Title
Study Session to Consider Draft Citywide Universal Design Ordinance Requirements and Standards
Body
CITY OF ALAMEDA
Memorandum
To: Honorable President and
Members of the Planning Board
From: Andrew Thomas, Assistant Community Development Director
Date: May 9, 2016
Re: Study Session to Consider Draft Citywide Universal Design Ordinance Requirements and Standards
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
Adopting a Universal Design Ordinance has been an important priority of the City, and this is reflected in the City’s certified Housing Element, which identifies adopting a Universal Design Ordinance as a priority program. While staff has begun the preliminary work on a draft Ordinance, due to a number of competing policy and development priorities since 2012, the effort to complete a universal design ordinance for the City of Alameda has seen repeated delays. Despite the continuing competition for staff resources and the continued strong economy which has been keeping the staff and the Planning Board busy reviewing development proposals, staff is committed to completing a draft universal design ordinance for consideration by the Alameda community, the Planning Board, the Commission on Disability Issues (CDI), and the City Council in 2016.
Based upon several public meetings with the CDI, including one on April 25, 2016, as well as a review of similar ordinances in other California cities over the last three years, this report provides an outline for a proposed ordinance for the City of Alameda. Upon Planning Board review and endorsement of the approach and outline for the proposed ordinance, staff will complete the required zoning text amendment to implement the agreed-upon universal design requirements and standards. The draft text amendment will then be scheduled for a public hearing and recommendation before the Planning Board, followed by a public hearing and first reading of the ordinance by the City Council.
At the April CDI Meeting, the CDI also recommended a jointsubcommittee of the Planning Board and CDI to assist staff with the preparation of the final draft ordinance and a possible joint meeting of the CDI and Planning Board to make a final recommendation on the final draft ordinance to the City Council.
BACKGROUND
Under State of California law, the City of Alameda should be ensuring that Alameda’s planning and development policies and regulations provide for the full range and type of housing needed to accommodate Alameda's diverse population, including seniors, families with disabilities, and lower-income households.
The 2015-2023 City of Alameda Housing Element, which was certified by the State of California Department of Housing and Community Development, includes a statement of goals, policies and action programs to improve the availability and types of housing in Alameda to address the Alameda community’s diverse housing needs. Housing Element Goal #2 reads: “Provide housing that meets the City’s diverse housing needs, specifically including affordable housing, special needs housing, and senior housing. To implement Goal #2, the Housing Element includes:
• Policy HE-4 “Encourage and support residential opportunities for senior citizens, including senior housing projects, multifamily housing projects with accessible and small housing units, assisted living projects, and in-law projects.”
• Program 4.2 “Consider amendments to the Zoning Ordinance to require universal design elements in all new housing projects of five or more units.”
These policies are supported by the following statistics:
• Approximately 54 million Americans have at least one disability, constituting the largest minority group in the nation;
• Seventeen percent of Alameda’s present population are seniors, and 11.4 percent are persons with disabilities. These numbers are higher than the national averages for both populations.
• Sixteen percent of respondents to the City of Alameda’s Social Service and Human Relations Board’s 2012 Community Needs Assessment identified themselves or a family member as a person with a disability, and 32 percent of respondents believe that services for people with disabilities are the highest need. Furthermore, the number of respondents to this survey represents a statistically significant percentage of the city’s total population.
• The population of seniors is growing at an unprecedented rate locally as well as nationally, and is expected to double within Alameda County between 1990 and 2020. Persons over 65 years old comprise 11 percent of the county’s population and represent its fastest growing segment. The senior population in the City of Alameda is also growing. In 1970, seniors were less than 11% of the population. In 2010, over 13% of the population reported being 65 years old or older. According to the U.S. Census, seniors will continue to increase as a portion of the overall U.S. population. As of 2015, an estimated 15% of the U.S. population is 65 years or older. By 2060, 24% of the population will be 65 or older. Due to longer life spans, approximately 2% of the current US population is 85 or older. This percentage is anticipated to increase to 5% of the population by 2060.
• The number of certified aging-in-place specialists in the country has more than doubled, to nearly 5,000, since 2008.
• According to a 2000 AARP survey, more than 90% percent of persons age 65 and older would prefer to stay in their current residence as long as possible. One key method to promote continuing independence in the home is to build and incorporate a number of architecturally friendly design features into new homes as they are built.
Since 2012, and in recognition of the above policies and statistics, the Planning Board has been requiring all residential projects with five or more units to include specific universal design features. The Marina Shores project, the Del Monte project, the 2100 Clement Avenue project, the Alameda Landing residential project, and the Site A Development Plan for Alameda Point all include project-specific requirements to ensure that a percentage of the units in each project includes features and design standards to ensure that the disabled and seniors aging in place are well served by the new residential development. With each development, the City’s efforts have improved and become more comprehensive.
To improve and streamline the development review process and minimize the need for project-by-project negotiations, staff is recommending that the City of Alameda adopt a Universal Design Ordinance that establishes uniform requirements for all new residential projects.
Citywide Universal Design Ordinance Outline
A draft Universal Design Ordinance should establish clear, easily understood universal design requirements for each new housing development to provide certainty for the development community and eliminate the need for project-by-project negotiations regarding universal design. Staff is requesting public comment on a following outline of proposed requirements for a Universal Design Ordinance.
Residential projects with five or more new units would be required to meet the following three (3) requirements:
1. The 100% Requirement: Every unit in the proposed project (100%) would be required to provide a limited number of reasonably inexpensive universal design features that exceed minimum California Uniform Building Code requirements that would make the unit more easily adaptable for seniors or residents with disabilities. These features would be included in the original design and construction of the unit. Staff has not prepared a recommended list, but it might include a short list of features and requirements such as:
Ø Blocking in bathroom walls for enable easy installation of grab bars.
Ø A minimum width in stairwells, to enable installation of lifts within the stairwell.
The 100% requirement was recommended by the CDI on April 25th.
2. The 20% Requirement. Twenty percent (20%) of the units in the project would be “universally designed” to be easily adaptable for a senior citizen, a resident aging in place or a resident with a mobility disability. The 20% requirement would include all of the 100% requirements, plus the following specific design features in the original design and construction of the unit. Specifically, the draft ordinance should require that a universally designed unit provide:
Ø Access to the Front Door: An accessible primary entry that does not require the resident or visitors to climb stairs to access the unit is essential for seniors or residents with mobility issues. (Adding wheel chair ramps to access the front door of a home can be expensive, and in some cases infeasible, if the home is designed with many steps between the sidewalk and the front door.)
Ø Access to the Living Spaces in the Unit: A senior aging in place or a disabled resident must have an accessible path of travel (without stairs and with adequate hallway width) from the front door to the living room, bedroom, bathroom, and kitchen area. Stairs within a home are problematic and can be difficult and expensive to eliminate or modify after the home is constructed. In addition, the hallways and doorways need to be wide enough to accommodate a wheel chair, and the walls should have blocking to make it easy to add grab bars if they are needed for a future resident of the unit.
Ø Accessible Bathrooms and Kitchens: The Universal Design Ordinance would require that the kitchen and bathroom include adequate floor space to operate a wheel chair and that the bathroom would include a walk-in shower stall. Bathrooms and kitchens can be very expensive to modify at a later date, if certain features and dimensions are not provided in the original design of the unit. Replacing a bathtub/shower unit with a walk-in or roll-in shower stall can be expensive ($20,000 or more). If the floor area within the kitchen and bathroom is built with minimal floor space, a retrofit of the space to accommodate wheelchair access becomes extremely expensive and may require an extensive interior remodel of the home.
3. The Model Home Requirement. If the proposed project includes a subdivision map or condominium map for the purpose of selling individual units, and if the remaining 80% of the proposed project that is not “universally designed” includes more than one model or dwelling unit type, and the subdivision is designed to be constructed with “model homes” for potential buyer inspection, prior to construction of the actual home to be purchased, then:
Ø The seller of the residential dwelling units shall prepare a brochure or checklist of additional universal design features or "options" that may be purchased by the buyer and installed by the seller during construction of the specific unit to be constructed by the seller to be sold to the buyer. The list of options shall be consistent with the list provided in the State of California's model universal ordinance (Exhibit 1).
Ø One of the model homes shall display the potential options.
Conclusions
• The draft outline for an Alameda universal design ordinance is unique. Staff has not found any city in California that has adopted a “100% requirement” or a “20% requirement”. Most cities in California have no universal design ordinance. The few cities that have adopted such an ordinance have adopted the State’s Model Ordinance that only includes the “model home” requirement. The City of Murrieta universal design ordinance is the only ordinance that staff was able to find that is somewhat similar to the proposed Alameda ordinance. It includes a 15% requirement (Exhibit 2).
• Multifamily apartment buildings and condominium projects such as the units constructed at Site A Block 11 and Block 8 and the Del Monte Building will likely exceed the 20% requirement, because these buildings include elevators and single-story units without stairs. Townhome projects will find the 20% requirement more difficult to meet because the townhome building type includes a lot of stairs and no elevators, and the units are constructed on small building footprints with little space on the ground floor to accommodate full living facilities required by the proposed ordinance. None of the townhome projects approved since 2012, have achieved the 20% standard. Single-family subdivisions on larger lots will find the 20% requirement to be less of a challenge. Single-family subdivisions on small lots will find the 20% requirement more difficult, because it will be harder to place all the necessary living spaces on the ground floor, in addition to parking, open space, and other facilities that need to be on the ground floor.
• Multifamily apartment buildings and smaller projects (generally 20 units or less) that are constructed before the units are sold will effectively be exempt from the “Model Home” requirement because all the units would be constructed before they are sold. Larger subdivisions, similar to the Alameda Landing residential project and the Marina Shores project, with model homes and "pre-sales" would be subject to the "Model Home" requirement.
ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW
A Universal Design Ordinance will implement action programs within the City of Alameda General Plan Housing Element, which was approved by the City Council in July 2014. The environmental impacts of adoption and implementation of the Housing Element were evaluated and disclosed at the time of the adoption of the Housing Element. No further environmental review is required.
RECOMMENDATION
Review and comment on the draft ordinance outline and consider establishment of an ad-hoc subcommittee to advise staff on the preparation of the draft ordinance.
Respectfully submitted,
Andrew Thomas
Assistant Community Development Director
Exhibits:
1. HCD Model Ordinance
2. City of Murrieta Universal Design Ordinance