Affordable housing approved on Millbrae’s Broadway

The original plan — which used Senate Bill 35 and state density bonus law to override local height and density regulations and parking requirements on affordable housing — generated significant concern around traffic, congestion and size from residents and councilmembers.

The applicant, Affordable AMG & Associates, could legally move forward with the old version of the project but chose to rework the design with city staff. The new design still uses state housing laws designed to incentivize unit production, including density bonus law as well as Senate Bill 330, which also suspends building restrictions on affordable housing.

“The applicant made a good-faith effort to come back after that SB 35 approval, which was done under a different state law, to modify the project with the architecture you see this evening and give the city a second chance on this,” Community Development Director Andrew Mogensen said.

The Planning Commission approved conditional use permits for the project as well as height, setback, parking garage entrance and parking waivers. City code, which is overridden by state law in this instance, stipulates 40-foot height limitations and at least 146 parking spaces for a project of its size.

The applicant also requested a concession for overhead utilities, rather than city-stipulated undergrounding, to keep the project affordable. Staff are working with Affordable AMG & Associates to potentially put development impact fees toward reimbursing construction of underground utilities, Mogensen said.

The new project design implements an architectural style more consistent with the city, with increased affordable housing units — 10 very low-income, 66 low-income, 19 moderate income and two manager units — and more parking, Gene Broussard of AMG & Associates said. The developers are also looking at an automated parking system that could increase parking by another 10-20 units, he said.

Still, some residents spoke at the meeting concerned that the size of the building and limited number of parking spaces would congest the neighborhood and be burdensome to nearby residential areas, including one Millbrae resident who identified herself as Maha.

“It would cause a lot of congestion in that area, where I feel already, there's a parking struggle,” she said. “The Pancake House is right there, two schools are very close in proximity.”

Commissioner Alan Wong, the sole no vote on the development, expressed concerns that it was located outside of the El Camino Real Specific Plan. Ideally, development would scale down as it moved outside of the transit corridor, he said.

“It’s outside of our El Camino specific plan, [where] we were envisioning buildings like this would be, so it kind of breaks my heart to see this go up so close to the residential neighborhoods,” he said.

One resident, Tom Broker, spoke in favor of the project.

“I strongly support this revised plan for 1301. I was not a big fan of the first plan,” he said. “This new plan is much improved, has much better parking capability and I like the fact that it's virtually all affordable housing.”

Vice Chair Maureen Davis, who voted for the project, lauded it as an example of a positive developer relationship. Although SB 35 allows for a great deal of developer discretion, it’s possible to partner with cities on affordable housing of this nature, she said.

“I really appreciate the improvement in this project. It is much much nicer looking, we have way more parking now, the fact that it's all affordable,” she said. “This is a fantastic project and just what we need.”

The vote was the final approval the project needed to move forward into the construction phase pending any appeals, Mogensen said.

holly@smdailyjournal.com

(650) 344-5200 ext. 105