Thank you Seema Patel for your facts-based Letter to the Editor of the San Mateo Daily Journal! Numbers don't lie. We absolutely can rebalance the housing under-development in San Mateo, and we don't have to do it in a way that creates more traffic (dropping medium and large sized developments in parts of San Mateo that require everyone to drive). Focusing on downtown and along transit corridors will offset some of these fears, and will allow San Mateo to retain it's Housing Element Certification.
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Editor,
In 1991, San Mateo voters passed Measure H limiting new developments to five stories in height and new residential projects to 50 units per acre. It’s no coincidence that housing production plummeted from ~750 units to ~100 units a year (pg H-A-36, https://bit.ly/3zV0D97).
By placing limits on the amount of housing but not commercial space, Measure H (extended via Measures P and Y) has resulted in more than three decades of wildly unbalanced jobs to housing growth. San Mateo’s recent housing element notes that, over the past decade, the number of jobs in San Mateo increased by 42.7% while the number of homes increased by only 3.6%, making it no surprise that home prices rose 115.6% in the same period (pg H-A-6, https://bit.ly/3zV0D97).
In the state’s review letters of the housing element, it asked the city to develop a program to address Measure Y’s constraint on housing development (https://bit.ly/3zZM04n). The city committed to either passing Measure T or adding capacity for 1,700 new units in our high resource areas, primarily single-family neighborhoods (Policy H 1.20, https://bit.ly/4h57mhm). If San Mateo does neither, it’s very likely our housing element will be decertified and the builder’s remedy will go into effect, allowing developers to build unlimited housing wherever they want, provided 20% of units are affordable.
Voters concerned about balanced, sensible growth should vote yes on Measure T, which increases height and density limits on 10% of San Mateo’s land next to major transit corridors. The alternative is less environmentally sustainable development in single-family neighborhoods or loss of local control.
Seema Patel
San Mateo
The letter writer is the chair of the San Mateo Planning Commission. She writes on her own behalf as a resident.
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