Summit County officials brought in a facilitator for the March 12 council meeting that got members closer to consensus on affordable housing.
That’s partly because the council has suffered from a bit of “indecision,” as Councilmember Chris Robinson said.
“I think what we lack is consensus on: what we want to accomplish, what are our objectives, what is our plan,” he said March 12.
At the meeting, the council picked a number: 1,500 affordable housing units, which it wants to build in the next 10 years. But none of the details on when, where and how are settled.
Staff are charged with bringing a concrete plan to the council for adoption sometime in April.
And councilmembers admit the 1,500-unit number isn’t scientific.
Almost ten years ago, Park City set a goal to build 800 affordable units within a decade.
According to Summit County Housing and Economic Development Director Jeff Jones, that was to maintain the fraction of Park City’s workforce that lives within city limits: 12%.
Thirty-six percent of Summit County’s workforce lives within county borders.
Jones said to maintain that, over the next decade, the county would need 5,995 homes. Councilmembers ran the gamut as to whether they wanted to meet that number; none recommended exceeding it and some declined to throw out a preferred number at all.
“There isn’t a metric that's going to tell you what the right number of, percentage of your community should live here,” County Manager Shayne Scott said. “The more, the better. It's going to be a policy decision.”
The council won’t adopt 1,500 units as a formal policy at least until staff brings back a plan. But it’s important that a plan be in place, said Community Development Director Peter Barnes.
“You need to be aware of the fact that there are projects out there. There are projects that come here, go through a preliminary process, realize there's no hope, and go away. They don't want Summit County to be the place where they die slowly,” Barnes said. “They want Summit County to be a place that can actually articulate the fact that, ‘Yes, we do want affordable housing. We're not necessarily sure of how much or where it should go, or what type it looks like, but we do want it.’”
And the council cautiously asserted it does value affordable housing March 12.
The 1,500-unit number explicitly doesn’t include the Dakota Pacific Real Estate project or whatever is built on the county-owned Cline Dahle parcel in Jeremy Ranch.
But Robinson cautioned developers: the affordable housing goal isn’t an automatic “green light” because the council still hasn’t decided about rezoning land to accomplish its housing goals.
Along with goal-setting, Summit County has pursued establishing a housing authority.
The council put the housing authority on pause during its policy discussions, and it says it won’t adopt bylaws governing the new agency at least until it decides on an affordable housing plan.
Jones said he has numerous applicants for the housing authority executive director position. Interviews start March 17.
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