Investors ask for change to housing amendments

Oct. 5—As the City Council prepares to approve a series of code amendments designed to remove barriers for new housing construction, some Astoria investors have requested a change to help preserve their ability to restore historic buildings by offering vacation rentals.

The amendments are in response to recent changes in state law intended to increase housing affordability and availability across Oregon.

Cities with a population over 10,000 — like Astoria — must comply with the new rules, which includes allowing duplexes on residential lots that allow single-family homes. The city must also expand opportunities for lot divisions for middle housing, which enables units in duplexes and triplexes to be sold individually.

The amendments were approved by the Planning Commission in July after a lengthy public process. The City Council held the first public hearing on the amendments in September and is expected to approve the changes later this month.

The code amendments would encourage infill and also incorporate recommendations made in Clatsop County's 2019 housing study.

One of the amendments would allow hotels and vacation rentals in commercial zones along the Columbia River and Port of Astoria under conditional use instead of permitted outright.

The revision is designed to give the public the opportunity to weigh in on the potential use.

However, some investors worry it will make it harder to bring dilapidated and vacant historic buildings back to life.

"For myself as an investor, making an investment with the risk of a conditional use permit not being approved, as opposed to knowing that we had an outright potential of a limited number of short-term units in a building would make the difference between me being interested in making an offer on a building or not," Trudy Van Dusen Čitović, the owner of Van Dusen Beverages, told the City Council on Monday.

Čitović, the daughter of former Mayor Willis Van Dusen, moved back to Astoria with her husband in 2018 and has invested in several historic buildings.

More difficult

Čitović was not convinced the amendment would lead to more housing, but said it would make it more difficult to restore some historic buildings. While she was supportive of the amendment's potential to limit construction of new hotels, she asked the council to consider adding a grandfather exception for historic buildings.

She pointed to the historic building next door to Oregon State University Seafood Research & Education Center as an example.

"That building is in extreme disrepair and is in a really difficult area because there's no foot traffic there," Čitović said. "So it's not a great place to put a retail establishment. It would require a ton of investment to turn it into anything at this point. And for myself, as an investor, the idea that there might be a potential to put even three to five short-term units somewhere in the back of a building like that, and then turn the front of it into something that's going to be more economically viable, whether that's housing or not, would really make the entire investment more palatable."

She said the city could put a limit on the number of vacation rentals, but that the exception would ensure investors have a reliable income while making the significant investment needed to improve the building.

Bob Magie, who has purchased properties including the historic Gilbaugh Apartments on Exchange Street, echoed Čitović's comments.

Magie and his wife, Cindy, converted the Gilbaugh Apartments into vacation rentals and have been working with the city to determine whether the conversion from long-term housing was allowed.

Magie said the restoration process is an expensive endeavor.

"And if it wasn't for the ability in the C-3 zone to do the short-term rentals, we wouldn't be able to do it," he said. "I mean, it's just so expensive."

Receptive

The City Council was receptive to the change, but opted to wait until City Councilor Tom Brownson and City Councilor Tom Hilton — who were excused from the meeting — were at the table to consider the exception.

"I mean, ideally, what we'd like to see, of course, is residential housing go into those buildings," Mayor Bruce Jones said. "And if there was a way the council could actually incentivize that, rather than simply allowing outright short-term rentals ... I'd be more in favor of that. But I don't know what tools we have available to us to actually incentivize housing in historic buildings that are otherwise not being restored because it's not economically feasible to restore them."

City Councilor Joan Herman thanked Čitović for the work her family has done to restore historic buildings.

She said the idea, on the surface, sounded like a good one.

"Because anything we can do to incentivize preserving our historic buildings, I believe we should try to do," Herman said. "But I also think it's important to give the public an opportunity to be able to speak out against a hotel project, which is not exactly what you're talking about. It is and it isn't, but we're not talking about a brand new four-story 60-room hotel."