What Berkeley Needs to Know about Proposed "Missing Middle" Re-Zoning
Proposed revisions to the Missing Middle report to be considered at the Berkeley City Council meeting on March 26, 2019
In the report on Missing Middle housing, we ask that the City Manager consider 1) the process by which other cities considered these type of changes and 2) for those that moved forward, how these changes were effectuated. Cities such as Houston, Chicago, Portland, and Minneapolis, among others, have undergone this process in a variety of ways and to varying degrees of success. Berkeley should learn from these cities to guarantee that any Missing Middle housing is built with equity as a key consideration.The report warrants further examination of how fire impacts our zoning needs. Ingress and egress are critical issues citywide as fire has the potential to spread throughout the City extremely quickly in Berkeley,[1] especially as climate change makes fires stronger and faster. We ask that the report look at how other cities incorporated these concerns and disaster preparedness in all areas of their cities.
No zoning changes should exacerbate gentrification or displacement; it is especially important that the effects of past redlining not be compounded. Automatically excluding all high-fire zones will result in eliminating 70% of the R-1 and R-1A zoning[2] that could be considered for upzoning and result in increased pressure on the areas of the historic redline and in low-income areas. Much of the proposed rezoning aligns with the historic redline; if not done carefully, rezoning can lead to displacement through demolished housing stock and rising rents. San Francisco has recognized that it is losing affordable housing more quickly than it is constructing it. Berkeley is in an affordable housing crisis and must retain the affordable housing we already have. -more-