BY EMILY MIBACH
Daily Post Staff Writer
Regional officials are considering a $10 billion or $20 billion bond measure for housing on the November 2024 ballot.
San Mateo County would get $1 billion if the authority goes with the $10 billion option. Santa Clara County, minus San Jose, would get $1.2 billion. San Jose would get $1 billion.
For a $10 billion bond measure, the annual cost for property owners would be $10.26 per $100,000 in assessed value, which translates into $102.60 a year for a home with a tax value of $1 million. Most homes have a lower tax value than what they would fetch on the open market. The bond would run for 10 years.
Bond funds would be doled out throughout the Bay Area, with cities such as Oakland, San Jose, Santa Rosa and Napa getting their own allocation, according to Kate Hartley, the director of the Bay Area Housing Finance Authority. The authority is trying to put the bond on the ballot. Hartley gave the San Mateo County Board of Supervisors an overview of the bond measure at the board’s Tuesday meeting. The Housing Finance Authority was created by the Legislature in 2019 to levy taxes to help the Bay Area build more affordable housing.
A report to the authority’s governing committee made up of elected officials from around the Bay Area, recommends the agency go with a $10 billion bond due to the current “fluidity of market conditions,” and possible changes to state law that could make it easier for bonds to be passed at the ballot box, lowering it from the current two-thirds majority needed to win.
Supervisor David Canepa said the $1 billion San Mateo County would get for affordable housing can “really be something impactful,” for the cities in the county. Canepa wanted to endorse the bond measure. However, the measure is not on the ballot yet.
One speaker opposed measure
Only one person at Tuesday’s meeting spoke against the bond. Moss Beach resident Carlysle Ann Young said a lot of seniors she knows will vote against anything that increases their property taxes and suggested a senior tax exemption.
San Mateo County has Measure K, a half-cent sales tax, on the books which was in part supposed to fund affordable housing. The county anticipates getting $110 million from the tax this fiscal year. Since the measure was initially approved as Measure A about 10 years ago, the county has spent $130 million on housing and homelessness issues, but the county’s website on Measure K does not break down how many units were paid for with that $130 million.
Santa Clara County voters in 2016 approved Measure A, a $950 million bond for affordable housing to be built. As of May 2023, 4,481 new apartments have been built, 689 homes have been renovated and $25 million has gone into a first-time homebuyer program, according to data from the county. Measure A expires in 2026.
It will be up to two regional boards — the housing authority and the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) — to agree to place the measure on the ballot. No one is directly elected to either of these boards. The boards consist of local elected officials from around the Bay Area.
The individual counties will not be able to override the placement of the tax on the ballot once those two boards vote, which will likely occur next summer. The counties will have to put together spending plans for the bond.
If the measure hits the ballot, it would require two-thirds approval.
Boards aren’t directly elected
The local members of the Bay Area Housing Finance Authority’s board include Millbrae Councilwoman Gina Papan, who is running for San Mateo County Supervisor, Mountain View Councilwoman Margaret Abe-Koga, who is running for Santa Clara County Supervisor, and Santa Clara County Supervisor Cindy Chavez.
The local members of ABAG include San Mateo County Supervisor Noelia Corzo, Los Altos Councilwoman Neysa Fligor, East Palo Alto Councilman Carlos Romero and Santa Clara County Supervisors Otto Lee and Susan Ellenberg.
I’m not inclined to raise my taxes. These local officials, all of whom are Democrats and Joe Biden supporters, have been OK with his massive borrowing that has increased inflation and shrunk paychecks. It’s not in my interest to approve a tax increase when I’m falling behind in my monthly expenses. Find another source for these funds.
People can’t afford to own homes in California. Taxes on a $$450k home in Oakland are over $7,000 a year, and almost half of that are ballot measure taxes piled on to solve problems that have only gotten worse. We have the worst schools, parks that are have s for drug addicts, trash everywhere, the worst roads in the nation