A Planning Commission hearing on Thursday turned into something of a therapy session for some of The City's biggest developers.
These policy changes would require buy-in from the Board of Supervisors, a body that tends not to be particularly interested in stimulating market-rate housing development. But the Planning Commission wants to at least start that conversation. The slowdown in housing production is especially concerning since the Housing Element, a state-mandated planning process, states that San Francisco needs to produce 10,000 homes per year to keep up with demand. If state officials find that San Francisco’s plan does not provide a realistic path toward constructing all of those homes, The City could lose out on significant amounts of state funding.
“When you have to go through five rounds of appeals, between the Planning Commission, the Board of Appeals, sidewalk tree removal appeal, environmental appeal, and so on and so forth, that uncertainty doesn't give a developer or someone who wants to invest in the City of San Francisco a fuzzy feeling,” said Reza Khosnevisan, a partner at SIA Consulting.
Glad to see necessary self-assessment. Added time, red tape, high costs, certainly deter new construction. Investors also look at ownership costs after construction - commercial vacancy tax, proposed residential vacant unit tax, rent control - make new developments unprofitable.