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While the building industry has many incentives to assist them with their projects, owners of single-family residences that are over 45 years old have only one in San Diego - the Mills Act. Here is a condensed synopsis of just a few of the comments from more than 2 hours of public testimony at a Workshop held by the City of San Diego on April 18, 2008: Homeowner Awaiting Historical Hearing for their Home: - Someday my house will be for sale, but who is to say that without designation the new buyer will have the incentive to provide the upkeep that is needed or not demolish this landmark all together. The promise of the Mills Act is the one incentive to rationalize the expense of the report preparation and the long wait to go to hearing, besides knowing that the house I treasure will outlast me. Local Resident and Craftsman Who Works on Historic Homes: – Our historic housing stock being torn down at an alarming rate. As a painting contractor, I have seen first-hand the effects of the Mills Act on our neighborhoods. I have worked on many homes under renovation being refurbished in anticipation of a Mills Act benefit. For the last thirteen years, some of the renovation of many of our older neighborhoods is in large part due to the effect of the Mills Act incentive. The money I earn is circulated in the local economy. Owner of a Historic Home: – The amount of money we get back on our Mills Act contract is a drop in the bucket compared to what we’ve spent in a labor of love. It seems foolish to focus on taking away the benefit to people when there are huge incentives being given to developers throughout the city. They make a lot of money off properties, and I really want to see us putting the same benefit into our neighborhoods as we are doing into downtown, and our waterfront, and all over the city. Owner of a Historic Kensington area home with the Mills Act: – The cost to restore and maintain a historic home are significantly higher. I am currently restoring an arched leaded window on the front of my home, and it is very expensive – significantly more than just to tear out the window and replace it with a new one. If we are going to compare the number of historic homes to other cities, that must be done accurately, as there are many, many other variables to be considered. And why is this even a problem? I think we should be proud of the fact that we have more historic homes and people who value preservation and want to maintain these historic homes. Ocean Beach Resident and Community Leader: – Negative effect on property taxes is very minimal – Ocean beach is one of 3 areas where property taxes have increased, largely due to small town feel and quaint neighborhoods. We just had a film crew finish up from Twentieth Century Fox for location, a pilot for CBS, which put 8 million dollars into the local economy. We believe it is important to maintain the integrity of our historic neighborhoods. Resident Historic District of Burlingame: – Owners of historic homes are “Crazy Homeowners,” because people who buy old homes are on some level “nuts.” Our home is a modest home, in a middle class neighborhood. If we were to try and buy our home now, we couldn’t afford to buy it. The Mills Act makes it possible to do what we have to do to keep up the upkeep on these homes, and what we’re doing is a benefit for the region. Because once these single family homes are gone, they can never be replaced. And so it is also the City’s responsibility to understand that we are doing a service for future generations. Architect who Served on the Historical Board and First Incentives Committee: – “A Rising Tide Raises All Boats – and the Mills Act is Our Rising Tide.” The first Incentives Committee investigated numerous potential incentives for over 2 years. They identified the Mills Act as specifically the best incentive assisting single family residences. Homeowner investment – economic engine that this creates is huge in San Diego – people invest $20,000 - $200,000 – a million dollars in their cherished historic properties, and they do so Not only because they want to but because there is some economic incentive through the Mills Act. The incentives the Mayor proposes sound good, but here are the problems with all of the proposed incentives – especially for owners of single family properties in residential communities: • Transfer of Development Rights does not work in single family residential area. An owner with a historic home is not going to give up their development rights to give a neighbor the ability to build a 3 story residence. No money is enough to mitigate that impact. Transfer of development rights in single family residential areas doesn’t work; • Federal Tax Credits – is for income properties. For owners of single family residential properties, for most of them their property is not an income property, so it does not apply; • Façade Easements – there is almost no different than a Mills Act benefit. Some income tax reduction and instead just to the façade. The whole property is not being reviewed; • Conditional Use – great if you have an old house that you want as a use such as a medical facility, but most of the single family residential neighborhoods don’t want that kind of use in the center of their neighborhood, not a commercial zone. Conditional use doesn’t work unless the area is already zoned commercial. But in large single family zoned neighborhoods, it doesn’t work; • Building Code Exemption – can work great in downtown in an area that needs this requirement. For Single Family properties there is no such need; • Non-Conforming Setbacks on historic buildings – non-historic buildings get that same use. This is not a special incentive that helps Single Family Residential properties; • The Mills Act does not cost San Diego City Schools “one thin dime” and actually RAISES the property values of neighboring non-historic properties; • Mills Act savings are reinvested into our community by hiring local skilled craftsman. Kensington Resident – Regarding the Grand Jury Report: – We find it unbelievable that the investigation did not include any interviews with homeowners of landmarked houses, or owners that have Mills Act contracts, yet the report presumed that the primary reason homeowners seek the Mills Act was for ”speculative purposes” in order to sell the home for a greater price. But they provided no data to back that conclusion. We performed our own analysis of the 34 historically designated homes in Kensington and found that 82% have not been sold since they were designated historic and many of them have been designated for 7-9 years. Our data and analysis does not support the Grand Jury’s conclusion. We hope that more staff is added to speed up the designation process, not slow it down, as more historically landmarked homes can do nothing but add to our quality of life and help push urban revitalization outward from our historic villages. New resident to Mission Hills, coming from New York: – We had a historic home in New York, but they had no comparable incentives. After we sold the house, the new owners wanted to raze the house and build a McMansion. The neighborhood got together and prompted the buyer to put the house in the paper for anyone who would take it and preserve the home. When we chose the house in Mission Hills it was because it was historic and because we would have the potential to get the Mills Act. Mission Hills Resident, Owner of a Historic Home with the Mills Act, Today Representing the Neighborhood Historic Preservation Coalition (NHPC): – We support reducing the backlog of voluntary designation nominations. We also support historic property owners should honor their obligations to keep their properties in good shape. We are concerned with putting demolition pressure in our commercial areas because of high density zoning – and historic neighborhoods have to deal with this. We are concerned about ministerial projects that often by-pass the community planning groups and developers who want to bypass the historic review process. We are concerned about building permit notices, which are a problem, as notices are given and the clock of review begins but communities are not made aware of the projects themselves until well after the date comes to become involved. There are problems with neighborhood code compliance – we would like to see incentives to promote GOOD behavior. We are concerned about the application of the 45-year review requirement and discretionary vs. ministerial processing – we have been awaiting the City Attorney’s opinion on this. We are concerned about remodeling projects that end up leaving only 1 wall left intact – these should be redefined as demolition. There are good historic buildings that maybe don’t have good enough integrity at the board’s present high standard to be individually designated. Voluntary reports are being pushed back while development projects go ahead of people who have been waiting over a year to go to hearing, meanwhile, historic resources are being approved for demolition. For example, the interim height ordinance has been delayed for resolution, and this has created a Catch-22. What do these issues have to do with the Mills Act? It has to do with the historic integrity of our neighborhoods. We need to have incentives to curb some of the demolitions that have been going on. Land Use and Housing is looking at this, but it can’t come soon enough for the integrity of our neighborhoods. Sherman Heights Resident: – I was involved in the early adoption of the Mills Act program. Most of the incentives in San Diego are for commercial properties, not single family properties. Grants, loans, professional services, fee waivers. Mills Act is a key element of the City’s comprehensive historic preservation plan. My own savings is just $350 per year. Kensington resident: – I live in a historically nominated house that my family has lived in for over 50 years. It is expensive but a labor of love. SOHO Member: – Mayor Sanders signed a pledge in 2006 to address climate change. Since then, the City has focused their “Green Mindset” on Land Use Planning. Wants to address Green Building Standards in the General Plan. Development without Preservation is not Sustainable. A green building is not the same thing as sustainable design. Preservation is sustainable design. One of the major tenets of preservation is re-use or adapting old buildings simply put, it is the ultimate recycle. When you preserve a building you maintain rather than lose its embodied energy. In addition, the materials are generally more sustainable than new materials like plastic or steel that take massive amounts of energy to create. The Mills Act is essential to our livability and quality of life and the ridiculously small amount of money we are discussing here should be considered an amazing deal for economic investment in our cities future. The Mayor and the City should bear in mind that while Talking Green, the Greenest Building is one that is already built. We challenge the Mayor to not only maintain the Mills Act, but to expand its incentives. San Diego is the Plymouth Rock of the West. We should be Leading, not Lagging. Sherman Heights Resident: – Historic designation in our community was a tool for preservation of the community, not just our treasured historic resources, but also the existence of a market-driven low income housing stock. In the mid 1980s, this neighborhood was threatened. The City Council passed an ordinance with a moratorium on building in Sherman Heights. With community input, this led to the creation of the Sherman Heights Historic District, long before the Mills Act was available to reward property owners. The Mills Act is working for San Diego and Sherman Heights. Kensington Resident: – My home was built in 1927, it is not in the Mills Act. One reason we purchased the home was to work towards the Mills Act and we started the process 3 years ago to work towards that. It is not an easy process. You have to weigh the Mills Act and the historic features you have to keep with the home. It is not an easy task but it is one of love. I encourage you to come to Kensington, get on a bike, ride around and look at these homes that have Mills Act and some of these older designated older homes and you will really appreciate the skill, the craftsmanship, and the love that some of these homeowners put into these homes. It’s not easy, but it’s something that we believe in and we believe it does help the neighborhood a lot. Native San Diegan: – I’ve been a corporate tour guide for 15 years and am here to put a face on the tourism industry in San Diego. I work with corporate incentive groups that come to San Diego – they get the decision makers who come to San Diego. We take them to corporate events and drive them through the City. I frequently detour them off the normal routes and take them through the neighborhoods. What ends up happening is you see their faces light up and they may not have come to San Diego because of the historic character of the houses, but they are realizing that they need to come BACK to San Diego. And they’re not going to come back alone, they are going to come back with their families, and they’re going to spend extra time, and they’re going to explore the character of our neighborhoods, because that IS one of the great things about San Diego. Over 15 years I’ve dealt with thousands of people and that’s always rewarding to see that response in their faces. In addition, part of the tone of Mayor Sanders’ changes is that we’re going to go into these hard-pressed neighborhoods, and frankly, that’s not where I’m taking my corporate groups. I’m taking them through the areas that have the nice homes already. South Mission Hills Homeowner: – It was a life-long dream of mine to own a historic home. I bought one of the oldest homes in south Mission Hills about two years ago and started to write my own report for historical designation, it took me almost two years. I turned it in last November and realized I was going to have to make a lot of changes to get my house designated. I’m up to about $32,000 dollars in changes, which is fine, it is a labor of love for me. I’ve taken out a home equity line to pay for these changes and I’m hoping I can use the Mills Act to offset some of those costs to maintain this home that is a National Folk House over 100 years old and made of redwood, so I’m going to have to maintain it through the years. If the proposed changes go through, I will not get the Mills Act, nor will anyone else in Mission Hills. The Mills Act is a blessing for us. San Diego Resident: – I think we have an incredible program that is being run for a very low amount of money. I hope it will be preserved as the core of the incentive program for historic preservation. | ||
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