Attachment B - Shape Stockton Feedback Responses
1 The following responses summarize actions the city has or intends to take to address the feedback received from all workshops, study sessions, neighborhood meetings, go-to-them-events, stakeholder interviews, and one-on-one meetings. The comments indicate what Shape Stockton or other effort is best suited to address feedback.
HOUSING ELEMENT
Main Points
Adoption and Certification of the Housing Element will allow the City to maintain its ProHousing Designation from the state and apply for future Grants and funds.
The City has coordinated its Homelessness Goals and Policies with the City’s Local and Regional Homeless Action Plan, and other efforts by nonprofit organizations.
A new land use inventory indicates where housing of all types and income levels can be located. The Housing Element Directs staff to make numerous changes to the Development code to achieve the following:
o All types of housing in all zoning residential and commercial zoning. Currently about 90% of the residential and commercial zones allow multifamily or mixed use. Staff will work to expand this to all zones. This includes multi-unit housing options (duplex, triplex, fourplex). o Changes are made to make more reviews “by-right” and to streamline environmental review for infill and housing development.
o Changes to add performance measures to add enhance project design and mitigation for housing located next to freeways, highways, or other areas that may have higher than average noise or air quality impacts.
City staff agreed to explore housing topics such as rent control, inclusionary housing, mixed income ordinances, and other housing funds and seek feedback from officials and groups on their use. The Housing Element aligns with the City’s Action Plans and Development Code to ensure internal consistency and direction on funding and zoning regulation changes. Fair housing indicators were analyzed and programs were added or enhanced to address disparities in access related to fair housing law. In particular Program 33 was added to call for the City to identify additional sites for housing in in relatively higher income and higher resource areas of the city.
Next Steps
City staff will continue to seek adoption for the Action Plans and Development Code overhaul that will implement many programs within the Housing Element.
Resources on the land inventory, existing housing opportunities, funding, and supportive information on equitable housing, tenant protections, will be kept online for the public to use and/or connect with the appropriate group responsible. The City currently has a dedicated Housing Policy website through Community Development and a Housing program website through Economic Development. These will be updated and linked when new resources are added.
SAFETY ELEMENT
The City has updated its Housing and Safety Element to comply with recent changes to state law. No new impacts were discovered as flood, fires, and heat island continue to be the largest natural threats posed to the City.
The Safety Element identifies and updates the City’s service and evacuation routes.
Attachment B - Shape Stockton Feedback Responses
2 Fair housing indicators were analyzed and programs were added or enhanced to address disparities in access related to fair housing law. In particular Program 33 was added to call for the City to identify additional sites for housing in in relatively higher income and higher resource areas of the city.
Next Steps
A vulnerable assessment was conducted to explore potential impacts due to climate change. This will be updated and included as part of the climate action plan update starting in 2024. Staff will continue to explore any needed updates to the primary safety policy and procedural documents that dictate emergency services and partnerships.
HOUSING ACTION PLAN (HAP)
Main Points
The HAP has been drafted to align with the policies of the new 2023-2031 Housing Element and not the previous housing element.
The HAP is a non-binding document and does not provide regulatory direction, but rather is designed to function as a resource for developers, property owners, and the community for better understanding Stockton's residential development standards and approval processes. The housing market seems to be the city’s biggest constraint, as two types of housing are generally being developed (i.e., higher-end single-family homes and deed restricted affordable housing), with more limited opportunities to develop market rate multifamily housing. The HAP builds on the Housing Element by summarizing actions that the City will take to better diversify housing development and provides additional information and recommendations on how to facilitate desired housing development both citywide and at key priority sites.
Site includes 10 areas for potential redevelopment/revitalization as well as 10 potential redevelopment sites that could become catalytic projects for the surrounding areas. The plan is intended to be updated every five years with staff having the authority to make minor changes within the time frame when priorities are amended by the council or actions are completed.
Next Steps
Seek further direction from the leadership and city council to refine housing priorities. Establish a working group of community members to facilitate future coordination meetings for education and collaboration on action plan implementation and partnerships. This group shall include residents, stakeholders, businesses, regional partners, and members of the development community. The City will continue to align interdepartmental priorities and strategically go after funding that has a lot of co- benefits to achieve similar tasks. This includes leveraging existing funding sources, efforts, projects, and partnerships to provide incentives to new housing projects throughout the City. Like the Housing Element, the City shall provide resources on the land inventory, existing housing opportunities, funding, and supportive information on equitable housing, tenant protections, will be kept online for the public to use and/or connect with the appropriate group responsible. This includes the marketing of vacant buildings, land, and partnerships to help facilitate new housing growth in addition to supportive service for residents.
Attachment B - Shape Stockton Feedback Responses
3 NEIGHBORHOOD ACTION PLANS
Main Points
Boundaries defined and land inventory completed to highlight properties (vacant/underutilized) that could support new development.
Each plan has involved stakeholders and includes actions tailored to the neighborhoods. Includes demographics and infrastructure analysis to help understand opportunities and constraints specific to each neighborhood study area.
Continue to allow multifamily and mixed use in all residential and commercial development. A study of housing types (missing middle) was conducted with suggested building types included for vacant and underutilized sites found within the study areas.
Next Steps
• Establish working group of community members to facilitate future coordination meetings for education and collaboration on action plan implementation and future partnerships. This includes the groups that have participated in outreach as well as City departments such as planning, public works, police, code enforcement, and economic development, and regional transportation partners. • Staff will work with departments and environmental consultants to identify properties with developmental potential that may need remediation and seek resources for site cleanup. • The City has been working to align Capital Improvement Plan (CIP) projects with funding opportunities for the neighborhood areas.
• Staff is looking into zoning incentives, such as extending entitlement approval for residential development from one year to at least two years.
• A variety of resources will be placed on the City’s website to assist residents and the development community, such as location of new and pending housing units, handouts on development (ADU, additions, etc.), funding opportunities for ownership, resources for dealing with code enforcement, and links to programs for supportive services and agencies within the region (childcare, substance control, training, etc.). • Home ownership is significantly lower in the neighborhood planning areas than citywide. Staff will explore options for home ownership within the existing housing stock (rent to own, condominium, etc.) as well as new projects to encourage more home ownership within these areas.
Cabral/East Cabral Specific Points
The development code update is exploring a Transit Orient Development (TOD) zoning overlay that would allow higher densities and more flexibility around the station. The TOD overlay could also become a catalyst for more funding opportunities for housing and mixed use near the transit stop. This area will benefit from wayfinding and current street improvement projects (i.e., Miner street) that will facilitate circulation around the downtown and station area.
Little Manila/Gleason Park Specific Points
Focus on infill development that will support the existing residential and vacant buildings located in the area. Work to improve the slough, including zoning incentives to activate community serving businesses along the slough corridor.
As part of the rail relocation project, work with the Rail Commission on mobility and street improvements can be made to support the area.
Continue to apply anti-displacement policies as the area is near downtown and could be impacted by revitalization of adjacent downtown areas.
Explore more options for home ownership as the area has a higher average of renters-to-owners than other areas of the City.
Attachment B - Shape Stockton Feedback Responses
4 South AirPort Area Specific Points
With most of the surrounding area already developed, focus on infill development of the nonresidential properties along South Airport Way with high density housing, mixed use, and support services for the surrounding community (i.e., groceries, training, education, child services). Continue to work with the State and developers on reuse of the fairgrounds property.
DEVELOPMENT CODE
Main Points
Consolidated the entire document from Eight Divisions to Six Divisions to remove redundancy and consolidate the document into sections for administrative items, land use, design standards, subdivision standards, process and authority, and definitions.
Feedback from residents, the development community, and industry experts was sought in the preparation of various sections (parking, design, allowable uses).
The parking standards were overhauled and simplified to meet best practices. While more urban standards remained the same, change were made to update the City’s nonresidential and low-to-medium density residential standards.
Changes to allow more uses “by-right” or approved at a staff level that avoids public hearings. Changed to all Multi-Unit (duplex, triplex, etc.), Multifamily (apartments), and mixed use residential allowed in all residential and commercially zoned properties.
Updated many sections to include best practices for standards and processes. Updates to reflect changes in state law.
To accommodate additional streamlining and ministerial reviews, more objective zoning standards were added to provide clarity in reviews. This includes design standards, performance standards, and specific land use allowances.
Sections recently approved by the City Council (cannabis, urban ag, food trucks, warehouse, etc.) were not changed but may have been relocated to accommodate format changes. The code was structured in a way to accommodate future changes without further complicating the code or leading to additional redundancy which occurs in the current code. This was achieved by assigning specific tasks to each division (i.e., administrative, land use, standards, subdivision, process and authority, and definitions) and formatting the code to allow future additions and removal to not impact the internal consistency or force staff to make numerous changes when one topic is changed.
Change made to address recommendations made in the Housing Element and Action Plans.
Next Steps
Since some of the changes to reduce redundancy involved consolidating zoning designations (CA/CL into CG), adding a new commercial-light industrial hybrid zone, and recommendations to rezone areas to align with the community needs, future city-initiated rezones will need to occur once the development code is adopted. As mentioned in the Housing Element and Action Plans, staff is considering making City initiated code and map amendments an annual event to help maintain and improve the code as state law and industry standards evolve. This depends on staff resources but is intended to continually improve the standards on a more routine basis.
Staff will explore various changes to the General Plan that could assist in the development code becoming more effective in achieving community objectives. This includes increasing overall densities in the general plan, updating the climate action plan, and adding various zoning incentives to encourage housing production.
Attachment B - Shape Stockton Feedback Responses
5 DESIGN GUIDELINES
Updated to reflect the zoning code’s expansion of objective design standards included in Division 3. Reflects best practices and is intended to be a guide to provide details and examples of how design of the City’s built environment should occur.
Reference to the zoning code and other design regulations (i.e., engineering street standards, general plan, etc.) to provide more
AREA SPECIFIC
Channel Area Actions
The requirement for Commission Use Permit (CUP) approval for a new and reused businesses has been removed to streamline new businesses. This requirement was put into place in the 1970’s when there was no vision for the Channel or north/south shore areas of the marina. Since then, rezones and changes in the development code and refined where the community would like to see the area and therefore the CUP does not need to review every item on a case-by-case basis.
Expand by-right uses and add new sub-area to area north of the channel and west of Interstate 5. This sub-area will continue to allow light industrial uses but prohibit heavy industrial uses due to the proximity of residential uses and encourage/allow more commercial oriented businesses to undeveloped properties. Staff will continue actions to identify properties in need of remediation and locate funding to assist in the clean up to prepare sites for construction or to market a location as “shovel ready.” Downtown Actions
While a zoning overlay is not needed, the existing Commercial Downtown (CD) Zoning district will be updated to increase flexibility and restrict future CD areas to the Downtown Core as defined by the General Plan. Staff will explore further density increase per a general plan update to increase densities prescribed in the general plan.
Magnolia and Design District Actions
Staff will look to maintain the historic district and provide resources online and at the City development center for programs, potential funding, and tax benefits from reusing and maintaining historic resources. The existing zoning overlay has been simplified to remove redundancy with other sections of the development code.
Miracle Mile Actions
Added more by-right uses and performance measures to the citywide standards for business and land uses most prevalent on the Miracle Mile.
Looks to rezone parks of the mile to Commercial Neighborhood (CN) to allow more pedestrian friendly land use and less auto oriented businesses within the area.
Continue coordination meetings with the Miracle Mile Improvement District to find additional ways to streamline standards and encourage businesses and events on the mile.
COMMENTS INTENDED FOR FUTURE EFFORTS
Staff will continue to analysis and explore neighborhoods for any land use (housing or commercial) or service deficiencies (fire response, parks, etc.) to further make policy and regulation updates and align funding sources to achieve community objectives.
Attachment B - Shape Stockton Feedback Responses
6 The City is currently processing other updates such as the Parks Master Plan, Public Facilities Fee (Impact Fee) update, applying for additional Grants (REAP 2.0), and an update to the Climate Action Plan. These efforts will specifically address other comments raised as part of the Shape Stockton efforts and could even result in further changes to the General Plan and Development Code to improve their implementation.