Maybe the developer can build a raised triple decker roadway to handle the added traffic this project would cause on Willow.

"Maybe the developer can build a raised triple decker roadway to handle the added traffic this project would cause on Willow." I know this was said sarcastically, but maybe that might point a way to keep these under control. Any "builder's remedy" would have to fully fund a slew of improvements needed to accommodate their insane plans.

We have finally found a funding source for High Speed Rail (and the necessary rail underpasses in Menlo Park): N17.

Mr. Oisin Heneghan appears to have failed to do his location research. Environmental impact would be a disaster -- gridlock's already present on Middlefield certain times of day. The fire station near the site would struggle to respond to energies. Menlo Atherton students would be delighted to awake a 1/2 hour earlier to make it to classes on time.

I'm not sure a developer has to go through those impact hearings under the "builder's remedy."

Let's Not Sign Up for Gridlock -- I doubt the developer cares. Developers are in this for one reason only - profit. He will long gone when he is done and won't have to deal with the outcomes of his development when it is occupied. Only the residents of MP will deal with this.

If you don't like this kind of development, I suggest voting differently next time and voting for some fresh faces to go to Sacramento.

how about some comments from our outstanding State legislators and Gov explaining why they passed and signed the legislation that gutted local control and made this wonderful project perfectly legal

@Parent In case you're truly wondering, they gutted local control because local control and "character of the community" were being used as a hammer to kill so many reasonable development proposals around the state.

I don't know how serious this developer really is, but I'd be happy in the long run if an extreme proposal like this drives a compromise solution (that stops preventing, for example, any multifamily housing in residential neighborhoods).

Another reminder that we elected the people who put this law in place. For those who voted for:
Marc Berman (D)
CA State Assembly Member
(916) 319-2023
and
Josh Becker (D)
CA State Senator
(916) 651-4013
Your vote gets credit for this insane law.

Could someone clarify if "builder's remedy" projects are still dependent on an EIR? If so, the stress is moot as it would never pass traffic issues. BTW...re legislator voting...I looked it up. It passed unanimously in both chambers...just boggles the mind that not one person had concerns about what might result!

David B is right, but...

The "compromise" that this developer will likely reach will still be WAY OVER anything that is appropriate for this neighborhood. They propose an absurd 40 story building and then look like real champions by "settling" for JUST a 20 story monster. I don't think anyone in that neighborhood is going to think that's a win.

This is the first we’re hearing of this since it was first announced months ago. What has our city government been doing to stop this?!? Please tell me they’re doing all sorts of work in the background on this and not being passive.

You cannot stop projects under "builder's remedy." That's the whole idea. Provided they meet the qualifications that 20% of units will be offered at below market rates, projects MUST be ministerially approved - that means "over the counter" with a simple application. No reviews.

You can thank Sacramento. This is PRECISELY what they wanted.

Does anyone know how many workers would be accommodated by 300,000 square feet of office space? Or how many rooms would be in a 128,635 square foot hotel? Or what local store(s) would approximate 15,000 square feet of retail space? Would parking space be required for any or all of this? If so, where?

Thanks for any wisdom you can provide.

Ellen -

The “rule of thumb” is 200 to 250 sq feet per employee for office space. So 300,000 sq feet would equate to about 1,200 to 1,500 employees.

The average Courtyard Marriott is 100,000 sq feet and has 150 rooms.

Hello Editor of The Almanac!

Please do a follow-up story interviewing our legisltors who voted for this outstanding piece of legislation that enabled this excellent development project:

Marc Berman (D)
CA State Assembly Member
(916) 319-2023
and
Josh Becker (D)
CA State Senator
(916) 651-4013

Thank you

Those officials will tell you that while the legislation does have some problems that need to be addressed, the idea of building more housing to lower prices is still sound.

Do you honestly think that they will break with the mob bosses in Sacramento?

"Do you honestly think that they will break with the mob bosses in Sacramento?"

Not a chance.

Now maybe all of you folks that continuously voted for Democrats for the last thirty years to the point where they have a supermajority understand why having one party in control of the state wasn't really a good idea. Did you honestly think they weren't going to screw you when it met their needs?

I'm loving this. I hope they build a 50 story behemoth as an altar to electing fools to our city council and sending the same anti-family homes Democrats to Sacramento. I can't wait until they build these garbage new monsters all over Menlo Park and the property values drop by half. I'm on my way out. Enjoy all the "new development."

According to the Builder's Remedy, "Lower-income households" is defined in Health and Safety Code section 50079.6, and must be made available at a monthly housing cost that does not exceed 30 percent of 60 percent of the area median income."

Menlo Park had a median income in 2022 of $198,273. Multiply that by 60% and 30% and you come down to $35,700 per year in rent. That's $2975 a month. I doubt a lot of working folks are going to afford that. The average rent now is just under $4K, so it isn't an enormous hit.

And at only 20% of the development there's a huge incentive to build enormous, because the other 80% are market value.

Most YIMBYs will still be priced out.

@Pogo "The “rule of thumb” ...

The 200sf figure is a bit aggressive. MP is using up to 250sf/employee in the SRI analysis. It does get trickier with remote and offsite work.

What about hotel employment? At 4/1000sf the hotel generates another 500 jobs putting the employment total at 1700, not counting the retail. Hotel jobs do not pay tech salaries.

Here's the book:

Housing Units: 805
Net Housing Supply: 1530 (= 805 units x 1.9 emp/unit)
Housing Demand: 1700
Net Housing: -170 units

The project produces a net housing deficit.

It's also unlikely that the "affordable" component of the project will house the number of low income jobs generated by the project, particularly from the hotel.

A law meant to produce more and "affordable" housing is producing neither.

There is little evidence that Sacramento-driven policy has reversed or even reduced any housing problem in California, except perhaps to produce many more small, luxury apartments available for high-income workers.

Thank you pogo and PH for the information.

Another question. Do the office, hotel and retail components automatically get a pass through the builder's remedy even though they don't provide housing? If so, why? Especially when the effect on housing supply is a net negative.

@Ellen "...pass through"

I'm not an expert. I believe there are qualifications for a project to be eligible, and those qualifications require a certain "amount" or "percentage" of "the project" to be housing.

You can read through "Government Code section 65589.5(d)(5)" to get an idea. I do try to read some of these and they can be helpful and obscure at the same time. Web Link

But to answer your question, yes, if the project qualifies then the non-housing components are also protected under the legislation.

65589.5(d)(5)(2)

(2) “Housing development project” means a use consisting of any of the following:

(A) Residential units only.

(B) Mixed-use developments consisting of residential and nonresidential uses with at least two-thirds of the square footage designated for residential use.

(C) Transitional housing or supportive housing.

Shouldn’t we be upset with our city council for not having a valid housing element when they knew the consequences?

We definitely don’t need skyscrapers in Menlo Park, but we certainly need more housing in the Bay Area. If our town submitted a valid housing element in time, instead of playing games the issue of a builder’s remedy wouldn’t be on the table.

Just got a email from Betsy Nash, “ I'm happy to report that the State Department of Housing and Community Development informed the City today that it has conditionally approved our Housing Element. This is good news and the welcome conclusion of a long drawn-out process.”

Ronen:

The council did submit a plan to the state. It was kicked back for revisions. It was resubmitted and kicked back again for different revisions. My understanding, the second set of revisions requested were items that were in the first submittal. If I was a pessimist, I'd suspect the state did that on purpose to delay an approved housing element so that the builder's remedy would kick in. I think this was the states plan all along. They want to shove as much housing down our throats as they think they can get away with. Because, after all, they know so much better than local jurisdiction what we need.

Keep on voting for democrats folks and they can continue to run the state into the ground.

My understanding is that about half of California's cities, including San Francisco, do not have certified Housing Elements which means they are vulnerable to "builder's remedy" applicants.

It's not just Menlo Park. It's actually pretty hard to get a document approved by Sacramento's HCD. They are quite capricious and do not say "do A and B and you'll be approved." They just send it back and say "try again."

It's absurd.

Here's an interesting article about the "builder's remedy" law:

Web Link

The interesting thing is that "builder's remedy" has been law for over 30 years; I had assumed it was new, as I never heard of it before. The difference now is that the state is regularly rejecting cities' housing element plans, making it much more common that "builder's remedy" will be invoked.

Ah - and there's this now: Web Link This seems to indicate that the "Sunset" proposal isn't technically dead ... but I think it's effectively dead, as it stands.

It's all brinkmanship.

If they are going to build building with more than 4 or 5 stories,
are they going to pay for changes needed to the fire dept to rescue people in the upper stories ?
Builders Remedy should have limits on the number of stories that can be put in multi floor buildings.

Yes, the "builder's remedy" has been around for a long time. The reason it is a threat now is because housing elements are not being approved by the state's HCD, at least not in a timely manner. Approval used to be pretty routine. Today, they are demanding affirmative plans for new housing much of which needs to be below market rate. A city cannot just say we did this the last cycle of 8 years and we're going to do this for the new cycle of 8 years. They want a plan that says we're re-zoning these properties to high density and putting them out to bid for development on this timeline. It's quite an undertaking.

That it now takes so long - years - means that developers are being given broad discretion to find a property and develop it. Provided 20% of the units are below market rate, they can pretty much whatever they want - any height, any density, any footprint. And without an approved housing element, cities are, for the most part, powerless to restrict these projects.

It's an absurd way to manage growth. You'll realize that when a big, high density project replaces the little home next door to yours.

i'm certainly not happy with our local or state govrnment. it is appalling that our local government has been so incredibly passive and deaf to resident's concerns -- meaning, it won't impact them or their neighborhoods, or their property values or their quality of life. menlo park has always thrown the east side of the city under the bus to protect the wealthiest areas on the west. For the record, this is not new. it's not new, anywhere. it has been the strategy, regardless of weather we're under too much progressive pressure or too much conservative pressure. that's because it's not about party affiliation. it's about money and power. Who has it. who doesn't. the greed and self interest parading, in this case, as concern about lack of affordable housing, should embarrass those who do it. but it doesn't. it doesn't matter if our representatives are republicans or democrats. progressive or conservative...it's all the same. Follow the money.

Private citizen -

You are exactly right. All of this building is the reward that developers are receiving for their financial support (read:contributions) to Sacramento politicians.

This has little to do with affordable housing. Look at the rents these buildings along the transportation corridor are charging! Most of the "working class" people say they care so much about can't afford the $5,000 to $8,000 a month rents in those buildings.

Keep robotically pulling that blue lever to continue receiving the same enlightened leadership.

The potential housing deficit could be greater than described in this thread if these offices are filled with workers the way Facebook does at 150 square ft per worker. Estimating the # of workers for the retail and hotel spaces, the math for this project looks like:
300,000 sq ft of office @ 150 sq ft/worker = 2,000 workers
15,000 sq ft of retail @ 450 sq ft/worker = 33 workers
128,635 sq ft of hotel @ 2500 sq ft/worker = 51 workers
TOTAL = 2,085 workers and 743 housing units

It looks to me as if this adds considerably more demand for housing than the number of units it provides. And all the developer needs to do is to make 20% of the number at below market. I believe he could build fewer total units and even more offices if he feels like it as long as that 20% exists.

We all should demand our current representatives to address this absurd law. It does NOT help the housing crisis, and prevents a city to make sure it does. It allows bad actors to avoid any accountability for harming the environment or community quality of life, and allows bad actors to avoid requirements to prevent or mitigate negative environmental impacts. The only thing it does is allow HCD to use a blunt instrument to get Housing Elements to include the words that read to their satisfaction.

Note that no city can force development of any kind; through the Housing Element,zoning, and development agreements they can ALLOW it and they can impose conditions that can improve the likelihood of desired results. Menlo Park's Councils again and again approve huge projects that worsen the housing deficit all the while touting the new homes but turning a blind eye to the increased demand that enormous new offices produce. The proposed SRI project is an example of allowing new housing but also allowing a huge increase in the # of workers that outweighs the benefit (i.e., far more new demand for housing than provided). The downward spiral continues, aided grotesquely by this law.

Iris -- your math just makes the case for why MP's RHNA number will go higher in the next round. This merry-go-round needs to be stopped. Vote differently folks, if you want a different outcome.

Iris -- great comment. Your math just makes the case for why MP's RHNA number will go higher in the next round. This merry-go-round needs to be stopped. Vote differently folks if you want a different outcome.

@pogo "[HCD] are demanding . plans for . housing . which needs to be below market rate. They want a plan that says we're re-zoning these properties to high density ..."

Yes. The most significant changes in the recent (accepted) HE involve upzoning neighborhoods with MR units for above moderate income families while pretending this will accommodate low-income families.

===
[HE]"City Action: In 2023 and 2024, adopt . and update . zoning standards to provide geographically dispersed sites for 1,953 lower income units (66% above the City’s lower income RHNA allocation of 1,166 units), all located within Racially Concentrated Areas of Affluence (RCAAs), thereby fostering a more diverse community."

[HE] "These rezonings are estimated to produce an additional 621 MARKET-RATE units. Although these units are not used to meet RHNA, they are considered in the environmental analysis (conservatively allocated towards above moderate income households) accompanying the Housing Element. With densities of 30 du/ac and above, these sites could meet the default density threshold deemed appropriate [by HCD] to facilitate housing for lower income households, however, they are not used to meet RHNA."
===

Translation: We finally enacted your lie. We upzoned neighborhoods at 30du/acre for 621 units that are 1.) market rate, 2.) not required to meet our housing quota, and 3.) zoned at "default" densities that YOU, HCD pretend will produce units for low-income families. But, we, Menlo Park, know this is a lie. So we will analyze them "conservatively" in our EIR for ABOVE MODERATE INCOME* families (>$200k for a family of 4.)

Pretending to house low income families, HCD forced MP to upzone neighborhoods for dense ABOVE moderate income housing.

MP got punished for not telling the lie until it had to.

Progressive housing policy has been totally co-opted by corporate lobbyists. Becker and Berman are utterly clueless and outmatched at every step.

Iris - You are absolutely right and I thank you for your calculations. Can't argue with them!

The only issue I have is that I believe these insane policies are actually quite popular in California, just not in affluent cities. There are a lot of people paying insanely high rents for pretty crappy housing. When a worker making $75k has to pay $5,000 a month for an old, worn out, poorly maintained, 2 bedroom, 1600 sq ft house in Redwood City or Menlo Park, that isn't good. Any legislation that they THINK will help them, they'll support. In almost any other state, for that type of money you could have a brand new, huge, 5 bedroom home in a nice, shiny suburb.

I know there are some neighborhood groups trying to put a statewide referendum on the ballot to overturn these rules. I think they will be badly surprised when their initiative fails miserably. The developer and building lobby is rich and powerful and nearly every politician in Sacramento is in their pocket. They will make this a war for affordable housing and a battle between the haves and have nots. They will win. Easily.

The developers and building lobby have already made this a war for affordable housing and a battle between the ‘haves’ and the ‘have nots.’
But in our city, some of the ‘haves’ have gotten out in front of it by trying to shift the impact to the ‘sorta haves’ — the middle class residents, while seeming to be progressive.

Pogo,
If it’s proven that Sacramento has been intentionally kicking back housing elements to enable builder’s remedy, et al, could the impacted cities come together to take this to a higher court? (Rather than trying to impact state law.)

Oh wait, our highest court is also majority bought and paid for.

Ya. You’re right. They will win. Easily.

Mpbiker -

I think you've figured it out pretty well. Yes, Menlo Park and other "built-out" affluent communities generally do not like these zoning and building changes. But those who remember why they moved here, purchased here, and like it here are easily outnumbered by those who support or benefit from the homelessness industry and well-intentioned affordable housing advocates. I would note that even with the problematic economy, layoffs in tech, downturn in housing and high mortgage interest rates, local home prices WENT UP during the last year. This isn't about "affordable" housing.

I do think the courtroom is a better venue for overturning this bad law than a statewide referendum which will fail.