With a unanimous vote in closed session at its Tuesday meeting, the Clovis City Council and Desiree Martinez reached a settlement agreement, ending years of litigation over the city’s land use policies and availability of affordable housing.
Martinez brought the case, Desiree Martinez v. City of Clovis, with the help of Central California Legal Services (CCLS), the Public Interest Law Project (PILP), and the Law Office of Patience Milrod to urge Clovis to plan and zone for housing for people of all income levels.
The city lost the case in court, then definitively lost on appeal in April 2023. The matter had appeared on the city’s closed-session agenda repeatedly for months, with no explanation from the council until Tuesday’s meeting.
For virtual meeting attendees, the Webex transmission of the meeting remained on throughout the 30-minute closed session, which took place privately, but abruptly shut off when the council reconvened about 7 p.m. There was no audio or video of the remainder of the public portion of the meeting, but an update on the Martinez affordable housing case was posted to the city’s website not long after the end of the meeting.
Per Director of Economic Development, Housing and Communications Chad McCollum, the City Attorney Scott Cross announced the vote on the settlement after the closed session and read some of the main points of the agreement:
- The city of Clovis will establish a local housing trust fund and has committed to contributing at least $1.8 million to support affordable housing developments.
- The city will dedicate city-owned sites to the development of affordable housing.
- Clovis will rezone small infill parcels throughout the city to accommodate approximately 1,300 multi-family dwelling units.
- The city will adopt an ordinance to require that up to 10% of units in mid-to-large-scale new housing development projects will be affordable to low-income families.
- Clovis will create a development impact fee-deferral program, deferring the payment of significant portions of city development impact fees for qualifying affordable housing projects.
Mayor Lynne Ashbeck spoke as well, acknowledging the work of the plaintiff’s attorney, Patience Milrod, who was present.
Those in attendance reported that the mood was “celebratory,” and that the council chamber was suffused with a palpable feeling of relief.
The Clovis City Council will meet again March 11.
For more on this story, read the latest update from Fresnoland here.
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