And so I don't think there will ever be a shortage of those types of projects, because even if it is a market rate, but they're producing substantial amounts of affordables, even up to 50% or 42% or things like that, that's definitely something where if we don't have 100% affordable project in town right now, that we would also utilize the funding for.

And depending on the grant type, some may be if and when we get the designation, and if we end up being competitive enough to receive a grant, that depending on the grant parameters, they might be tied to a specific project we're seeking and applying for, they may be more general. Like here's money, go do you with the money. And so a good example of a recent action is involving our permanent local housing allocation or PLHA where we had a certain amount of money to help with first home buyer assistance and Rachel can answer more questions about this. We issued a request for a proposal or a request for qualifications to then have someone help us administer that money to individuals who can help with that purchase. So similar to if we got a large amount of money for affordable housing, we would have an equivalent process transparent. Here we have this money, submit your proposal, submit your qualifications to help achieve the goal with the intent of this fund.

I just want to say this is the best presentation I've seen. The four of you and the way you did it and the succinctness of it and then the honest answers and very specific answers to the questions. So I appreciate that.

Thank you. What is the purpose of the public comment period? You're going to include that in the application. Can you give me a little more insight into the purpose of it?

So when we have, well, if you notice, government always has a public comment period. There's always an opportunity to comment on items that we do, whether it be council, we have the Homeless and Housing Subcommittee, but it gives an opportunity for the residents to be heard on what item we're presenting with your tax dollars. So it's a level of transparency. We have it for city, we have it for county, state, federal, there are always opportunities to comment on proposed activities. Does that answer your question? Are you talking about specifically the pro-housing?

Yes.

They will be, yes.

Yes.

going to have quotes from the submissions from the public included with the application, or is it just how many people responded? Just maybe illuminate that a little bit.

Yeah, so every public comment will be recorded in the application itself. We do have to be transparent with the state, but also to council. When we go to council in August, we will also make sure to include public comments and feedback that we have received from the community so that council's aware of what recommendations or suggestions or changes may need to be made in the application itself.

Thank you. Any other questions? You all look very excited, like you're going to run home and you're going to read this application, all 151 pages. If you get tired, you have your spouse or your child or your cousin, read it to you. But we hope that you're able to come to some of our other public engagements and comment on the information. Another answer to your question is that sometimes you all might bring up something that we didn't think about. And then that gives us an opportunity to say, oh, we didn't think about that. We might need to incorporate it into our plan. So if it's just all of us, we're assuming that we know what the residents want. So that's the purpose of this, but yes.

It's something to just, I want to underscore really quick, just, you know, the state wanted us to go above and beyond with more of what we had already in our housing element. And we were trying to be cognizant of one, bandwidth, two, that we have a limited time to fulfill the housing element objection or obligation itself within its cycle. So what is proposed in the application is direct, I'm iterating again, I know, I'm sorry, I have a broken record, is directly from our housing element. So we are committed to exploring these items. But as part of this process, it's iterated, making sure the public fully understands what we're proposing to do or what we're technically needing to explore and look at as part of our housing element is really a big part of why we have an ample public comment period. Yes, hold on, Carol.

So if overly plays are needed to fulfill our housing and other things, will those be brought before obviously planning commission and council and like this wouldn't give absolutely. Yeah.

Yeah, absolutely. Anything, and kind of going back, you know, I was thinking about your question, Carol, about the rezoning. It's not so much rezoning as it's more of adding more opportunities and uses to the existing regulations. So adding more opportunity for alternative types of housing, co-housing, single-room occupancy, manufactured homes, tiny homes, you know, in more areas than they are already allowed. overlays all that stuff that touches our zoning code and how we entitle projects anything that touches and I'm gonna get a little nerdy or municipal code title 24 especially has to go to Planning Commission has to be vetted in a public process has to go to City Council to ensure that not only our decision makers know what's happening but most importantly our public

I think, like I live on a street that has apartment buildings and little things, so I'm not concerned. But I think the concern would be, and if it's all affordable housing, I don't think anybody would say a word. But if a developer says, well, I'm going to put in my 15%, but I'm going to build six stories and this and that, would this project, would this housing designation help them do that?

possibly. The intent of, well, we do, again, going back to the housing element and our programs and objectives are, you know, the state is kind of steering us to explore more opportunities to build more housing, right, in general. But ultimately, it is our elected council's decision how we How we implement these programs and objectives we propose New uses and new zones as we were committed to in the housing element City Council says, you know, it sounds great or you know what? We're not we're not feeling it as much and at least we can tell the state we did we tried here's the end result It's the public process So I do hope that kind of answers. Okay. Thank you Carol No, it's really just, frankly, I was trying to think of a comparison. Is it a BOGO? Is it a buy one, get one? No, it's trying to take advantage of what we're already committing to do with our housing element and potentially being a little more competitive with funding.

In reading the history of the pro-housing designation, a lot of cities are not... getting their housing elements to the goal of getting it certified. And so what they thought about is, how can we incentivize the jurisdictions across the state to get their housing elements on time and get them certified? And so this was a dangling carrot. This was like, hey, if you do your housing element certifications and all the benchmarks that need to be made for it, we will give you, yes, we will give you priority in your grant applications. So that was an interesting fact that I got to read in reviewing this information. And we as veterans probably want that money because we wouldn't have it otherwise. So the grants are really handy. And if you have any inclination on what it's like to develop projects, I'm not going to point at the people in the room that are working in that profession, but... It takes multiple millions of dollars to make a new development. And we get entitlement funds, some of it for development. We have home investment partnerships program, federal funds from the federal government. The city of Ventura gets roughly, I think, under $400,000 a year. Years ago in the early 2000s, we used to get 800,000 a year and some jurisdictions get over a million to develop housing and we get under 400,000. That might build one unit somewhere. I don't know where, but it would build one unit of housing and that just doesn't pencil out.

Something else that is of course connected with housing, but ultimately sometimes gets not as highlighted as it should in the context of this pro-housing element is the programs that we're doing, as Ms. Harking noted, and how do we address homelessness, right? And how are we advocating for interim shelter, navigation centers, transitional supportive housing, in addition to permanent multifamily, single family, permanent housing. So it's the full gamut of how we shelter our community members, transitionally, permanently, or what have you. So that is why it's also a very thick application, because we have to look at all those different layers.

So along those lines, Jen, could you talk about this recent application for encampment resolution funding?

Absolutely, thanks Karen. Yes, the encampment resolution funding ERF grant, we recently submitted for a vehicular encampment grant to address those who are sleeping in vehicles or those who are living in vehicles. and need relocation. Our patrol task force worked really closely with us as city staff to figure out particular locations and how we can address this. We really need a safe parking program, but we also need the funds to be able to do that. And so this grant application actually helped us apply for nearly around $6 million to be able to stand up a program to help with relocations, but also to provide those case management supports and rapid rehousing dollars like rental assistance to help get people into housing. A lot of those individuals are dealing with disabling conditions and have been on the streets for long periods of time. And so it takes a lot of case management and effort to work with individuals to get them into supportive housing or permanent housing. So that particular grant, we should find out by September, October, somewhere in there. from the state to see if we are awarded. But it was an opportunity we didn't want to miss as a city. And also pro-housing designation, the state is going to continue to offer more grant funding similar to this, right, for supportive housing or transitional housing. And this designation would also make us eligible for those grants as well. Thanks.

I just have to say, Jen put together the most solid ERF application. I have no doubt we're going to get the six million that we're asking for for this program. It's amazing. I was just tickled pink when I was reading it. It's a fabulous application.

So when we get that, because we will manifest it, Patty, we hear there's no housing in Ventura, so where will those people be placed?

Yeah, so a rapid rehousing approach is a little different than traditional housing. Rapid rehousing is a program where we pay, we provide case management supports to help someone increase their income or benefits. So we may have seniors, for example, 62 and older, who are on limited social security income and it's very difficult to even find a room for rent. So working on finding places like rooms for rent or working with the housing authority to help connect them to a voucher Trying to work on ways for connections to supportive housing is really the goal. And then you do have some that are working and living in cars or staying in vehicles. And so their income just isn't enough. So we need to get people connected to employment services and workforce development and help them increase their income. That's a big goal of the grant is to help work with people to increase their income and benefits and then connect them to whether it's a room for rent or shared housing, ADU, different types of approaches to get someone off the streets.

So do you have like access to where those units are? That's something that's more what I'm curious about because there isn't any units. That's why we're trying to build, right?

Yeah, so we work directly with the Housing Authority on making sure that we are increasing supports or connecting to vouchers as they come available. We work with the continuum of care and pathways to home for any supportive housing units that come available through many mansions, behavioral health, the Human Services Agency, Salvation Army, Turning Point Foundation. There's a lot of supportive housing. As those units come available, we want to match people to those housing units. Then the United Way of Ventura County has been doing incredible work with a landlord engagement program. And they actually have landlords that are willing to partner with us for rapid rehousing dollars, which means that they may have a room for rent or a shared housing model. And so it's just more of an incentive, right, to make sure that we're matching people to those units as they come available.

So if there were homeowners who were thinking about doing ADUs, but maybe they don't want to spend as much because costs are so high, would you think about partnering with certain homeowners who don't yet have an ADU, but would be willing to be part of a program where some of that money helps support that, and then they are willing to put somebody in their ADU?

That's a great question and I love the idea of the partnership and especially for permanent housing placement and rapid rehousing. So that is definitely a possibility. We had a recent short-term vacation rental ordinance that also changed, right, where ADUs are no longer eligible for short-term. meaning that we want them to be permanent and that is another way for us to connect individuals for placement. So yes, I would say yes, absolutely.

And Jen, are we, is Home Share still not, is Home Share off the table?

That's through United Way now. So United Way is kicking off the Home Share program. And so that is something where it's really geared towards seniors, but anyone really who, you know, empty nesters who have a couple extra rooms or one extra room and needs help or assistance or things like that. So United Way did recently take over that program as well. And then, Patty, to segue back to ADUs, we have not applied for them, but there are grants that have been released in the past for jurisdictions to apply to to help with ADU funding. That program has been seen in a couple other jurisdictions throughout California, and so what it is usually is if the jurisdiction is awarded the grant, they can kind of create requirements. yes, we'll give you $20,000 to help build your ADU, but you have to have them income restricted to low income for the next, and they're not usually as long as the 55 years that we see in our inclusionary housing ordinance or things like that because we see the monetary amount or things like that, but I believe a couple jurisdictions in the San Diego area have it where it's like 10 to 15 years it has to be restricted to lower income households and things like that. That is something that we have not applied for in the past, but as those new grants come on and we're a full housing services team now and things like that, that is definitely something that I think we would look at. And if we're a pro-housing designation, then that will probably get us extra points on that too.

Thank you. Okay.

Not to get too into the weeds, but this is actually the second encampment resolution funding grant the city would get, and we worked with the city to do the first one, and we were able to use part of that funding for Valentine Road Apartments. We were able to house 30 encampment folks there, and Pastor Quartz will provide for housing another group of folks that are from the encampments. So we'll work with that other piece.

Good plug, Karen. Good plug. OK so everybody has our information here. We're going to see everybody's beautiful faces at the next that home housing and homeless subcommittee meeting and everybody's going to read off 151 pages of this really exciting application. We're very excited. We thank you for your time tonight and take some pizza or some cookies or a soda on the way out. We bought them just for you and we hope you have a good night. Thank you.

Thank you so much, everybody.