City Council Approves Modifications on Affordable Housing Priority Guidelines

During deliberations Monday on affordable housing guidelines, African American Councilmembers Tyron Hampton and John Kennedy called on the city to remember past housing policies that forced African Americans and other residents of color out of the city.

Hampton pointed out that African Americans have been displaced through gentrification, redlining and the construction of local freeways that destroyed Black communities.

“For the basis of this conversation, it sounds like you don’t want Black people living in Pasadena,” Hampton said.

Hampton, a fifth-generation Pasadena resident, said he has had family members displaced.

Kennedy said the actions that pushed Black people out of Pasadena, are still impacting the city.

“These are not just actions that took place at the federal level we had local public policies that had a negative impact on communities of color, including the African American community,” Kennedy said.

The council agreed to launch a pilot program for 50 units to utilize as data. The program will include a five-year residency requirement for residents who lived in the city within the past 10 years.

More recently, rising housing costs have forced many African Americans to move east to the Inland Empire.

African-Americans were hit particularly hard by the foreclosure crisis in the early part of the century.

Kennedy said the highest priority should be given to those displaced through bad public policy.

Kennedy called for the guideline on former residents to be changed to make residents that lived in Pasadena more than five years ago be eligible for prioritization.

Councilmember Steve Madison and Mayor Victor Gordo expressed issues with prioritizing the guidelines to help bring people back to Pasadena instead of helping local residents already in the city.

“The problem is the priority level,” Gordo said. “Denying people who are already here that 20 percent, that’s the issue.”

Madison called for a pilot project to see if the guidelines would draw people back to the city.

“We will be telling people who live and work here now including people of color, ‘sorry we don’t have a unit for you, but we are out searching for someone who used to live here to come back.’”

Some residents agreed that the modifications did not help African Americans that have been displaced for various reasons.

“This does not sufficiently address the problem of displacement due to the City’s housing policies of the past, which disproportionately affected persons of color. African Americans have been facing displacement from our City for over 20 years,: said Sonja Berndt. “Therefore, this priority should be available to any households that were displaced from Pasadena over the past 20 years.

“Currently, the priority for persons who were involuntarily displaced from Pasadena, who are homeless, is priority #4,” Berndt said. “The report recommends downgrading this priority to #5.  Why are we prioritizing persons who are already housed over persons who are unhoused?  This is illogical and short-sighted.  We are so far behind in housing our unhoused persons.  We need to take whatever action we can to house unhoused persons.”

The item was reviewed last month by the City Council’s Economic Development and Technology (EDTech) Committee.

The Rev. Bert Newton of Pasadena Mennonite Church said officials needed to consider the reasons for the city’s decreasing African-American community.

“The original proposal would have prioritized 20% of affordable housing in the city for people who have been displaced in the past 10 years,” Newton said. “African Americans have been experiencing displacement for over 20 years. In many cases, these are people who have grown up in Pasadena and whose families have been in Pasadena for generations. The timeframe for displacement should be at least 10 years, not five. I really think it should be even longer than 10, perhaps 20 years.”

About 33 tenants are currently overhoused.The city plans to reach out to overhoused households and could provide incentives including moving costs to free up the larger units, according to Housing Director Bill Huang.

The modifications aim to help former residents forced to move due to gentrification and increasing housing costs.

The Local Preference and Priority System Guidelines were adopted by the council in 2006 to determine the order in which eligible applicants receive priority to rent or purchase available affordable housing units, including units developed with city subsidy and units created under the Inclusionary Housing Ordinance, according to the city staff report.

Although those policies have been successful, policymakers, stakeholders and housing advocates have come to realize that they fail to address the impacts of housing displacement created by the rising costs of housing and gentrification.

Cities around the nation, including Portland, New York, Oakland, and San Francisco have revised their policies in order to address gentrification and over-housing.