The San Francisco Redevelopment Agency has developed this summary of answers
to frequently asked questions about the proposed Amendment to the South of
Market Redevelopment Plan, based on community meetings and over five years of
discussions with the elected Project Area Committee (PAC). The PAC has endorsed the Plan Amendment,
which is now scheduled for consideration by the Redevelopment Commission,
Planning Department and Board of Supervisors, beginning in Fall 2005. If you would like further information,
please call the Agency at (415)749-2400.
Q: What is the purpose of the South of Market Redevelopment Plan Amendment?
A: The Plan Amendment would enhance the revitalization program for
the South of Market (SOM) Project Area,
especially along the Sixth Street Corridor.
The existing SOM Earthquake Recovery Redevelopment Plan was adopted to
address damage from the Loma Prieta Earthquake and to provide economic
assistance to neighborhood-serving businesses and related establishments. The Plan Amendment would include but not be
limited to the following key actions:
· Increase the scope of
redevelopment activities to address a range of blighting conditions in the
area.
· Adopt new
redevelopment goals and objectives developed by the PAC.
· Expand the boundary of
the original Project Area to include the area around Bessie Carmichael School.
· Authorize Owner
Participation Agreements and the ability of the Agency to acquire certain
limited kinds of blighted properties through eminent domain, if owners are
unwilling to address the blight themselves or negotiate a fair market value
sale.
· Extend the Agency’s
ability to incur and repay debt by an additional ten years and
increase the aggregate amount of tax increment that the Agency may use.
Q: What area does the
Redevelopment Plan include?
A: The South of Market Redevelopment Project Area
includes most of the area between Stevenson and Harrison Streets, Fifth
and Seventh Streets.
Q: What is the process
for approving the Redevelopment Plan Amendment?
A: After the Agency
Commission has approved the Plan Amendment, and the Planning Commission has
found the Plan Amendment consistent with the City’s General Plan, the Board of
Supervisors will review the Plan Amendment at a public hearing and consider its
approval. Consideration by the Agency
Commission and the Planning Commission is currently scheduled for April 2004,
with Board consideration taking place approximately 30 days thereafter.
Q: What is blight?
A: Under
state law, the Agency may only undertake redevelopment activities in areas with
significant blight. The SOM Project Area is characterized by eight of the
nine categories of physical and economic conditions that are considered blight by the
California Community Redevelopment Law (CRL).
These blighting conditions, as well as the proposed methods of
alleviating them, are documented in the Preliminary Report on the Plan
Amendment prepared by the Agency. The
eight applicable conditions of blight are as follows:
1. Buildings in
which it is unsafe or unhealthy for persons to live or work –
including a substantial number of deteriorated buildings.
2. Factors
that prevent or substantially hinder the economically viable use or capacity of
buildings or lots – including old, deteriorated and obsolescent
buildings; earthquake hazards and poor soil conditions; the presence of
underutilized properties and trash; and deteriorated and substandard public
improvements.
3. Adjacent
or nearby uses that are incompatible with each other –
including
adult-oriented uses adjacent to residences.
4. Impaired
investments – including the poor economic performance of retail
businesses.
5. Economic
indicators of distressed buildings or lots – including high
commercial vacancies, low commercial lease rates, and underutilized areas and
vacant lots.
6. Lack of
neighborhood serving commercial facilities – including
facilities such as supermarkets, pharmacies and banks.
7. Residential
overcrowding or problem businesses – including overcrowding in
more than a quarter of the residential units in the proposed Project Area,
which is twice the rate of overcrowded units as in the City as a whole, and an
excess of bars, liquor stores and other adult-oriented uses.
8.
High crime rate – including six times the
criminal activity per capita compared to the City as a whole.
Q: Why is the Plan Amendment necessary to eliminate blight in
the SOM Project Area?
A: Although there has been ongoing Agency-assisted development
and private investment in the Project Area, conditions of blight remain and
indicate a need for greater redevelopment activity to fully revitalize the
area. The physical and economic
conditions of blight in the Project Area are so prevalent that they cannot
reasonably be expected to be reversed without redevelopment, and as such, have
become a burden on the community that cannot be reversed or alleviated without
the assistance of the Agency through the authority of the CRL. The heavy prevalence of blight has
significantly deterred investment and improvement of the Project Area.
Q: What redevelopment
activities are proposed and how will they alleviate blight in the SOM Project
Area?
A: The Agency’s primary strategy for
addressing blight in the Project Area is to improve and preserve affordable
housing, thereby improving conditions without displacing residents. Complementing this core strategy, a variety
of other programs serve to enhance both the growing residential neighborhood
and the overall area. These programs
include economic development, streetscape improvements and sidewalk cleaning,
and assistance to community service and cultural organizations.
Pursuant to this strategy, the
Agency’s program includes the following:
Owner Participation and SRO Rehabilitation Loans: Invite
owners of residential hotels to participate in rehabilitating their properties
to meet basic life-safety and other building standards. Encourage participation
through low or no interest loans, forgivable in exchange for extending
affordability. SRO owners repeatedly in
violation of applicable laws, codes and ordinances and unwilling to participate
could be required to sell their properties to the Agency at fair market value.
Acquisition for the rehabilitation and new construction of
affordable housing: Acquire strategic SRO’s or other blighted
properties on Sixth Street for rehabilitation or new construction of affordable
housing.
Economic
Development: Provide grants and loans for business improvements, tenant
improvements, and façade improvements through programs like Six on Sixth. Support business incubator programs, entrepreneurship
training, job training and job placement programs.
Infrastructure
Improvements. In
conjunction with the Department of Public Works, complete installation of new
sidewalks corner bulb-outs, new street paving, street trees and historic light
poles.
Q: What is eminent domain?
A: Eminent domain is a process by which a public agency
may compel the sale of property in return for the payment to the owner of the
property’s fair market value, if such acquisition is necessary to advance a
public purpose and the public agency is not able to reach agreement on the
terms of acquisition with the property owner.
The Agency has exercised this power only once in the last twenty
years.
The Plan Amendment would authorize the Agency to acquire
certain properties in the Project Area through eminent domain only after the
Agency exhausts all legally-required processes to negotiate with a property
owner, which include giving the owner the opportunity to correct blighting
conditions on the property and to participate in and benefit from its
redevelopment. If negotiations with the
property owner prove unsuccessful, the Agency will seek the advice of the
PAC. The Redevelopment Agency
Commission must approve the use of eminent domain for any specific
property.
Q: Which properties could be subject to eminent
domain?
A: The Plan Amendment strictly limits the Agency’s potential
use of eminent domain to the following types of properties:
1. The
property contains a Single-Room Occupancy hotel that has been cited repeatedly
for violations of applicable laws, codes and ordinances.
2. The
property contains an un-reinforced masonry building that has not been
seismically retrofitted by the date required by City ordinance.
3. The
property contains uses that have led to recurrent problems of public safety and
welfare.
4. The
property contains a building in which it is unsafe or unhealthy for persons to
live or work as determined by the Department of Building Inspection (DBI),
after failure to comply with an order of abatement. (The Agency, however, shall not use eminent domain to acquire
owner-occupied single unit buildings made unsafe or unhealthy solely as the
result of future earthquakes, and shall not acquire any owner-occupied single
unit building under this Section 4.3.2(4) unless DBI has prohibited the use of
the building).
5. The
property is located on Sixth Street and is vacant or significantly
underutilized or used as a surface parking lot.
6. The
property is located on Sixth Street and exhibits one or more conditions of
blight as defined by the CRL. (See
“What is blight?” section above.)
Q: What is an Owner Participation Agreement?
A: An Owner Participation Agreement (OPA) is an
agreement between the Agency and a property owner in which the owner agrees to
redevelop or rehabilitate the property.
It lays out the basic development program and concept, a performance
schedule for design and construction, intended financing and other customary
elements of the development process.
The OPA is developed in accordance with the Agency’s Owner Participation
Rules, which establish the procedures by which property owners are assured the
opportunity to redevelop their properties.
Pursuant to the South of Market Redevelopment Plan Amendment, only the
owners of properties that could be subject to eminent domain (see proceeding
section) would be invited to enter an Owner Participation Agreement.
Q: What is tax increment financing?
A: Tax increment financing is a method of funding the
Agency’s investments in a redevelopment area by recapturing, for a time, all or
a portion of the “tax increment” in the area, that is, the increased tax
revenue that may result if the redevelopment stimulates private
investment. Property tax increment
revenues are the result of the rise in property values, not an increase in tax
rates.
Q: Will my property taxes increase after the Plan Amendment
is adopted?
A: No. The Redevelopment Agency has no power to set tax
rates or levy property taxes. Property
taxes on properties within a project area are governed by the same laws as
properties outside redevelopment project areas.
Q: Does being in a redevelopment project area affect my
property value?
A: Generally, when redevelopment activities are
successful, the property values within and around the project area increase
over time due to the rehabilitation and new construction of buildings. Redevelopment activities enhance the
marketability of properties in the area by correcting blighting conditions and
improving the area’s image and economic base.
Q: Will the Plan Amendment replace the Planning
Code?
A: The Redevelopment Plan and Plan Amendment maintain the existing
Planning Code and provide for the Planning Department to continue to administer
land use and zoning controls of private development in the Project Area.
Q: How has the Redevelopment Agency involved the public in the
Plan Amendment process?
A: Since 1997, Agency staff has worked with the PAC and the
wider community to increase the effectiveness of redevelopment activities by
amending the existing Redevelopment Plan. Extensive meetings with the PAC and
its committees, together with wider community meetings, have reviewed and
refined the proposed program and carefully crafted the documents implementing
it. Quarterly newsletters have kept the
South of Market community informed of these meetings and encouraged public
participation. On April
21, 2003, the PAC endorsed the Plan Amendment.
Q: Whom may I contact for more information on the
Plan Amendment?
A: If you have questions or comments, please call Mike Grisso,
Project Manager, at (415) 749-2400.
PAC
Office: 1035 Folsom Street
San Francisco, CA 94103
(415) 487-2166
http://www.sompac.com/