The Mayor and Commission referred this item to the Finance and Citywide Projects Committee (FCWPC) at its May 8, 2019 meeting. Commissioner John Elizabeth Aleman was the item’s original sponsor. Commissioner Arriola is the item’s current sponsor. The Committee requested that the item return to further explore the impact of the parking reduction being requested.

The Housing Authority of the City of Miami Beach has several lots in North Beach that it plans to develop to create workforce and affordable housing units. These properties are located at:

• 1144 Marseille Drive (22 units projected)

• 165 - 185 South Shore Drive (40 units projected)

• 280 – 330 South Shore Drive (50 units projected)

   

  On August 20, 2019, the HACMB’s Board of Commissioners selected the Housing Trust Group, LLC as a development partner for the HACMB’s North Beach properties. Since August 26, 2019, HACMB has submitted various funding applications to the Florida Housing Finance Corporation (FHFC) for the development of up to 94 units of workforce housing at its North Beach sites but was not awarded funds. 

  On December 17, 2019, the Housing Trust Group and the HACMB submitted a funding application to FHFC for 4% Low Income Housing Tax Credits (LIHTC) and State Apartment Incentive Loan (SAIL) to develop 118 units of elderly housing at 165-185 and 280-330 South Shore Drive, and 1144 Marseille Drive.  The city provided several affidavits in support of the Housing Authority’s application. The FHFC anticipates making final funding recommendations in February 2020. The HACMB and the Housing Trust Group expect to continue to submit funding applications to the FHFC for the development of its vacant land properties in the coming months.

  Affordable housing projects typically serve people earning up to 80% area median income (AMI) with the majority of funding to serve households earning up to 60% AMI. The chart below indicates the Area Median Income for our area:

Increasing affordable housing options is a key element of the 2019 Strategic Plan: Through the Lens of Resilience and its importance is echoed in the Greater Miami and the Beaches Resilient 305 strategy as Objective 5, Action 18. The Housing Authority has advised of its intention to build the projects to LEED Gold certification and will include the resilience features required by the city.

At the January FERC meeting, several issues were specifically addressed:

1. The request from HACMB for a reduction of parking requirements should the agency proceed to develop multi-family, workforce housing. (HACMB has withdrawn this request.);
2. The Committee’s request that HACMB conduct an analysis to determine whether it would be worthwhile to sell the lots on South Shore Drive and use the proceeds of the sale to acquire units closer to mass transit, thereby promoting public transportation for tenants and reducing parking need; and
3.  The request from HACMB to waive or reduce city development fees to reduce the overall cost of developing these sites as either workforce or affordable housing for elderly persons.

HACMB has announced that it will convene a workshop of its board on February 25, 2020 to consider the possibility of selling the North Beach lots and subsequently acquire other properties as discussed at the January FERC meeting. HACMB provided the analysis below that projects that such an action would result in far fewer units than anticipated through the development of the sites with new construction:

Furthermore, the analysis does not factor tenant relocation costs mandated under the Uniform Relocation Assistance and Real Property Acquisition Policies Act (URA), which requires tenants be paid gap funding for their relocation for up to 48 months. Furthermore, any building that can be purchased at an affordable price is most likely already naturally occurring affordable housing (NOAH) and would eliminate these units from the market resulting in a net gain of zero new affordable housing units in the city’s housing stock.

As reasserted at the January 13^th meeting, HACMB requested the city consider the reduction of development fees for its proposed affordable and workforce projects. At the meeting, the Committee requested an estimated value of these development fees. Below is a chart delineating the estimated permit and development fee costs based on the current proposed development budget:

Construction permit plans are reviewed an average of four times before the plans are consistent with all applicable codes and in a form that can be approved by regulatory departments and agencies.  Additionally, each discipline conducts several inspections throughout the building process to ensure consistency between approved plans and actual construction.  Due to the extensive city resources required to review construction plans, the Administration does not recommend reducing Planning, Fire, Public Works and Building Department permit fees. Regarding the building permits specifically, although the City Commission may reduce specific City fees pursuant to its authority to establish a City fee schedule under Chapter 14 of the City Code, Florida law establishes that state and county surcharges cannot be waived.

As discussed in the January 13^th meeting, the City Commission created an incentive area that reduces the mobility fees for all projects north of 63^rd Street by 62.5% through 2022 and on a sliding scale through 2025. This discount would apply to this project. Additionally, the standard mobility fees for workforce and affordable housing are 50% and 25% respectively of the total fee required for market rate units.  With the reductions currently provided, a 112-unit affordable housing development in North Beach would pay $15,918 in mobility fees if fees were paid prior to August 31, 2022.  The project would also pay approximately $54,460 in parks concurrency mitigation fees.  If the City Commission sought to further reduce concurrency mitigation and mobility fees, legislative action would be required, and the Administration would recommend making this reduction available for all affordable housing developments.

In addition to these reductions, the Planning Department is generally supportive of reducing the parking requirement for the 112-unit project currently proposed across all the HACMB-owned North Beach sites; however, existing reductions for workforce and affordable housing and alternative modes of transportation may be sufficient to enable the development to proceed. The code currently has no parking requirement for affordable housing for elderly residents and a requirement of 0.5 spaces per unit for affordable housing for non-elderly residents.  Reductions of up to 50% of the requirement are available through participation in the Alternative Parking Incentives Program, by providing mobility infrastructure such as short/long-term bicycle parking, ride-share drop-offs, carpool/vanpool spaces, motorcycle/scooter parking, etc.

The Administration supports the reduction in the mobility fees for the HACMB projects in North Beach as well as a reduction in the training and technology fees associated with the Planning, Public Works, Fire and Building Departments permit fees for all affordable and workforce housing projects.