HomeMy WebLinkAbout02-08-25 Public Comment - J. DiMarco - AHO commentsFrom:jerrydimarco@mail.com
To:Bozeman Public Comment
Subject:[EXTERNAL]AHO comments
Date:Saturday, February 8, 2025 4:21:53 PM
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I would like to submit the following comments and suggestions about the Affordable
Housing Ordinance.
pg 2, 3. Allowing more housing on a lot, and denser development in neighborhoods or zoning
districts increases property values in the entire neighborhood or district. This affects the costof housing more, and is a bigger factor in Bozeman's affordability problem.
pg 3, 6. How many of these dwelling types are actually considered desirable livingarrangements by families living here or wanting to live here?
pg 3, 9. Cutting regulations can increase hazards which could lead to damage or destruction ofhomes and expensive repair or replacement costs. Lowering standards decreases quality of
life. How do costs due to regulations compare to the increased cost of land caused by higherdensity development?
pg 3, 11. Most of these incentives negatively impact quality of life, or substantially increaseland valuations in an entire district. These factors have been ignored in the affordable housing
debate. It is time to stop this process and reassess the affordability problem in light of thisoversight. Otherwise we may end up institutionalizing the gentrification that is happening.
pg 4, 15. Does welfare include not having to keep moving until you find a suitable livingarrangement?
Is public safety and quality of life being sacrificed as you reduce regulations or downsizestandards?
16. What do these terms mean? Many of these terms are undefined, and therefore do weknow what type of development they will lead to? How will future commissioners and
planners interpret them?
pg 7, C. typo in 1st sentence, there are only 2 tables.
F. This paragraph needs clarification. How far apart can the other site or parcel be? How often are single developments on different parcels? How will you ensure that all
amenities will be available to all units?
pg 10, C. Why was the wording changed from “may” to "shall"? Why is discretion not
allowed?
D. Why is the city attorney allowed to make the determination about which other
documents are acceptable? Isn't there a case law about this?
Pg 11, Sec. 38.380.040. - Incentives. 4 additional stories are excessive. 4 stories should be the
maximum outside downtown and Commercial Areas. 1 parking space per unit should be theminimum for all multi household and mixed use buildings. The standard should be that every
unit should have at least the amount of parking as is the norm for family vehicle ownership.
pg 11, C. Some of the minimum lot sizes are unacceptably small and possibly unsafe. If a
house is on fire, how far away does it have to be from an adjacent house to not ignite it? Ifone row house catches on fire, how many other houses could burn down?
pg 12, 2 If you're not going to require sufficient parking, then multi-household and mixed-usebuildings should only be allowed on streets that can accommodate two lanes of traffic in
winter with parking on both sides.
Where are residents going to park if the city requires no street parking for snow or
vegetation removal? What if they are away or forget to move their vehicle and get a ticket? What if there are vandals or thieves walking the streets in their neighborhood at night? What
if their car needs repair and they can't take care of it right away? What if residents share theirhome with relatives or friends or college students who also have cars? You should not depend
on people not owning vehicles, because most people want and/or need to have their owntransportation.
I still think the only acceptable parking arrangement for multi-household and mixed-usebuildings is at least 1 space per living unit, so off street parking can be used for visitors. It
makes the most sense to incorporate the parking space into the lowest floor of the building,and include storage spaces for each unit.
3a. As you expand acceptable parking up to 1000 ft away, are you thinking aboutdisabled people, senior citizens and children, especially in winter? As the number of multi-
household buildings increase in a neighborhood, all their expanded 1000 ft parking areas willoverlap. How will that work out?
pg 15, 3. You did not provide information about how high buildings will be in the variouszoning districts. There are also more districts in the ordinance than are shown on the handouts
you gave us at the meetings. We should have been given the choice about what buildingheights are appropriate. It should have been in the survey.
More stories of height and more units per building will dramatically increase traffic. Therefore, tall buildings should not be in neighborhoods. They should be located only near
major roads. Their height should be limited to what citizens of Bozeman decide.
The downtown does not need support, it is doing just fine. The downtown does not need to
grow. I have not seen any proof of this, only unsupported statements. Several articles I'veread by planners and planning organizations about rejuvenating or helping downtowns to
thrive, do not mention growing downtowns up or out. Besides, the Commercial Areasidentified in the Growth Plan should function as other downtowns so we avoid the New York
City effect, referring to the traffic jams and skyscrapers. We don't need any buildings tallerthan the hotels downtown. 100 ft is plenty of height.
It appears that you are opening the golden gate to the global investment community (as
defined by Patrick Condon, prof. in School of Architecture at Univ. of BC). They havealready pushed housing costs out of reach. The increased density and building height allowed
in this ordinance will ensure the continuation of this trend.
In exchange for providing some low quality of life affordable housing, developers will get
what they want – the ability to build whatever they want, wherever they want, any time theywant. Just as that ability led to the sprawl we have in the county, this ability will lead to
another kind of sprawl – the sprawl of big buildings into neighborhoods. Neighborhoodcharacter will not be preserved.
This ordinance may produce some low quality of life affordable housing, but unfortunatelythat will be the only type of affordable housing we get from this day forward. Our city
government was asked to preserve existing affordable housing but they failed. It went awaywhen our residential districts were upzoned. In fact, the formerly affordable housing, and
really all single-family housing, will likely be demolished in the future and replaced with bigbox housing. What kind of community and quality of life will we have then?
The retirement plan of the future will be to buy a single family home if you can, then whenit’s time to move on, sell to a developer or increase density yourself and make a killing. This
works because most of the developer’s profit comes from the increase in land value.
I asked Prof. Condon whether it was better to reject the global investment community,
because they will also make everything else expensive. So it will still cost a lot to livehere. Rejecting them would reduce the number of dollars chasing after homes, which should
result in lower costs for land and housing. He thought that would likely be optimal "frommany perspectives", but did not think the political will was there.
The Better Bozeman Coalition has papers at its website debunking the myths about theeffect of zoning on the cost of housing, and about the effect of density on affordability. Prof.
Condon's talk from last year is posted on their website too. I recommend viewing them if youhaven't already.
Density and height are not the solution to the affordability and quality of life problems. Weneed to stop this process and go back to the drawing board. Quality-of-life issues must be
integrated into the ordinance. We also need to address the demand side of the problem and getrid of the excess dollars chasing after homes. We saw the effect of demand during the
pandemic, which produced some of the steepest increases in housing costs ever. We must cutinvestors out of the housing market, and let only full-time residents purchase homes or rent
apartments. If we can accomplish that, more families should be able to afford comfortablehomes with garages on a lot where kids can play. We won't get to affordable until Bozeman
can provide that for all families who want to live here.
Thank you for your time,
Jerry DiMarco
Bozeman