New Housing on the Horizon for Gonzales
Gonzales may be a small town, but it has become an increasingly crowded place, without sufficient housing to serve its needs or those of its growing workforce.
The city has spent years developing plans for new housing. Now those plans are approaching implementation as developers show new interest in Gonzales. The city could see 6,100 new housing units built over the next two decades, a milestone not only for the city but for the entire county. The Gonzales population could double.
This is a significant undertaking for the citizens of Gonzales. To ensure that it is carried out responsibly, the city has adopted development guidelines based on principles of sustainability and smart growth. New housing will be directed toward the east in close-in areas already designated within the city’s sphere of influence so they can be easily annexed. Development will be geared toward creating compact communities with a mix of housing types and containing open space, walking trails, parks, schools and commercial space. The goal is to grow Gonzales while avoiding the pitfalls of sprawl and retaining the city’s small-town character.
What follows is an examination of the current housing situation and how the city plans to move toward filling that need responsibly.
The Housing Shortage
The 2015-2023 Gonzales Housing Element found the city had exceptionally low vacancy rates and high overcrowding rates. The Housing Element highlighted a city housing vacancy rate that has been one of lowest in Monterey County since the start of the century. It also said 43 percent of all housing units in the city were overcrowded, significantly higher than the averages for Monterey County (21 percent) and California (15 percent).
The city’s successful economic development program adds extra urgency to the tight housing market. The city has attracted a number of new produce processing plants to its Agricultural Industrial Business Park, which have brought thousands of new jobs. But the city doesn’t have enough housing to accommodate all those new workers. The Association of Monterey Bay Area Governments (AMBAG), which covers Monterey and Santa Cruz counties, recently published its Regional Housing Needs Allocation. Gonzales had the second-highest ratio of jobs to housing units, at 3.2. Sand City, which had a jobs-to-housing ratio of 11.1, is somewhat of an anomaly, a three-square-mile city of big box stores and warehouses with a population of just 325. By contrast, Gonzales, with two square miles, had a population of 8,647 as of the 2020 Census.
Filling the Need
Currently there are two large development projects under consideration that could add 6,000 housing units over the next 20 years. One, called Vista Lucia, would include 3,500 homes on 768 acres. The other, called Puente Del Monte, would have 2,600 homes on 544 acres.
These projects, if built, would go a long way toward realizing the city’s goal of securing new housing to meet its current and future needs. The aim has been to not only provide new homes but to do it in a way that conforms to the city’s desire for communities that are sustainable and use principles of smart growth. Initial proposals from developers indicate the city’s principles are an integral part of development plans.
One of the basic ideas in Gonzales is to funnel growth toward contiguous land that is currently outside the city limits. This area contains what is generally less productive agricultural land that is close to existing city services like water and sewer, so it is deemed more suitable for growth.
And since these areas are already within the city’s sphere of influence, they are available for annexation, if approved by the Local Agency Formation Commission. In addition, growth in the city’s tax base as a result of industrial expansion puts the city in a good financial position to manage this growth.
The Greening of Gonzales
Gonzales strives to create a healthy and vibrant community for its residents. It has developed a set of guiding principles that promote sustainable and green solutions. These guiding principles have been honed over decades. They have their documented roots in the Gonzales General Plan, adopted in 2010 and subsequently amended with even more sustainability guidelines. It calls for well-planned, larger residential developments rather than separate and independent smaller subdivisions that can lead to urban sprawl.
The General Plan includes a 24-page Sustainability Element, voluntarily adopted by the city at a time when such elements were not required. The plan notes that “Sustainability constitutes a central theme of the Gonzales 2010 General Plan.”
The Sustainability Element sets forth policies to “promote efficient use of resources and reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions.” It says that future growth will be directed toward new, workable neighborhoods containing easily-accessed community and commercial facilities. It also calls for employing the latest urban planning ideas, including such concepts as green building design and new urbanism principles.
The subsequent 2015-2023 Housing Element goes further, calling for new developments that contain pedestrian-oriented neighborhoods with a variety of housing types and densities for all income levels and containing schools, parks, community facilities and commercial services.
Finally, Gonzales has pioneered adoption of a Health Element as part of a General Plan, which is not required by law. The process began in 2016 when the city developed a Health in All Policies (HiAP) strategy, which stressed “health is where people live, work, learn, and play.” The HiAP strategy focused on developing partnerships across sectors and incorporating the community in the policy and development process.
Gonzales used the findings to develop a Health and Wellness Element in 2018 that was added as an addendum to the 2010 General Plan. The added element calls for access to healthy affordable food, green sustainable practices, complete neighborhoods, safety, economic development, youth leadership, educational opportunities, access to affordable and quality healthcare, and social connectedness. The Health Element also contains goals, policies, and implementing actions for each of these topic areas. They are a part of the “constitution for development” for the City of Gonzales.
All of these concepts and principles will come into play on any future development. What this means is that the 6,100 new housing units that have been suggested would be built in communities adhering to well-documented sustainability and green guidelines.
Conclusion
Gonzales’ vision for the future foresees a healthy, engaged population, living in a community with ample job opportunities. Its overarching goals are encapsulated in what has come to be known as “The Gonzales Way,” a term that describes the can-do attitude of the Gonzales citizenry as well as an ability to guide change in a way that supports sustainability while preserving the smalltown feel. The Gonzales Way ethos on such fronts as access to health care, youth engagement and economic viability earned the city a coveted Robert Wood Johnson Culture of Health Prize in 2019, one of only five communities in the country to attain the award that year.
But one area that has been difficult to address, even under The Gonzales Way umbrella, has been housing. Now the city has an opportunity to begin working on that missing piece of the puzzle.
Existing guidelines, combined with The Gonzales Way of doing things, will ensure that these new developments will create sustainable, green neighborhoods that retain the city’s rural character and serve the needs of the city’s residents well into the future.