Homeowners start to cash in with California duplex law
Good Morning, I’m Debbie Cruz….it’s Monday, October 28th
A startup is offering San Diego homeowners cash for their backyards. More on that next. But first... let’s do the headlines….######
39 vote centers opened for early voting over the weekend.
Voters can fill out a ballot at the vote centers or drop a completed one off. You can also register to vote conditionally.
More than 200 vote centers will be open starting this Saturday (Nov 2). All vote centers are open on Election Day, November 5th.
You can find the vote center closest to you at kpbs.org/voterhub.
There’s been a 2nd reported case of dengue in the county. A Vista resident was hospitalized with the mosquito-transmitted illness. They had not traveled to a place where the illness is common, suggesting the dengue was contracted locally.
The 1st case happened earlier this month in Escondido. The cases are believed to be unrelated.
County officials say dengue is rare, but vector control will be in Vista through tomorrow to treat 60 homes with a pesticide to reduce mosquitos.
Starting tomorrow, unionized Sharp HealthCare workers will vote on whether or not to go on strike.
On Thursday their union announced a call for an unfair labor practices authorization vote.
Union workers claim Sharp is committing labor violations, like retaliating against whistleblowers. They also want the company to invest more in patient care, staffing and better working conditions.
Sharp is one of the largest employers in the county with 5-thousand unionized workers.
From KPBS, you’re listening to San Diego News Now. Stay with me for more of the local news you need.
THREE YEARS AGO, CALIFORNIA PASSED S-B 9, A LAW ALLOWING DUPLEXES ON PROPERTIES OTHERWISE RESTRICTED TO SINGLE-FAMILY HOMES. IT ALSO LETS HOMEOWNERS SPLIT THEIR LOT IN TWO AND SELL OFF EXCESS LAND, SUCH AS A BACKYARD. THE GOAL IS TO CREATE MORE AFFORDABLE STARTER HOMES THAT BLEND IN WITH THE EXISTING NEIGHBORHOOD.
METRO REPORTER ANDREW BOWEN SAYS SAN DIEGO HOMEOWNERS ARE JUST BEGINNING TO CASH IN.
Jay Blake lives with his wife in a 2-bedroom house in North Park, right next to a canyon that's home to a lot of chatty birds. The Blakes liked this home for its privacy. It's set back about 80 feet from the street, leaving a very large front yard. It is a little bit overgrown, I would say. We have a couple of trees and shrubs, things like that, the trees have dropped a lot of leaves, obviously. Blake has never had any use for the yard. In fact, he's had to spend about $5,000 to maintain it. So he started looking into developing the space into new housing. I had people come out to give me quotes on it. I realized that I didn't necessarily have the resources to do that on my own. And so I did a lot of Google searching about the possibility of other things that I could do with it. That search eventually led him to the startup, BuildCasa. The business was founded in 2022 after the passage of SB 9, which allows homeowners like Blake to subdivide their properties and cash out on their unneeded land. BuildCasa handles the permitting and finds a buyer or developer to build a duplex on the new lot. Blake was pleasantly surprised when he got the company's offer for his front yard: $250,000. Both my wife and myself have advanced degrees, which have really been great for us. But we've had student loans that have plagued us since about 2010. And I think a large chunk of this is going to go to paying those off and finally getting those off our backs honestly. Fundamentally, what we see is a lack of affordable starter homes for sale really across the country but it's hyper concentrated in California. Ben Bear is BuildCasa's CEO and co-founder. He says SB 9 is too complicated for most homeowners to navigate on their own. And it's not for everyone. You have to be open to having a new neighbor and certainly, you know, that's not something that everybody wants. Where we have seen a lot of interest and uptake is particularly among senior citizens who are, you know, house rich and cash poor, and want to age and place and bought their home a long time ago. Bear says San Diego is an attractive market for SB 9 projects because there's high demand for housing — and construction costs are lower than Los Angeles and the Bay Area. It also has a city government that supports SB 9 — and that's not the case everywhere. The wealthy Bay Area suburb of Woodside declared its single-family neighborhoods mountain lion habitat in an effort to block SB 9. The move was short lived, and this year, the legislature passed a clean-up bill that closes some of the law's loopholes. I mean, this was a momentous bill, it was a lot of people coming together to get this signed. Muhammad Alameldin is a policy associate at the UC Berkeley Turner Center for Housing Innovation. He says SB 9's passage in 2021 was a major political achievement. But a study he co-authored last year found the law's impact on the housing supply has been slow to materialize. It does take a while for the general public to know about the law. And for planning departments to adjust to state laws, state policies. Alameldin says the emergence of companies like BuildCasa and its competitor Yardsworth shows the market is ironing out the kinks in SB 9. And it's helping bring back competition to the home building industry. After the Great Recession, a lot of contractors switched to house flipping. Having more developers build housing, especially small-scale housing like this, is very healthy for the housing industry." I wanted to leave the property in better hands, I suppose. Jay Blake says he's glad the new housing in his front yard will fit in with the neighborhood, which is already full of duplexes and triplexes. And he's glad someone else is dealing with the permits. I realize that I might be leaving a little bit of money on the table and I'm not bothered by that because I don't have to be bothered by all the logistics of property development I guess. After paying off their student loans, the Blakes are thinking about using what's left over to add central air to their home. And maybe another solar panel. Andrew Bowen, KPBS news.
RENOVATIONS BEGIN THIS WEEK TO CONVERT A FORMER EXTENDED-STAY HOTEL INTO AN AFFORDABLE APARTMENT BUILDING. REPORTER KATIE ANASTAS SAYS IT WILL HOUSE PEOPLE WHO CURRENTLY LIVE IN SHELTERS OR ON THE STREETS.
The Mission Valley building will have 161 units for people with extremely low income. The San Diego Housing Commission will also provide vouchers to help people pay their rent. Renovations will include new paint, flooring, beds and air conditioning. Tenants will have access to supportive services on site. I spent a month in my car. I've shared that before, and I will never, ever, ever forget how good it felt to get back into an apartment that was mine. Sean Elo-Rivera is president of the San Diego City Council. It almost didn't feel real at first. And what sits behind us is 160 homes for folks who will have that exact same feeling, only probably even more relief when we get this thing open in six months. He says that six-month timeline is “warp speed” compared to building new housing from the ground up. Earlier this year, the state awarded $35 million to the San Diego Housing Commission through Homekey, a statewide effort to quickly convert existing buildings into housing. Other funding comes from the city, the county and the Regional Task Force on Homelessness. Katie Anastas, KPBS News.
SAN DIEGO HAS A WAYS TO GO BEFORE MEETING ITS GOAL OF NET ZERO GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS BY 2035. A new interactive dashboard lets you track the city’s progress.
Here’s metro reporter Andrew Bowen again.
AB: On the new website’s homepage, you can see the latest inventory of San Diego's emissions: 8.6 million metric tons of carbon dioxide in 2022. The city aims to cut that in half in the next six years. The dashboard allows you to search through all the city's 190 actions related to climate change, such as increasing the urban tree canopy and phasing out natural gas usage in buildings. Chief Sustainability Officer Shelby Busó says emissions are going down, and progress is incremental. We've had some baby steps to get this all off the ground, but we expect some giant leaps over the next couple of years. You can explore the city's climate dashboard at climatedashboard.sandiego.gov. Andrew Bowen, KPBS news.
THERE IS A NEW EXHIBIT AT THE JAPANESE FRIENDSHIP GARDEN IN BALBOA PARK, AND IT’S PERFECT FOR HALLOWEEN, EXPLAINS ARTS REPORTER BETH ACCOMANDO.
This Halloween, Momoka Nakajima of the Japanese Friendship Garden wants to introduce you to a few monsters you may not know. They’re called yokai. So Yokais are Japanese ancient monsters. People from old time, they embodied their thoughts and fears into any item, so their anxiety or fears turned into yōkais. They believe that each item, anything, has a soul in it. Yōkai refers to more than just monsters, says National University arts and humanities professor Ramie Tateishi. Yokai describes any phenomenon that's out of the ordinary or is unusual. So it could take the form of these monsters, but it could even be just any unexplained natural happening. Yōkai can include spirits, ghosts, shape-shifting monsters, anthro-pomorphic animals or ordinary household items that come to life when they exceed 100 years. The Yokai pop up exhibit at the Japanese Friendship Garden may be small but it will open your imagination to a wide new realm of supernatural possibilities. Beth Accomando, KPBS News.
You can now visit KPBS’ digital altar in honor of Dia de Muertos, or Day of the Dead.
An altar or ofrenda has pictures of loved ones that have passed, food, flowers and other meaningful trinkets.
KPBS’ digital ofrenda has photos and memories of those that have died. Some memories came as audio clips, like this one from Annette in Chula Vista:
My best friend Elizabeth passed away on December 13th , 2023. She was 38 years old. Me and Elizabeth met in the eighth grade , and we have been very close ever since then. And we have decades of memories and , um , just really good memories , really good laughs. We would always make each other laugh , like uncontrollably falling on the ground , crying , coughing Because we were laughing so much.
Go to kpbs dot org slash day of the dead for more rememberances.
That’s it for the podcast today. As always you can find more San Diego news online at KPBS dot org. I’m Debbie Cruz. Thanks for listening and have a great day.
