In last Sunday’s (Dec. 22) “As We See It,” the Sentinel Editorial Board wrote that the City of Santa Cruz “has been trying to stave off neighborhood opposition to [housing] projects by increasing downtown density.” This particular strategy has been obvious to anyone who pays attention to local housing but it is coming at the cost of losing our low skyline downtown to massive and rather unattractive buildings.

When there has been neighborhood opposition, it was in response to smaller developments next to or inside them (there is no need here to question the reasons for such opposition). In all of this, we seem to have forgotten about building housing units in homeowners’ backyards.

Five years ago, the Sustainable Systems Research Foundation conducted a GIS (global information systems) survey of Santa Cruz backyards to determine how many might be large enough for an accessory dwelling unit (ADU). We estimated that there were at least 5,000 yards meeting our size and space criteria (and that did not include rooms in houses that could be turned into apartments).

According to the Sentinel Editorial, “Santa Cruz is being required by the state of California to create 3,736 more housing units by 2031.” Those yards and other available spaces could accommodate that many units and more.

But at what cost? The price of a two-bedroom ADU in Santa Cruz has skyrocketed since 2020 to $250,000 and up ($400-$600 per square foot), as a result of pandemic and labor shortages, the rising price of lumber and other building materials and high demand for builders and skilled workers. No one in their right mind would invest in an ADU as a rental property.

It turns out, however, that the current cost of apartment construction in Santa Cruz is at least $500 per square foot, or $500,000 for a 1,000-square-foot unit. That’s why rents are so high in those new buildings. The cost of an ADU is not that much different.

Maybe we should be thinking of other ways to stimulate the local ADU market.

It is now legal to sell part of your backyard to someone who wants to build an ADU on it. That would raise the cost of the unit which would now include the value of the land. Given the price of houses around here, that might not be such a bad deal.

The city could set up a fund to partner with homeowners on ownership of ADUs, with the value of the ADU to be returned to the city whenever the parcel is sold.

It could subsidize construction costs in return for an agreement to cap rents at affordable levels.

It could partner with UCSC to build ADUs for students, at less cost than dormitories, in return for a ground rent to the parcel owner.

And those are only three possibilities.

Those buildings downtown are going to be built. Whether they will prove profitable to the developers remains to be seen, of course. But if we want to save what is left of Santa Cruz’s charm and character, maybe we should think about building ADUs.

Ronnie D. Lipschutz is President of the Sustainable Systems Research Foundation in Santa Cruz and Emeritus Professor of Politics at UCSC.

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