City Council to Vote on New Proposal for Lake Merritt Site

OAKLAND, CA: The Oakland City Council will vote on March 15 on a new proposal to build housing on a city-owned parcel of land near Lake Merritt that previously had been slated for a controversial luxury apartment complex, city officials said today.

City staff members recommended the new team of UrbanCore Development and the East Bay Asian Local Development Corporation, an affordable housing developer, this week after the council's Community and Economic Development Committee heard presentations on Monday by that team and two other development groups. Last June 16, after several lengthy meetings, including one that was shot down by protesters who opposed the project, the City Council voted to give preliminary approval for UrbanCore to construct a 24-story apartment tower with about 2,000 square feet of ground-level retail space at the site at the corner of East 12th Street and Second Avenue.

But the city scrapped the deal last July after the East Bay Express published what it said was a leaked confidential memo that City Attorney Barbara Parker had written earlier last year saying that the sale likely would violate a state law that requires cities to first offer public land to affordable housing developers before offering it to private developers such as UrbanCore.

City officials said the UrbanCore/EBALDC team was selected for consideration because its 360-unit proposal seeks to maximize housing on the site and calls for 30 percent of the units to be offered at below-market rates for households earning from 30 percent to 120 percent of the area's median income.

City officials said the mixed-income proposal minimizes the amount of the subsidy the city would be required to pay to produce the affordable units and also provides the highest number of family-sized units as well as a $4 million payment to the city and ongoing property and business tax revenue to fund city services. The city said another factor is the potential UrbanCore/EBALDC has to accelerate its funding and development schedule so it can quickly create much-needed new housing in Oakland.

By Bay City News

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