A developer wanted BSU student apartments to replace affordable units. Here’s what Boise decided
The residents at Ridenbaugh Place near Boise State University told the City Council about their fear of spending months trying to find new homes — or even becoming homeless — if the council rezoned a parcel to allow nearly 200 student apartments there.
If the proposed project moved forward, the 55-year-old, single-story buildings at the southwest corner of West Boise Avenue and South Protest Road would be demolished. They now house roughly two dozen units. The affordable homes for families and several elderly people would be gone.
In the end, nearly every person who spoke during hours of testimony at Tuesday night’s council meeting testified against the rezoning. That’s despite the fact that developer Collegiate Development Group agreed to offer assistance to displaced tenants through relocation support, including the option to return to the new development after it was built with discounted rent for three years; or up to $4,000 in moving funds for a one-bedroom apartment, and more for larger ones.
The four members of the six-member Boise City Council who were present at the meeting were split, leaving it to Mayor Lauren McLean to break the tie. Her vote was to deny the rezoning, which handed the current residents a victory.
McLean cited concerns about property use, transportation and what the project would mean for the city overall in explaining her vote.
“We cannot prevent the current property owner from doing something with the homes and the apartments that he owns, but we can come to the table at the time of a rezone to expect more and expect better for our residents,” she said.
The project from Collegiate, based in St. Louis, would have put a three-story building on the site, including more than 260 underground parking spaces for tenants. There would have been 196 units with a total of 541 bedrooms.
Céline Acord, a planning manager for the city, touted the relocation support offered by the developer as a “generous offer.” She said her team “has never seen this kind of package before.” But some worried it wasn’t enough.
“The project could take two years to build,” Janet Rollinger, whose house sits on property overlooking the land in question, told the council. “Are these residents going to find a new location for two years before they can even take the offer of moving back?”
Others worried what would happen when that time was up. The Statesman reported last year that rents would average about $750 per bedroom — an amount that would add up to much more than the “somewhere in the 800s” that a resident estimated his rent to be for his two-bedroom unit earlier this year.
Neighbors a little farther away worried about what more student housing across the street from Identity Boise, a student apartment building with dozens of units, would do to the neighborhood. Did developers and previous decision-makers pay enough attention to pedestrians’ needs? What about traffic concerns? Would hundreds of college students produce a lot of noise and bring down property values?
A few people cited the Planning and Zoning Commission’s decision to recommend denial of the project in February, when commissioners worried that the Ada County Highway District had not fully weighed in on the project and that BSU had not finished updating its master plan.
The city’s comprehensive plan calls for a mixed-use development in the area, and some argued that the small store and coffee shop that was planned for the ground floor of the proposed complex wasn’t varied enough to meet that requirement.
As for the council, President Elaine Clegg and Jimmy Hallyburton voted to deny the project. Clegg argued that the uses weren’t mixed enough and didn’t provide enough variety in the types of housing available. Hallyburton acknowledged that it probably wouldn’t be possible for residents to get a better relocation deal, but he didn’t think the project met the intentions of mixed-use development.
Holli Woodings and Patrick Bageant took opposite stances. Woodings said she understood how tenuous it was to be a renter but argued that it was ultimately the owners’ property to sell. She said she also felt that the surrounding mixed-use development, as well as what might be developed in the future, meant the proposed complex would fit with the neighborhood.
Bageant said he could see arguments on both sides, but noted that ultimately the affordable housing Ridenbaugh Place provides will go away.
“The person who buys it is going to be buying it to do something that they can make money with,” he said. “We don’t have any authority to tell them not to.”
Council members TJ Thomson and Lisa Sánchez were not at the meeting.
McLean said she hoped to see a different application for the property, one that addresses council members’ concerns.
“Then, it’s very likely I would be breaking a tie on a different side,” she said.
This story was originally published September 30, 2020 at 12:13 AM.
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