San Jose Inclusionary Zoning

Update (July 2008): The San Jose City Council approved, by a 6-4 vote, to accept the report by the Consultant that was hired to study the feasibility of an Inclusionary Zoning policy in San Jose. The report outlined a favorable view on inclusionary zoning, but the report is seen by many as flawed.

San Jose District 4 representative, Sam Liccardo, has proposed extending the 20% inclusionary zoning mandate that currently exists in the redevelopment area of San Jose to city wide. This policy, if adopted, will have a detrimental impact on housing in the future.

Councilmember Liccardo is hoping that a city wide inclusionary zoning policy would spur the growth of affordable housing. The error in the logic is that homes produced under inclusionary zoning are only open to the lower end of the income spectrum. Currently, the low and high end of the income spectrum can afford to buy a house. Market rate housing is priced so high, that a minimum income of $140,000 is needed to afford an entry level home. The gap between market rate homes and subsidized homes is called workforce housing. The type of housing that is often left ignored is workforce housing.

When the CEO's of the biggest companies in the valley were asked for the one thing that will help attract the best and the brightest to their companies, they all answered in unison, housing. The housing they are talking about is workforce housing.

Often is the case that the group that is left out of buying a home are those who earn too much for a subsidized home and too little for a market rate home. By relaxing constraints on building, developers can produce the housing to reach the demand, thus bringing down the market rate of homes to the level that the valley's workforce can afford.