City Council Holds Heated Hearing On Workforce Housing

By VERNON ROBISON

The Progress

The Mesquite City Council faced a passionate crowd at a meeting held on Tuesday evening, July 27. On the meeting’s agenda were two proposals aimed at fulfilling a long-held strategic goal for the city to bring new workforce housing projects to the community. But the crowd in attendance was vigorously opposed to one of them.

The Council held two public hearings on resolutions for zone change requests. Each request would pave the way for higher-density multi-family housing projects, aimed at the city’s workforce, to be built. After more than an hour of heated public comment, the council finally voted to approve the smaller of the two requests and to table the larger one for further negotiations with the developer.

Top strategic planning goal
In his introductory remarks to the items, Mesquite City Planner Richard Secrist stated that the City Council had set down its prioritized goals in early 2019 with a strategic plan for the city.
“The #1 primary goal in that strategic plan was to promote and develop workforce housing,” Secrist said. “To set things in motion, we set up a workforce housing task force to study the issue and come up with a strategy to accomplish that.”

Secrist pointed out that the last multi-family housing built in Mesquite had been eleven years ago. Thus, more of such housing was desperately needed, he said.

“People in gaming and hospitality making $12.50 per hour are already priced out of the single family housing market,” Secrist said. “So we need to focus on something they can afford.”

The task force had begun targeting parcels which were ideally located for this type of housing, Secrist said. Considerations included proximity to commercial services, bus routes, major arterial streets, schools and recreational amenities. Priority was also placed on parcels already zoned for multi-family housing.

During a discussion period, Council members emphasized the urgent need behind this strategic planning goal.
“There is no question that workforce housing is the number one priority right now in the city,” said Councilman Brian Wursten. “Everyone agrees that we need it. But when it comes down to where we put it, nobody wants it where they live. So as people come up and talk about this tonight, I would love to hear their ideas for answers on this. Because this is a big issue facing the city that we have to address somehow.”

Mesquite Mayor Al Litman highlighted the extent of the current shortage of housing being faced by the city. “We are short approximately 1,600 living units in the city right now,” Litman said.

“That number comes, not from us, but from independent studies that were provided to us. And that is only looking at things as they are now, with no future growth.”

Smaller project approved
The first of the two requests on the agenda involved two adjacent parcels comprising 9.39 acres located near the northeast corner of Mesquite Blvd and Old Mill Road. The proposal was to change both of the parcels to a Medium Density Multi-Family Residential Zoning (MF-3) to make way for a condominium complex to be built.

Secrist explained that the developer was proposing a complex of 164 total units. This would be equivalent to an overall density of 17.46 units per acre, Secrist said. This would be well within the MF-3 zoning requested which allows for 20 units per acre.

After only brief public comment on this resolution, Wursten made a motion to approve the measure which was upheld with a unanimous vote.

High density brings opposition
The second item, however, was a much larger project. It involved a 14.4 acre parcel at 520 W. Pioneer Boulevard. The request was to change zoning from the current Low Density Multi-Family (MF-2), which allows 10 units per acre, to High Density Multi-Family (MF-4) allowing 25 units per acre.

The applicant proposed the construction of a 352-unit apartment complex to be built at the location. The proposed complex would offer a mix of one and two bedroom units with an overall density of 24.44 units per acre.

These density numbers proved way to high for many of the neighboring residents in attendance at the meeting.

“I am all for multi-family units being built in that location,” said Marty McCann, a resident of Rancho Santa Barbara subdivision. “It is cohesive with the condos in the area there. But I think it can better be done with the current zoning limits. If this was approved at 350 units, it would be one of the largest complexes in town in a very small area.”

In agreement with this was Pastor Wendy Swanson, of Mesquite United Methodist Church which is immediately adjacent to the proposed parcel.

“Bringing in new residents to our area is a good and needed aspiration,” Swanson said. “Keeping the zoning as it is would provide a good and amicable living space with up to 144 units. But changing the zoning would put a burden on the property, the neighborhood, the police and fire resources, the environment and the existing infrastructure.”

Angie Schuster said that she had moved to the neighborhood from Henderson during the pandemic to be in a “safe and quiet town.”

“That the council would believe that residents in the immediate area would feel safe with over 1,000 residents crammed into a 14-acre lot points to a high level of short-sightedness and being out of touch with the community,” Schuster said.

Traffic worries
Many commenters expressed concerns that the high density would bring traffic snarls throughout the surrounding streets and intersections.

Secrist explained that an extensive traffic study had been completed showing impacts from the project to surrounding streets. The study estimated an average of 1,915 new vehicle trips per day from the project, with 127 during the morning peak hours and 155 in afternoon peak, Secrist said.
“That is basically a doubling of the existing traffic,” Secrist said.

But even with that increase, the capacity levels on surrounding roadways would remain well within the city’s guidelines on street service levels, Secrist said.

This provided little comfort to neighboring residents in their worries about seeing gridlocked traffic on their streets.

“We are told that the traffic study was done in May,” said Jane Howard a resident of the nearby Sedona development. “That is really an unfair representation because most of our snowbirds are here from October through February and that is when the streets are super busy.”

City Engineer Travis Anderson responded that there was much more research involved in the study than just counting cars on the road at a certain period of time.

“I believe the traffic study is valid,” Anderson said. “There are integrations in that study. It is not just traffic counts. They look at the Institute of Transportation Engineers handbook and follow all of the methodology in there. So I do believe that we would be within the acceptable levels of service required by the city.”

Anderson also addressed some of the initial concerns about density. He referenced a rough site map document submitted by the developer that showed a preliminary plan for how the apartment complex would be laid out. He added that there are concerns about the density shown there.

“There are a lot of things that we talked about when this was brought to us,” Anderson said. “We need to look at trash enclosures and many other items that we are going to require to meet standards. All of that would bring the density down on the project.”

Still no solutions
During closing council discussion, Wursten expressed concern that no solutions had been found.
“I appreciate all of the comments, but we still don’t have any answers on what to do about the core problem facing our community; other than we don’t want it in this specific area,” Wursten said. “I feel like we urgently need to come up with some decisions that take care of problems. But our only solution seems to be put it on the other side of town.”

Councilwoman Sandra Ramaker made a plea for the neighboring residents, many of whom are retired, to have empathy for the younger workforce in the community.

“I’d wager that some of you, somewhere in your life, when you first got out of school or moved to town or you needed a job, you lived in apartments because you couldn’t afford homes,” Ramaker said. “We have a lot of people right here that are looking for a place to live now. We are not all seniors here. We need to find a way to solve this. And I haven’t heard anyone come up with any solutions here tonight.”

Back to the negotiating table
City Councilman Wes Boger turned the conversation with a comment near the end of the discussion. “I feel like the solution here is to leave the zoning as MF-2,” he said to cheers from the audience.
Boger added that the neighborhood lacked many of the elements to justify such a dense zoning including commercial centers, schools, employment centers, parks, urban services and more.
“This one doesn’t make the sense to me that the previous request did,” Boger concluded.

Litman conceded that perhaps discussions ought to take place with the developer about proposing a less dense project.

“We haven’t discussed MF-3 this evening whatsoever,” Litman said. “It wasn’t proposed but it is a much less dense complex. It may be totally rejected by the developer, I don’t know. But it is my opinion that maybe we table the item for further review and look at MF-3 again.”
According to City code, MF-3 would allow up to 20 units per acre.

Ramaker made a motion to table the item to discuss lower density with the developer. The motion received a second.

Just before the vote, the project developer Joseph Markowicz asked to speak. Given the circumstances, Litman allowed a three minute period for him to make a comment.
Markowicz explained that his company manages another large apartment property in Mesquite and is committed to providing good housing that members of the workforce can afford.

“I’d like to speak for those people tonight, the ones that are not here,” Markowicz said. “They are the people who do your lawns and serve your food and take care of you. They need places to live in this community.”

Markowicz explained that there are many complex considerations in play in the project that would make it impossible to reconsider its density at this point.

“If it is not this one then, I’m sorry, we would have to not close escrow and the transaction will not take place,” Markowicz said. “If we table it tonight, the escrow won’t happen. So I would ask to give a final vote tonight please.”

Litman recognized that a motion had been made to table the item. He asked for the vote.

The motion passed with a 3-2 vote. Ramaker, Boger and Karen Dutkowski voted in favor. Wursten and George Gault were opposed.