Bradley Studios Approved by Planning Commission
The Large Affordable Development Was Nearly Stymied by Its Proximity to Mission Creek
Fifty-three additional units of affordable housing are all but assured of being built on lower Bath Street next year, thanks to a three-and a-half-hour-long City Planning Commission meeting Thursday, which yielded a unanimous approval of the Bradley Studios project. Now the Housing Authority of the City of Santa Barbara (HACSB) can meet an impending deadline for its application for tax-credit financing to build the structure. I was not in the room when the vote was taken, but the relief on the part of Housing Authority officials had to be palpable, as anything less than a majority approval would have killed the project’s prospects of getting that financing for a year, shelving the project, basically.
Discussion of the Bradley Studios complex—a large, bungalow-style development of efficiency studios for low and very low-income workers and chronically homeless individuals transitioning off the streets—took up the entire meeting and drew quite a swath of professional Santa Barbara to the crowded city council chambers: architects, environmentalists, developers, social service providers, activists, attorneys, and more. The vast majority of public comments favored the project. To read more, see homelessinsb.org.
