TRPA changes stance on affordable housing

STATELINE -After criticism by members of an advisory board last week, Tahoe Regional Planning Agency staff has changed its stance on an affordable housing proposal.

Douglas and Washoe counties should be grouped with the rest of the basin's jurisdictions as having done their "fair share" to provide affordable housing at Tahoe. That is a switch for agency staff members, who earlier were saying the two Nevada counties had not done enough.

If the agency's governing board agrees with staff at a meeting next week, a moratorium on subdivisions in certain places at Tahoe will be lifted basinwide, not just in California communities.

The moratorium, which targets places considered to be good affordable housing sites, has been in place since Jan. 1, after the agency's governing board postponed a decision.

The past five years, all Tahoe communities - Douglas, Washoe, Placer and El Dorado counties along with the city of South Lake Tahoe - were found to have done their part to provide affordable housing.

This was the first time Douglas and Washoe counties' efforts were found by staff to be inadequate. The finding, however, was criticized as subjective because there are no specific guidelines for determining whether the communities are doing enough.

A committee was formed to examine the issue by April.

"What they said about not having specific criteria, I think, was a fair criticism of us," said Gabby Barrett, the agency's chief of long-range planning. "So the staff has said, 'OK, let's go ahead and set up the criteria. We've set up a working group. I think that seems like a good place to ask what would be fair criteria."

What: Tahoe Regional Planning Agency meeting

When: 9:30 a.m., Jan. 26

Where: North Tahoe Conference Center, 8318 North Lake Blvd., Kings Beach

Information: Call (775) 588-4547 or look on the Internet at www.ceres.ca.gov/trpa