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Document: Draft Housing Element Update 2022-2030

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Though they praised their consultant’s work, Crescent City Mayor Pro Tem Blake Inscore said the 6th Cycle Housing Element — and previous housing elements — fell short on addressing emergency shelters and where they can be built.

Under the California Health and Safety Code, emergency shelters provide temporary housing for those who are homeless for a period of six months or less. In Crescent City, these facilities are allowed without a permit within the public facility zone, which consists of the Del Norte County Fairgrounds, the Crescent City Police Department, the Crescent City Fire Hall and Crescent City Hall.

“None of these properties, with the exception of possibly the back part of the lot at the police department and possibly the parking lot at the fire hall, really lend themselves to any kind of meaningful use for emergency shelters,” Inscore told his colleagues on Monday. “I wasn’t happy when we did that the first time and I’m still not happy. I think it’s a cop-out on a responsibility that we have as part of our Housing Element.”

Councilors weighed in on the city’s updated plan for housing as part of a 30-day public comment period that ends Dec. 16. The 6th Cycle Housing Element is expected to go before the city Planning Commission for comment on Thursday. People can also view a draft report on the 6th Cycle Housing Element and take part in a survey by visiting the city’s website.

The 6th Cycle Housing Element is part of Crescent City’s general plan and establishes goals, objectives and policies to create “sustainable, mixed-income neighborhoods across the city,” according to a Nov. 14 news release.

Crescent City will need to provide space for 189 housing units through 2030, according to Bob Brown of SHN Consulting, who is acting as the city’s planning director. That’s more than double the housing units the city needed to provided space for in its 5th Cycle Housing Element, he told councilors.

“In the 5th Cycle Housing Element, the city was responsible for providing space for 77 housing units,” he said. “The number jumped quite a lot.”

Following the public comment period, the city will submit its updated Housing Element to the California Department of Housing and Community Development. It could take up to 60 days for HCD staff to provide input on the plan and the city would respond to the requested changes, according to Brown.

Emergency shelters are addressed in Chapter 8 of the city’s Housing Element, which focuses on development constraints, including the role that zoning plays. Under state law, cities must identify a zone where emergency shelters can be constructed without a conditional use permit or other discretionary permit. There must be land available to accommodate such a facility.

According to the 6th Cycle Housing Element draft, officials considered the public facility zone appropriate because it’s near county mental health and social services, food, healthcare and transportation services. An emergency homeless shelter was at the Del Norte County Fairgrounds in the past.

“The city is interested in and willing to partner with agencies or homeless service providers to develop shelters on these sites,” the Housing Element states. “The sites owned by the City could be sold or leased without hearings or any other discretionary process. Other existing principally permitted uses in the PF zone include auditoriums, public fairgrounds and related uses, hospitals and similar uses.”

The Housing Element also indicates that the city would be willing to add parcels to the public facilities zone or identify a second zoning district or create an overlay district if homeless needs increase in the future.

Even though the Del Norte County Fairgrounds once housed an emergency shelter, Inscore said he didn’t think local fair board directors or state officials would consider that property a viable site for another one.

“We’re not going to move out of City Hall, we’re not going to move out of the police department and we’re not going to move out of the fire hall,” he said. “A place where a permanent emergency shelter could be constructed and built right now as a primary permitted use is the fairgrounds, which that’s not going to happen.”

Inscore added that the 6th Cycle Housing Element didn’t include Del Norte Mission Possible as a major service provider for those who are unhoused. It also failed to name the Legacy, formerly the Coastal Inn & Suites, which was purchased by Del Norte County as a transitional housing program in 2020, he said.

Inscore’s concerns prompted his colleague, Councilor Raymond Altman, to ask about the definition of an emergency shelter and the role an area’s population plays and space plays in the requirement that a jurisdiction allows them to be principally permitted in certain areas.

“Are you talking about when it gets really cold, like right now, where people can get temporary shelter from the cold? Are you going to have a permanent emergency facility that’s empty all the time ‘cause there’s no emergency?” Altman asked. “We’re just a small city. Are we providing services that, necessarily, may be getting too big for our britches even when we’re discussing the Housing Element? It sounds more like a county thing to me because the county’s so much more larger — to provide some sort of rescue-type shelter like you suggested. I don’t know that emergency is the right word.”

Crescent City Mayor Isaiah Wright and Councilor Jason Greenough agreed with Inscore that the city needs to consider other areas where emergency shelters could be principally permitted besides the public facility zoning area. Greenough said he felt the designation of the public facility zoning area was “a box that needed to be checked.”

Though he acknowledged that it wouldn’t be easy, Inscore suggested that he and his colleagues look at a list of parcels available to be developed and discuss expanding the zones where an emergency shelter could be principally located.

“I have always felt like we did something that we knew we would never have to actually have,” he said. “This feels like a not-in-my-backyard policy and I don’t like that. I think that sends a terrible message to the community that if the city does it, they should think the same way.”

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