Foster City achieved several housing milestones in 2022 through its work creating affordable housing in the Pilgrim Triton neighborhood and providing rental assistance to tenants at Foster’s Landing, according to its General Plan and Housing Element Annual Progress Report.
The report highlights Foster City’s progress on its General Plan and Housing Element from 2015 through 2023, two key documents providing a roadmap for how the city will make future land use, housing and infrastructure decisions.
The report found that in 2022, Foster City created 22 apartment units in the Pilgrim Triton neighborhood for low-income and city workers at 501 Pilgrim Drive. The city-owned site has 12 of the 22 units occupied, with more people expected to live in the unoccupied units. In 2022, the city continued to provide rental subsidies to 10 tenants at Foster’s Landing to ensure the prices remained affordable and they would not be forced to move by the property developer. The units had previously been affordable housing, but the below-market rate period expired, causing a sharp increase in rent costs. Around nine tenants are still at the site, thanks to the subsidies, with the city planning to continue the program in 2023 while tenants look for other housing. The city applied and received a county grant of around $643,000 to assist with displacement help. The city is also providing community outreach on affordable housing.
The progress report must be forwarded to the state by April 1 each year. The state said Foster City is one of 38 cities that have met their Regional Housing Needs Allocation numbers in the latest reporting period, according to city staff.
The City Council accepted the report at its March 20 meeting. The Planning Commission reviewed and accepted the report at its Feb. 16 meeting, with some calling the current council to do more to add housing through political support and education, given the growing need and stricter state requirements. Foster City faces an affordable housing crisis, with city staff previously providing statistics showing housing for about a third of existing Foster City households is not affordable, and 34% of all households pay 30% or more of their income on housing. Rents have increased by around 33% in the past decade, and a family needs to earn about $300,000 to buy a home.
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