Thumbnail image courtesy of City of Crescent City
DANCO Communities President Chris Dart said his company is trying to alleviate parking concerns associated with the 36-unit residential development that is expected to replace the old Daly’s building in Downtown Crescent City.
Dart noted that Community System Solutions had already done a lot of design work on The Redwood Downtown. It will now be up to Crescent City 3rd Street LP, a DANCO Communities limited partnership, to move the project forward.
The new developers will be open to “any changes that make sense,” Dart said, including parking.
“I understand parking is a concern and we have been exploring how we can solve that,” he said, “either by reducing the building size and adding parking on site or potentially connecting up with another adjacent or vacant lot close by.”
Three members of the City Council on Monday approved the project transfer.
That transfer includes replacing CSS with DANCO in agreements to loan just over $1 million state Permanent Local Housing Allocation (PLHA) and Prohousing Incentive Program (PIP) dollars. It would also apply to an additional $650,000 in PIP funds if Crescent City’s March 2 application to the California Department of Housing and Community Development is successful.
Mayor Isaiah Wright and Councilor Jason Greenough were absent on Monday.
Community System Solutions, a nonprofit organization that works with local communities to pursue funding and development opportunities, entered into escrow with DANCO on the sale of the former Daly’s department store building on April 28, CEO Mike Bahr told Redwood Voice Community News.
“They’ve got capacity and money to be able to take that project and move it forward,” Bahr said of The Redwood Downtown. “And then that frees up our team.”
In addition to being impressed with DANCO’s work on Harbor Pointe Apartments, a 26-unit senior housing development on H Street in Crescent City, Bahr said they’re able to work much faster than CSS when it comes to getting The Redwood Downtown online.
CSS had considered going after federal HOME Investment funding, but the application process takes a year, Bahr said. If CSS was unsuccessful, it would have to go through the application process again.
“For us it’s delivering to the community that end product that people can use, not who’s going to build it,” he said.
Currently, The Redwood Downtown is a mixed-use development project that will be built at 3rd and J streets, which is within the city’s downtown business district. It will consist of two three-story buildings. The first will offer ground floor retail space and two-stories of residential units. The second building will be devoted to housing.
On March 12, the Planning Commission approved the project’s site plan. At that meeting SHN consultant Ethan Lawton explained the California State Density Bonus Law and what that means for The Redwood Downtown.
Since The Redwood Downtown is considered 100% affordable — 29 out of the project’s 36 units will be offered to households that make between 50-80% of the area median income — it complies with the State Density Bonus Law requirements, according to Lawton.
The State Density Bonus Law allows The Redwood Downtown to exceed height limitations as well offer additional residential units than the local zoning designation allows. Since The Redwood Downtown will be within a mile and a half of a major transit stop, it also doesn’t have to comply with local parking requirements, Lawton told commissioners.
As a result, CSS’s site plan called for two off-street parking spaces instead of the 44 off-street spaces local laws require — a component of the project that irked several community members.
On Monday, Wier told the City Council that Dart and his colleagues at DANCO had been meeting with Don Arambula, a consultant with Crandall Arambula who has been helping the city put together a masterplan for revitalizing its downtown. Since introducing councilors to The Redwood Downtown in December, Wier has stated incorporating residential units into the downtown is a key component to creating a thriving economy.
Two public commenters — Doug Dye and Jodi Mangum — were concerned about the project’s location within the tsunami inundation zone. Dye, who lives within the county, mentioned a creek in the area that ends in a marshy area between 3rd and 4th streets.
Dye, evoking memories of the 1964 Good Friday Earthquake and Tsunami, said he also had concerns regarding the State Density Bonus Law and wondered if Crescent City was overlooking California Building Standard Codes to further The Redwood Downtown.
On Thursday, Wier told Redwood Voice Community News that there had been a ravine that funneled water through the area. However, it’s not up to the Planning Commission to decide what the developer needs to do to address those issues. Crescent City 3rd Street LP will address whether the project meets seismic and building code standards when they seek a building permit, Wier said.
“There will be some additional work that will need to be done,” the city manager said, adding that the old Daly’s structure is anchored into the soil with building piles. “It’s not anything that can’t be overcome and the developer is fully aware.”
DANCO Communities and CSS are still going through the escrow process for the transfer of the property, Wier said Thursday. Once that’s finished DANCO will continue to explore potential parking options as well as what’s needed to meet grant requirements, he said.
