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After neighbors on Keeler showed up at the Transportation Commission on Thursday complaining about the condition of their street in the hills, I decided it was time for another drive into the Berkeley hills. After hearing Councilmember Wengraf say during the City Council debate on the ADU Ordinance Tuesday evening that property owners in the hills didn’t know where to put their fences as the hills were moving and property lines weren’t clear, Keeler wasn’t the only reason I was curious.

Adding to the urgency, nothing was settled Tuesday evening. The Berkelely City Council ended in a split vote (4 to 4) on the Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs) Ordinance for the Hillside Overlay, the Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zones (VHFHSZ), and will take up the ADU Ordinance again next Tuesday, October 3. It is item 10 on the agenda. https://berkeleyca.gov/city-council-regular-meeting-eagenda-october-3-2023

Writing about adding ADUs aka granny flats in the Berkeley Hills is a constantly moving target.

The more I read, the more I dig, the messier it gets. Just this week J.K. Dineen wrote in the San Francisco Chronicle about the multiple vacant multi-unit buildings in San Francisco. That was a contrast to the usual stories with the usual rants about not building new housing, often quoting Scott Wiener or Buffy Wicks.

I’ve always wondered how many vacant housing units there are in Berkeley with the “for lease” signs that never seem to go away. We’re supposed to get that answer with the vacancy tax? 

Before leaving, I studied the online Berkeley street map and the Earthquake Zones of Required Investigation showing the fault lines and landslide areas in the North Berkeley Hills. Most of Keeler is in designated landslide areas and all of Keeler is in the Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zone. 

This is the link to the Earthquake Zones of Required Investigation map I checked. https://maps.conservation.ca.gov/cgs/EQZApp/app/  

The map opens to the entire state of California. Typing Berkeley into the box with the magnifier will center it over Berkeley. By clicking on the + symbol the map can be enlarged to the point where the street address is visible. From there you can click on an address and learn if the parcel is in a Fault Zone, Liquefaction Zone or Landslide Zone. The fault lines are broken black lines, areas of required investigation before building are yellow, landslide areas are in blue and yellow, and liquefaction is green. 

I didn’t stop to check if the map of the fault line and landslide areas was included with the open houses for sale I drove by; maybe next time. 

I’ve driven Marin and Spruce many times, but never deep into the North Berkeley Hills. This time I drove up and down the narrow winding roads filled with canyons and hills that are better suited to deer and wildlife than to the houses I saw packed in closely next to each other, hanging over cliffs or perched on hillsides. I didn’t count the number of times I crossed the Hayward Fault or meandered in and out of the earthquake zones of required investigation. 

There is no way to get a sense of the topography by looking at a google map. Even the 3D map versions are of little help in giving a true sense of the terrain. Nearly all of what I drove was designated as landslide zones. 

It is no wonder that Wengraf is so concerned about wildland urban fire. The evidence for the foolishness of adding density to an area that should have remained wildland instead of turning it into a densely packed urban area was everywhere. 

Tuesday, September 19, 2023, was the first time I can remember a split vote with the cuncil unable to reach a majority vote and continuing the agenda item to the next meeting (October 3, 2023). The presentations, public comment and debate on ADUs started after the evening break at 8 pm and ended at 11:15 pm with Hahn, Wengraf, Robinson and Arreguin on one side and Kesarwani, Taplin, Barlett and Humbert on the other. Councilmember Harrison was away representing the City. 

While Mayor Arreguin voted with Wengraf, Hahn and Robinson on the 19th, he was back at the podium in his State of the City presentation the next day talking about his aspiration to exceed the Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA) for the assigned 8934 new housing units in Berkeley. Instead Arreguin set his sights on adding 15,000 housing units in Berkeley and spreading them across all districts. That should keep the real estate and building industries and unions happy. They have lined up behind Arreguin with their endorsements in his run for State Senate Seat District 7. 

Fire Chief Sprague in his presentation on the 19th laid out the real Berkeley fire risk and concluded with “The scientific data presented in the supplemental, coupled with the region’s cyclic relationship with significant fire events, are the reason Berkeley Fire Department strongly believes that a moratorium should be considered on any development within the Fire Zones that: increases HU/ac [housing units per acre], reduces existing non-conforming 

[tructure Separation Distance – puts buildings closer together], increases population or increases the number of vehicles that will use the roadway during a wildfire.” 

ADUs and JADUs are supposed to be naturally affordable, because they are added to existing lots or to existing housing stock. An ADU is a completely independent living unit and can be detached or attached to a single-family home. A JADU (Junior ADU) is built completely within an existing home by converting/renovating an underutilized part of the house. 

For details: HCD Accessory Handbook https://www.hcd.ca.gov/sites/default/files/2022-07/ADUHandbookUpdate.pdf 

There is pressure to build enormous amounts of housing when population in California is in decline. The latest update from the California State Department of Finance projects population to continue to decline for the next several years and then slowly grow until it peaks in 2044 with a population increase of 635,426 over 2020 to 40,155,497. Then population falls into slow decline until by 2060 there are fewer people in California in 2060 than 2020. Document P-1A Total Population for California gives the revised year by year projections. https://dof.ca.gov/forecasting/demographics/projections/ 

It might be easier to follow by watching Marc Verville’s presentation to the Livable California organization on September 23, 2023. It is posted on YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qtVEkLx3-Qs 

You can turn the YouTube video instantaneously into a transcript by pasting the link into YouTube Transcript. It’s not perfect, but close. https://youtubetranscript.com/ 

The process to get to the 8,934 new housing units assigned to Berkeley to build starts with the California Department of Finance. The California Department of Finance creates the projections for population growth. This is turned over to the California Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) which turns the population projections into new housing needs to be built over an eight-year cycle. Then HCD breaks down housing needs by region and assigns the housing needs known as the Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA) to the Council of Governments (COG) which breaks it down further to cities and counties which must develop a plan called the Housing Element: where all this new housing can go to meet the assigned allotment in the eight-year cycle, currently 2023 – 2031. 

Berkeley’s regional COG is the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) of which our Mayor Jesse Arreguin is the President. 

Finding places to build means cities and counties with a shortage of vacant lots and “underutilized” buildings to demolish for new housing are pushed into upzoning, which is changing zoning to put more housing, more people on a lot, which adds more density, increases the value of the land and provides the incentive to demolish whatever happens to exist on a lot. 

ADUs and JADUs aren’t counted like houses and multi-family units, so they increase building structures, decreasing the Structural Separation Distance and adding population density, all while slipping under the radar except for being part of the RHNA count. 

The cities and counties aren’t actually building the housing (at least goes usually).l Building is in the hands of private/corporate developers/builders. When cities and counties have failed to meet their target allocation of building new housing midway through the eight year RHNA/Housing Element cycle, there is something called “Builder’s Remedy” which basically lets builders bypass zoning and approval processes as long as 20% of dwellings/units are for low-income households (up to $112,150 annual income for a household of 4 in Alameda County) or when 100% of the units are for moderate income households (up to $177,500 annual income for a household of 4 in Alameda County). 

You can read the entire chart of income levels by category by county starting on page 6. https://www.hcd.ca.gov/sites/default/files/docs/grants-and-funding/income-limits-2023.pdf 

The only problem with all of this is that it seems the California Department of Finance made a little(?) error in their overly ambitious projections of population growth moving into the current RHNA cycle. Instead of fantastical future growth, the population in California is actually in decline. The Department of Finance press release of May 1, 2023 laid the ground that population projections had been overly optimistic. https://dof.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/sites/352/Forecasting/Demographics/Documents/E-1_2023PressRelease.pdf 

The new updated population projections made public in July 2023 set the total California population gain for 2031, the year this Housing Element cycle ends as only 11,957 more people than 2020. 

In January 2021, ten months into the pandemic, when California population was in decline, ABAG (under the leadership of Arreguin as President) in its ABAG Plan Bay Area 2050, their plan for the future, used the fantastical growth for the Bay Area of 51% since 2015. The Plan Bay Area 2050 projected population growth of 1,367,000 for just the Bay Area. https://www.planbayarea.org/digital-library/plan-bay-area-2050-final-blueprint-growth-pattern 

Back to the RHNA assignment to Berkeley to build 8934 new housing units: It is based on those old fantastical growth projections, not the Department of Finance July 2023 revision. The Housing Element for Berkeley and every entity in California is built on population growth that the Department of Finance no longer supports. 

HCD is still operating on those old projections,holding cities to building housing for fantastical population growth predictions. Other cities are resisting, with some suing over the RHNA assignments, but not Berkeley. 

In 2022, Berkeley ranked as 84th in density in the U.S. When the ranking is narrowed to cities between 100,000 and 150,000, Berkeley is the second densest city in the nation. Listening to Arreguin, it sounds like his intention is to surpass that second in density rating. The agreement Arreguin negotiated with UC Berkeley Chancellor Carol Christ appears to put student population growth on the accelerator. That agreement which can fill an entire Planet issue is a subject for another day. 

On to the ordinance to add ADUs in the benign sounding “Hillside Overlay.” That title encompasses all of the hazards which are layered on top of each other, the Hayward Fault, the designated landslide areas and the Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zone and Wildland Urban Interface. 

After multiple stops and starts, City Council separated the ADU Ordinance into two Ordinances. The first ADU Ordinance covering all of Berkeley except the Hillside Overlay passed in a unanimous vote on January 18, 2022. It was modeled on Councilmember Kesarwani’s Supplemental encouraging adding ADUs. 

The ADU Ordinance for the Hillside Overlay based on the Hahn-Wengraf revised material for fire safety requirements using the public safety exception was passed on January 25, 2022. While allowing ADUs, it included firm setback requirements for building separation at property lines, prohibited intrusion into the setbacks and rooftop decks and included off-street parking requirements 

There were memorable points in that January 2022 evening. While there was overwhelming public comment in support of the Hahn-Wengraf supplemental, there were a few outliers like Todd Andrew, who commented that evacuation in a fire would not be a problem as people would be driving down Marin. 

When Wengraf took the floor after public comment closed, she shared the video of people evacuating in the 1991 Oakland-Berkeley Hills fire where 25 people died. It was pretty raw. Wengraf said this as she commented on the video, “this is what an evacuation looks like. There is no such thing as an orderly peaceful choreographed evacuation. It’s chaotic, it’s driven by fear and panic and everybody is racing for their lives.” 

What I remember most about the January 2022 evening was not the end of the evening with seconds running out in a 5 to 4 vote when Councilmember Bartlett said he thought he voted the wrong way and asked for reconsideration to change his vote. In the 5 to 4 revote, Bartlett sided with the motion based on the Hahn-Wengraf Supplemental. 

The memory that stood out the most from that evening was Councilmember Kesarwani’s long winded comment on the simmering resentment of perceived inequity between the North Berkeley Hills and the “flats,” South and West Berkeley. An excerpt of her comments is included here: 

“…I do have to say that those stone pillars that mark the areas of the city that were designed to exclude people of color…you know that does sting, that stings for me as a woman of color and that stings for my constituents and I just want to share with you my perspective that when you put forward limits that are very much different from what the rest of the flats are doing are going to be part of the housing solution that does rub some of us the wrong way and I’m trying to see your perspective and spend a lot of time driving around the hills on those narrow winding streets and I do want to say that it is unsafe up there. There are real concerns. But I do think we also have to figure out how can we do, how can we affirmatively further housing. You know that’s fair to the whole city, but that also mitigates wildfire risk and that it is my view that we follow the minimum requirements of state law and as it relates to ADUs.” 

While Kesarwani acknowledged the real fire danger, more important to her was fulfilling equity, that the hills did not have exceptions and were under the same conditions as the flats for adding ADUs. That stand lost to public safety in January 2022. 

The perception of privilege and the impacts of redlining lingers. The demographic chart of the Berkeley City Council Districts by race and home ownership tells the difference. In addition, the hills create a natural barrier to the homeless encampments that settle in the flats mostly in Districts 1, 2, and 3 with smaller encampments in District 4. 

On October 17, 2022 HCD sent a letter to Jordan Klein, Director of Planning and Development Department stating that Berkeley’s ADU Ordinances did not comply with State Law. 

Now we are back at this again, with a split City Council on what to do about adding ADUs in the Hillside Overlay with its many dangers, the Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zones, the Hayward Fault, and designated Landslides Zones. 

X The landslides were ljast January . Significant fires cycle about every 20 years. The last major fire was 32 years ago, 1991. Berkeley is overdue. In 1868 the ground on the Hayward Fault line shifted six feet. A major earthquake on the Hayward Fault is overdue too. 

There is limited egress and ingress to the Very High Fire Hazard Severity Zones. 

How will thousands of residents in the Berkeley Hills evacuate while the Fire Department tries to make it in? All we really have are Marin and Spruce. Grizzly Peak through the very high fire zone really isn’t a way out. 

Chief Sprague has a lot more worry than the thousands of residents in the Berkeley Hills. He has the department firefighters. Adding to all of this is climate change, the dangerous winds where fires create their own weather patterns. Fires can go up or down the hills and canyons. Embers can float in the wind and start new fires including in places not expected to burn like Coffey Park in the Tubbs fire. 

Will City Council ignore the warnings from Fire Chief Sprague and acquiesce to HCD or will City Council heed the warnings and put forth the case to attend to public safety first? Will the simmering resentment over perceived privilege put the entire city at risk? These are open questions. Wengraf called on City Council to challenge HCD. There are strong arguments to be made.