Housing crunch: 11,000+ new homes could ease area shortage
More than 11,000 housing units in the tri-county region are being built, have been ap- proved or are proposed to help tackle the area’s acute housing shortage.
One such housing project is the 1,500-unit Harvest in Limoneira in Santa Paula.
The development is a 50/50 joint venture between Santa Paula-based lemon grower Limoneira and The Lewis Group of Companies, a California-based planned community developer. Limoneira CEO Harold Edwards told the Business Times April 26 that the project, aimed at providing housing for the com- pany’s employees and the community at large, is going “amazingly well.
“There’s a massive demand for housing, and we’re just trying to serve that underserved demand in Ventura County,” he said.
Most of the units will be single family units for sale, with some rentals. An additional 550 units are expected to be approved by the city, bringing the development’s total units to 2,050.
Edwards said the project is “literally one of those things where the second you put something up for sale, it’s snatched up.”
California, including the Central Coast, is in a prolonged housing crisis. According to the California Department of Housing and Community Development, during the last ten years, housing production averaged fewer than 80,000 new homes each year. Ongoing production, meanwhile, continues to fall far below the projected need of 180,000 additional homes annually.
Too much of people’s incomes go towards rent, overall home ownership rates are at their lowest since the 1940s, and there are a disproportionate number of Californians experiencing homelessness, according to the department.
A report released last year by the Santa Barbara Foundation notes that the Santa Barbara-Santa Maria region has the fifth highest housing cost in the state.
That leaves “the majority of our community members precariously housed,” the report says.
The most recent large housing project to be green-lit is the 1,470-unit Dana Reserve development in unincorporated Nipomo in San Luis Obispo County. It was narrowly approved by the San Luis Obispo County Board of Supervisors on April 24 on a 3-2 vote.
The approval came despite considerable community opposition on grounds that the development would undermine Nipomo’s small-town feel. Other residents supported the project, saying it could lead to lower housing costs and address homelessness.
The project offers homes at a wide range of prices, from moderate income to about 200 low and very low-income units.
Supervisor Debbie Arnold, who favored the project, said the development will address the county’s shortage of workforce housing.
“The medical care folks here, the firemen, the police, all these people will tell you the same,” she said. “On their salaries, they can’t afford to buy a house here.”
The board, she said, hears from businesses all the time that they can’t locate in the county because there are no affordable homes for the workforce they need.
Dana Reserve, she said, “is designed to bring in folks from every different income and every different demographic.”
Developer Nick Tompkins told the board that while the state’s housing crisis “may be especially acute here, creating meaningful, tangible and deliverable solutions to that is really tough.
“When we hear of individuals talking about their current, unstable housing, it makes us even more determined to do our part,” said Tompkins, who owns development company NKT Commercial.
A proposed community alternative plan called for just 800 homes and the elimination of far fewer oak trees, but the board majority went with the larger project.
Supervisor Jimmy Paulding, who opposed the development, said, “the vote today underscores the tension between the need for housing and the need to address the impacts associated with large developments and protect what we love about our community.”
