{"id":23263,"date":"2022-08-14T11:44:42","date_gmt":"2022-08-14T18:44:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/occupysf.net\/?p=23263"},"modified":"2022-08-14T11:44:44","modified_gmt":"2022-08-14T18:44:44","slug":"s-f-developer-hits-brick-wall-in-bid-to-turn-tenderloin-lot-into-housing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2022\/08\/14\/s-f-developer-hits-brick-wall-in-bid-to-turn-tenderloin-lot-into-housing\/","title":{"rendered":"S.F. developer hits brick wall in bid to turn Tenderloin lot into housing"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/author\/heather-knight\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Heather Knight<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Aug. 13, 2022 (SFChronicle.com)<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/s.hdnux.com\/photos\/01\/26\/76\/70\/22801950\/3\/1200x0.jpg\" alt=\"A developer whose 14-month effort to turn the vacant lot at 841 Polk St. in the Tenderloin into housing \u2014 100% affordable is his dream \u2014 is no closer to making it a reality.\"\/><figcaption>A developer whose 14-month effort to turn the vacant lot at 841 Polk St. in the Tenderloin into housing \u2014 100% affordable is his dream \u2014 is no closer to making it a reality.Stephen Lam\/The Chronicle<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>The vacant lot at 841 Polk St. could be a public service announcement for San Francisco\u2019s desperate need for housing and the obstacles people face trying to build it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It\u2019s used as a makeshift parking lot by a mechanic next door as people sleep just outside its chain link fence. On Friday morning, the sidewalks of the adjacent Olive Street alley were grim. Piles of trash dotted the area, including one that looked like the charred remains of a fire. Old furniture was strewn between tents and other makeshift abodes. A man dozed on cardboard, his head resting on the pole of a No Parking sign.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>A No Housing sign would be just as apt.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Coby Friedman, head of CF Contracting, bought the small lot a couple of years ago. Tellingly in this city where every price tag makes eyes water, he paid $1.1 million for a 2,900-square-foot patch of dirt in the middle of the Tenderloin. He wants to turn it into housing \u2014 100% affordable is his dream \u2014 but 14 months after turning in plans to the city, he\u2019s no closer to making them a reality.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>His predicament is one example of why&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/sf\/article\/Gov-Newsom-launches-unprecedented-review-of-San-17362055.php\">this week\u2019s intervention by the state<\/a>&nbsp;to remove barriers to construction in San Francisco was so welcome.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIt\u2019s about time!\u201d Friedman said of Gov. Gavin Newsom\u2019s unprecedented move to investigate the city\u2019s infamously long, burdensome, expensive process of permitting and building housing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>More from Heather Knight<\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/sf\/bayarea\/heatherknight\/article\/newsom-california-supervised-consumption-17363149.php\"><\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/sf\/bayarea\/heatherknight\/article\/newsom-california-supervised-consumption-17363149.php\">Open letter to Gov. Newsom: Please don\u2019t veto this bill that will save many lives in San Francisco<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/sf\/bayarea\/heatherknight\/article\/newsom-california-supervised-consumption-17363149.php\"><\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/sf\/bayarea\/heatherknight\/article\/newsom-california-supervised-consumption-17363149.php\"><\/a><\/li><li><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/sf\/bayarea\/heatherknight\/article\/sfpd-traffic-tickets-17355651.php\"><\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/sf\/bayarea\/heatherknight\/article\/sfpd-traffic-tickets-17355651.php\">\u2018What exactly are they doing?\u2019: 45 S.F. traffic cops issue just 10 citations combined a day<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/sf\/bayarea\/heatherknight\/article\/sfpd-traffic-tickets-17355651.php\"><\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/sf\/bayarea\/heatherknight\/article\/sfpd-traffic-tickets-17355651.php\"><\/a><\/li><\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThis could be a win-win for everybody,\u201d Friedman said of his plans to build housing on his lot.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>It could be, but it\u2019s well-documented that bureaucrats and elected officials over the decades have created a system that makes it inordinately expensive and time-consuming to build housing and&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/sf\/article\/housing-development-cost-price-residential-17264782.php\">has nearly ground construction of new units to a halt.<\/a>&nbsp;It\u2019s also&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/bayarea\/heatherknight\/article\/San-Francisco-is-one-of-California-s-most-15891810.php\">a system with a marked pattern of delays and denials<\/a>&nbsp;of new housing and one in which nosy neighbors get an unusual amount of say in what can be built near them.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>On Tuesday, the California Department of Housing and Community Development named San Francisco as its first target of a \u201chousing policy and practice review,\u201d an investigation designed to determine why building housing in the city takes longer than anywhere else in the state and generates so many complaints to the state\u2019s new Housing Accountability Unit.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The state also informed San Francisco it had rejected its first draft of its housing element, a legally required document that must show how it will build 82,069 units, including 33,000 affordable ones, by 2030. If City Hall can\u2019t vastly improve its plan, it risks losing hundreds of millions of dollars in housing and transit grants from the state.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>San Francisco has come under scrutiny for rejecting some major projects in recent months \u2014 most notably&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/sf\/bayarea\/heatherknight\/article\/S-F-supervisors-complain-about-our-housing-16576412.php\">495 housing units on a Nordstrom valet parking lot.<\/a>&nbsp;But its expensive, cumbersome process for building housing also means many potential projects never even get started.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Just ask Friedman. He last built housing in San Francisco in the 1980s and then it was just single-family homes. This is his first attempt at a fairly big housing project in a city that makes housing construction a wildly frustrating endeavor for even those who have made their careers out of it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Friedman has worked on other projects unrelated to housing in San Francisco over the years \u2014 and to be clear, his track record isn\u2019t perfect.&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/sf.curbed.com\/2017\/5\/30\/15714296\/mountain-lake-playground-reopen\">His company misplaced a decimal point<\/a>&nbsp;in its bid to remake the playground at Mountain Lake Park, causing construction delays.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>In this case, though, it\u2019s mostly the inordinate expense of building housing in the city that\u2019s causing the frustration. Under the city\u2019s zoning rules, he can build high \u2014 130 feet \u2014 but not dense. Just 23 units would be allowed. The lot is also so small, it would be hard to include the green space required by the city.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Friedman has proposed building more units with different plans, ranging from 60 to 84 studios, but even at that number, which would require special permission from the city, he can\u2019t find an affordable housing developer willing to build it. That\u2019s because building affordable housing is so expensive and time-consuming \u2014 costing, on average, $750,000 per unit and taking seven years \u2014 that developers usually turn down projects with fewer than 150 apartments.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>So Friedman is caught in a Goldilocks-style dilemma with the city saying he\u2019s seeking far too many units and affordable housing developers saying he\u2019s seeking far too few.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Sam Moss, executive director of Mission Housing Development Corp., an affordable housing developer, said he had to turn Friedman\u2019s offer down because it didn\u2019t have enough units.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cIt won\u2019t kick off enough money to pay the rent,\u201d Moss said. \u201cThat\u2019s a shame, but it\u2019s not wrong. It is sad because in my humble opinion, it has given our city bureaucracy cover to just say no to anything that isn\u2019t a 150-unit type deal. It means we\u2019re trying to make the perfect the enemy of the good.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He added that it\u2019s not all San Francisco\u2019s fault. The federal government used to give more housing vouchers, which low-income tenants could use to offset the cost of rent.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Dan Sider, chief of staff for the Planning Department, said none of Friedman\u2019s proposals so far have complied with city rules and the ball is back in his court. He said, \u201cWe are in regular communication with the developer, guiding them either toward maximum allowable density or legislative relief from the Board of Supervisors.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Asked whether it\u2019s simply impossible to build housing there and Friedman should just move on, Sider gave a flat no.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cBeyond any doubt, housing is an ideal use for this site,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>The question, though, his how to get it approved and paid for.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Corey Smith, executive director of the Housing Action Coalition which seeks to build more housing at all income levels, has tried to help Friedman by introducing him to developers and walking him through the byzantine process. But he\u2019s not surprised Friedman has so far been unsuccessful in a city that makes it so hard to succeed.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>\u201cThe guy\u2019s actively trying to build housing in a city that needs housing and is happy to build affordable housing,\u201d Smith said. \u201cIt\u2019s a good example of a symptom of our own illness. Why is it so, so difficult to do the thing that everybody claims that they want?\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Asked his prediction for 841 Polk St. in, say, a few years, Smith said, \u201cMore of the same.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>He imagines the dirt lot still vacant, homeless people still sleeping around it and the city still desperately needing housing. Let\u2019s hope the state can help craft a brighter future.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><em>Heather Knight is a San Francisco Chronicle columnist. Email:&nbsp;<a href=\"mailto:hknight@sfchronicle.com\">hknight@sfchronicle.com<\/a>&nbsp;Twitter:&nbsp;<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hknightsf\">@hknightsf<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Written By <a rel=\"noreferrer noopener\" href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/author\/heather-knight\/\" target=\"_blank\">Heather Knight<\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/SFChronicle\/\"><\/a><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/hknightsf\"><\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Heather Knight is a columnist working out of City Hall and covering everything from politics to homelessness to family flight and the quirks of living in one of the most fascinating cities in the world. She believes in holding politicians accountable for their decisions or, often, lack thereof &#8211; and telling the stories of real people and their struggles.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>She co-hosts the Chronicle&#8217;s TotalSF podcast and co-founded its #TotalSF program to celebrate the wonder and whimsy of San Francisco.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/img\/logos\/black\/logo.svg\" alt=\"San Francisco Chronicle Homepage - Site Logo\"\/><\/a><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.sfchronicle.com\/img\/core\/hearst_newspapers_logo.svg\" alt=\"HEARST newspapers logo\">\u00a92022 Hearst<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Heather Knight Aug. 13, 2022 (SFChronicle.com) The vacant lot at 841 Polk St. could be a public service announcement for San Francisco\u2019s desperate need for housing and the obstacles people face trying to build it. It\u2019s used as a makeshift parking lot by a mechanic next door as people sleep&#8230; <a class=\"continue-reading-link\" href=\"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/2022\/08\/14\/s-f-developer-hits-brick-wall-in-bid-to-turn-tenderloin-lot-into-housing\/\"> Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr; <\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23263"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=23263"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23263\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":23264,"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/23263\/revisions\/23264"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=23263"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=23263"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/occupysf.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=23263"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}