Stone Pine property sale will help make it housing

San Mateo County is working together with the city of Half Moon Bay on the development, with the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors approving an $11.5 million contract to start construction work and allocating $6 million to buy and install the 47 manufactured homes that will house community members. 

If development continues to plan, the homes — which are currently being built in nearby Santa Cruz — will be delivered by early 2024 and residents will be able to move in by spring. 

“Which is pretty spectacular, given that’s a little over two years since the shooting that sparked all of this,” Chidester said. 

Putting a housing development on the land, which was originally a roughly 20-acre parcel purchased from the Peninsula Open Space Trust, means that the county must own it, Chidester said. The city and county are currently in negotiations for that sale. 

The requisite transfer in ownership is necessary because the city of Half Moon Bay originally took out a $3 million loan from the state for the purchase of the land and refurbishment of their corporation yard, which sits on the parcel. That loan did not allow for housing production on site.

San Mateo County then took on the burden of that loan to the tune of around $2 million, allowing the facilitation of affordable housing, Chidester said. But a grant received by the county for the mobile homes requires the county to have site control, as well. 

“We’ve identified a portion of property set aside now for housing being built,” he said. “[We’re] creating a separate parcel. That parcel, sold to the county, they will have site control and operate it.” 

The price of the sale will be removed from the total loan balance with the county, and the remaining parts of the land — including the corporation yard and an area by the creek entitled for open space — will remain in city hands. 

Sale of the parcel will be discussed at a public hearing Dec. 16, per a City Council staff report.