San Diego Unified’s sweeping affordable housing plans take shape, as details emerge of 5 projects

The San Diego Unified school board is set to vote Wednesday on whether to move forward on five affordable-housing proposals that would bring nearly 1,500 homes to district property — its biggest move yet in a yearslong strategy to help its workforce and generate revenue.

But both the selection process and the proposals chosen have drawn some concerns from the public, including about who could and couldn’t live there, particularly at the largest site.

By far the most ambitious project would be built at the site of current district headquarters, the Eugene Brucker Education Center on Normal Street at the edge of Hillcrest and University Heights.

The proposal recommended by district staff, from developer Affirmed Housing, would see the development of 952 units — all of them rent-restricted for people who make between 30% and 100% of area median income, and most of them studios and one-bedrooms.

That project would also involve permanent improvements for a drop-off and pickup area at nearby Birney Elementary, plus building improvements like a preschool, school board documents show.

And it’s expected to net the district nearly $300 million in rent revenue over the ground lease’s 99-year term.

District staff recommended the proposal over three competing ones, including one that would have built substantially more rent-restricted homes, but for tenants with higher incomes.

Two of the other sites where San Diego Unified wants housing — the Revere Center in Linda Vista and the Fremont/Ballard Center in Old Town — also drew four competing proposals each. A site in Barrio Logan drew just two, and another Linda Vista site only one.

The recommended proposal for the Revere Center site would see developer Decro build 220 units, all restricted to people making 30% to 80% of AMI, plus a child care center and outdoor play area. It would also bring the district $134 million in ground rent revenue over its 99-year lease.

The project picked for the Fremont/Ballard site, from Bridge Housing, would add 140 homes — mostly two- and three-bedrooms — for tenants with 40% to 70% of AMI. It too would have a child care center, along with a district facility, and it would bring $10.7 million in ground rent revenue over 95 years.

At the Instructional Media Center in Linda Vista, developer Decro proposed 107 rent-restricted apartments, for nearly $52 million in ground rent. And in Barrio Logan, the same developer would build 87 such units, a child care area and an outdoor play area, and pay $11 million in ground rent.

Because those last two sites drew so little developer interest, the district’s consultant, LeSar Development Consultants, recommended interviewing Decro to confirm its vision and capacity for developing both sites.

It also recommended interviews with all the top-ranked developers, and asking each for a best and final offer “to ensure the most competitive and aligned proposals are considered for selection,” it said in a memo.

Enrique Ruacho, the district’s chief of staff, said that after Wednesday’s vote, the projects will be vetted to ensure they’re feasible — and fully aligned with guidelines the school board set earlier this year.

In March, the board signed off on a sweeping plan for affordable housing, including the plan to explore development at the five sites, as well as a set of guiding principles that lay out top priorities for any housing to be built.

“Maximizing the number of affordable units is the highest priority,” the guidelines said. They also called for housing “responsive to the needs of employees with TK-12th grade student dependents.”

Those declarations came after concerns were raised about prioritizing maximizing affordability rather than the number of affordable homes, along with fears that some of the income restrictions could put the housing out of reach for many district employees.

But based on board documents shared ahead of Wednesday’s meeting, district staff did not recommend the projects with the most affordable units. Of the four competitive projects, all of the proposals staff recommended were those with the highest percentage — not the highest number — of affordable units.

Similarly, the proposal recommended for the Eugene Brucker site raised concerns over whether it fits the guidelines’ focus on housing employees with children. Two-thirds of the units proposed there are studios or one-bedrooms, with fewer large apartments that can comfortably house families.

The district did not immediately respond to questions about those concerns and how the projects aligned with the guidelines.

To Marc Johnson, a neighbor who co-chairs Community Coalition of University Heights and served on the school district’s evaluation committee, the proposal chosen for Eugene Brucker was the least bad of four options.

“There’s a lot of crowding going on,” he said. “There’s not enough space.”

He pointed out that it has a lot of studio and one-bedroom apartments, when the district employees they surveyed had said they needed two- and three-bedrooms.

He said there’s a lot to like about the proposal but wants changes — including more open space and lower building heights near residential neighborhoods.

“The mass and scale is not quite right for the site,” he said.

Wesley Morgan, a University Heights resident and the treasurer of YIMBY Democrats of San Diego, was similarly disappointed — but for the opposite reason.

He noted that the scale of the recommended project has lower height limits than other proposals for the site, and that the surrounding area already has tall buildings. And he said he felt the district had scaled back its plans in spite of comments it was getting in recent months.

To Morgan, it looks like the committee was “afraid of picking the highest-density version.”

Jimmy Silverwood, president of Affirmed, said Tuesday evening that he felt his team’s proposal for Eugene Brucker had taken a balanced approach, and that its effort to maximize density meant a trade-off in being unable to include units with more bedrooms.

But he stressed that they were still in a conceptual phase.

“If we are selected, we would work with the district on potential revisions, depending on what the board wants to see,” he said.