What's at stake?
A proposal to make it easier to build housing on office space in the city will have its first hearing at 5:30 p.m. at the May 22 Fresno City Council meeting. The proposal would streamline the development process by approving applications that meet code requirements by-right.
The proposal, which aims to increase housing stock in the city’s northern area, is met with mixed feedback from councilmembers.
Some take issue with development proposals being approved without their discretion, while others see the proposal as a way to justify a controversial rezoning proposal in southwest Fresno.
Fresno’s quest to make it easier to build homes in more established neighborhoods and in office parks could get a boost in the coming weeks.
The Fresno City Council will hear a proposal Thursday that would allow for land currently zoned for offices to be more easily converted into housing through ministerial approval, or by-right. The council’s first hearing on the set of streamlining reforms, which has been delayed for months, is currently scheduled for May 22.
While the plan could allow for more homes to be built in the city’s more affluent northern neighborhoods, council members are torn between a desire to see more homes built in existing neighborhoods, a development practice called infill – and giving up their discretion to respond to neighbor complaints about new development.
If the proposal doesn’t pass, there are consequences: city officials say they could lose access to state housing funds. And an obscure state law may have tied the fate of a controversial rezone in southwest Fresno to the passage of this ministerial proposal, creating strange politics for a policy that in the short-term moves homes around on paper.
What will the ministerial proposal do?
The streamlining policy is not a rezone. The amendment proposes adding a trio of housing opportunities to be approved ministerially by the city — meaning, development proposals would be approved as long as applications meet development code requirements, and without need for discretion from city leaders or options for community input.
The biggest change would be in allowing for the development of infill, multi-family homes in areas currently zoned for office use, and to do so by-right, without city discretion.
The policy would also allow office-to-home conversions and new apartments near bus stops or in the city’s infill priority areas, with mixed-use zoning, by-right.
The effort, the city says, has been a long time coming.
The practice used to be allowed a decade ago. The mayor has outlined his desire for it in his One Fresno Housing policy. The city’s intent to do so has also seen the state reward it with a now-approved Housing Element and a Pro Housing Designation — two prerequisites to apply for millions in state housing funds local jurisdictions rely on to help develop affordable housing.
Councilmembers hold “a difference of philosophy” on streamlining
Councilmember Annalisa Perea, who represents west central Fresno and parts of the Tower District and Fresno High neighborhoods, is a part of the voting bloc that favors the proposal. Perea said the move would help the city build vertically, which would address what she says is a criticism some constituents’ have against the city’s current development practices.
“We hear from people that they do not support sprawl,” Perea said. “This will do the exact opposite of that.
“This is a policy that will allow us to start acting like we’re in a housing crisis,” she later added.
Fresno City Council President Mike Karbassi — who represents northwest Fresno — has been vocally against the text amendment’s approval dating back to its initial agenda debut in March.
Citing “a difference of philosophy,” Karbassi said he’s not against building more housing, but he is uncomfortable with taking power away from the council and, in essence, allowing developers the power to reshape office space into multifamily housing with little pushback.
“Taking that power away from me as a representative, that’s unacceptable,” Karbassi said. “It’s a hard pill for me to swallow…giving one person, an unelected, the power to rezone a property.”
Karbassi has taken side with his constituents over commitments to the state before. The councilman has been very vocally opposed to the controversially rejected apartments in a northwest neighborhood near the San Joaquin River bluffs, citing community concerns. The city’s rejection last year opened them up to potential litigation from the state. The developer ultimately sued the city.
“I did not come here to roll over to the state of California,” Karbassi said in response to possible litigation over the ministerial proposal’s rejection in a March Fresno City Council meeting.
Councilmembers who are against the proposal also take issue with what they believe would be a betrayal of their constituents who bought their homes near office space, thinking the zoning would stay that way.
“It is due diligence to give the residents who put us in these seats in the first place the ability to speak up and bring their public comment forward to developments in their area,” said councilmember Nick Richardson — who represents northeast Fresno — in a March council discussion on the topic.
The change could impact north Fresno the most – along Bullard, Herndon, First and Cedar Avenues – where most of the city’s office parks are clustered.
The ministerial proposal is no guarantee that housing will be built there. However, the city’s role is to zone land for housing, and then incentivize developers to build there.
The Planning Commission will hear a proposal for an office-to-residential rezone in June near Chestnut and Behymer Avenues in northeast Fresno. On paper, the ministerial proposal would make this process easier, and in turn, incentivize developers to increase housing stock in the city.
A rejection of the policy, however, could guarantee the city to lose out on millions of dollars in state housing funding.
The city agreed to take this policy on in order to attain the state’s Prohousing Designation. It’s a gold star given to cities and counties that eliminate barriers for developers to build more housing. The policy – if approved – also keeps the city’s Housing Element, its roadmap for building housing, in the good graces of state regulators.
If the ministerial proposal is rejected, the state could repeal both of those crucial designations, blocking them from applying for state funding opportunities, according to city manager Georgeanne White.
Sophia Pagoulatos, long range planner at the city’s planning and development department, told Fresnoland the city could lose out on its current grant applications — including one for $10 million for homelessness support and prevention. The city could reapply, but that process is unclear, she added.
Southwest leaders concerned about tie to controversial Elm rezone
The streamlining proposal itself has a part to play in other city matters, too. Depending on who you ask.
During a workshop for the ministerial proposal on May 15, Fresno City Councilmember Miguel Arias — who represents southwest Fresno — indicated that he’d only support the ministerial proposal if it could stand on its own merits.
That’s because another rezone in southwest Fresno may rely on the fate of this proposal to succeed, thanks to an obscure state law, SB 330.
Community members have been fighting a plan to rezone a few warehouses on Elm Avenue from mixed-use back to industrial since 2021.
On paper, up to about 3,500 homes could be built on the 55 acres on Elm under the current zoning, if the warehouse owners ever decided to sell or start from scratch.
The rezone would eliminate this theoretical possibility for more homes. But state housing law requires city officials to offset any decrease in housing capacity by approving another policy on the same day that would restore the balance of potential homes to be built, at least, on paper.
If the ministerial proposal fails, the Elm rezone – even if it gets a majority of council votes – also fails.
This is part of Arias’ calculus for how he votes on both items. At the May 15 workshop, he made clear his indication that he can only support the ministerial policy if it also means not shafting his constituents who want the Elm rezone to fail.
On Wednesday, Pastor B.T. Lewis led a demonstration in southwest Fresno opposing the Elm rezone.
The demonstration, which included community leaders like Eric Payne, director of the Central Valley Urban Institute, and Artie Padilla, director of the Fresno DRIVE Initiative, was clear — southwest Fresno is “unanimous” in its opposition to the rezone, citing damaging health effects and a demand for the city to uphold the community’s specific plan.
Lewis, who also serves as a community liaison for Fresno Mayor Jerry Dyer, criticized the connection between the two items. He, too, expressed a desire for both items to be judged by the council on their own merits, instead of being processed as a pair of offsetting policies.
“What they’re doing is trying to hide their rezone under the ministerial text amendment when, in reality, whether the text amendment is there [on the agenda] or not, this rezone needs to be denied based on all the reasons that we talk about here today,” Lewis told Fresnoland.
Barring a delay, the city council will hold a first hearing on the ministerial proposal and vote on the Elm rezone at Thursday’s meeting. Both items are scheduled to be heard back-to-back, starting at 5:30 p.m.
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