The Brentwood City Council has approved a housing development project last week, following changes to portions of the plan amid concerns about equity and the neighborhood impact.
Changes for the Hanson Lane project included increasing the park size and adding a masonry block wall, along with other language revisions in the plans for the 94-home development on 19.73 acres bound by Lone Tree Way to the north and Hanson Lane to the south.
During Tuesday’s meeting last week, City Councilmember Jovita Mendoza took issue with how the acres for the parks were calculated — a calculation she said seemed to benefit the developer, not the residents — and called for a larger parcel than initially proposed in the latest iteration.
She also raised the point that the city’s District 2 and the area around the houses in discussion is 40 percent Latino, while highlighting the differences in amenities there compared to the wealthier side of town.
“They don’t have sidewalks, they don’t have underground wires, they don’t have parks. To me, it’s either elitist or racist — it’s one of the two or maybe a combination of both — but that is how I feel when I see something like this. Why do people of color continually have to live with less than other people?” she asked, adding that she lives on the “nice side” of town. “I’m very blessed and I know it, and I look at the other side of town and ask, ‘Why do we keep screwing them on parks?’”
They don’t have sidewalks, they don’t have underground wires, they don’t have parks. To me, it’s either elitist or racist — it’s one of the two or maybe a combination of both — but that is how I feel when I see something like this. Why do people of color continually have to live with less than other people?
City Councilmember Jovita Mendoza
The plan by applicant MLC Holdings Inc., a subsidiary of Meritage Homes Corporation, will include 12 affordable units dispersed throughout the complex, which will feature four-bedroom homes ranging in size from 2,541 to 2,771 square feet. As the project application was deemed complete in January 2022, it is subject to a city ordinance that requires the project to provide 10 percent of total units as affordable units.
The proposed project will provide 13 percent affordable units with five reserved for very low-income households, four reserved for low income, and three for moderate-income.
Following a Planning Commission meeting on Sept. 19 — during which time, residents with land at the end of eastern Lone Tree Way raised concerns with traffic, increased litter along Marsh Creek, and the development of a housing tract near their agricultural land — the applicant proposed to install with the project a 6-foot “good neighbor” fence. Also added to the plan were parks, which were later deemed too small.
‘Not enough land anymore’
During the City Council meeting last week, a Spanish-speaking couple stood at the speaker podium with a translator, Maria Sanchez — also a resident of Lone Tree Way who raised the concern at the Planning Commission meeting in September that notifications about the development were only sent out in English, excluding the Spanish-speaking community from important information about the possible changes.
Sanchez said she took it upon herself to create flyers in Spanish for the landowners in the area. She translated the couple’s concerns about tall houses overlooking their property, increased traffic and the loss of land.
“We will be leaving not enough land around Brentwood, which we call ‘tierra’ — not enough land anymore. We’re building homes and homes,” Sanchez said.
After public comment, council deliberation and staff’s edits to the plan, the council unanimously approved the project. Councilmembers also thanked Kevin Fryer of Meritage Homes for listening to the concerns of the community and working with them to adjust the development plan.
Mayor Joel Bryant said he would like to see the city accommodate the concerns as much as possible but noted the city needs to build homes in order to meet affordable housing mandates.
“We have generational families that have been here for many, many generations — some well over 100 — that their family members can no longer live here because they can’t afford to,” he said, adding that it’s disingenuous for people to demand both affordable housing and no more housing.
“So we have a balance that we have to maintain of building accessible, high-quality homes that accentuate a desirable lifestyle that our families have and that do not overcrowd,” Bryant said.