If half of the city’s six public courses were made available for development, said the Executive Director of a center for underprivileged youth, San Francisco could build up to 160,000 affordable housing units.
In an opinion piece published in the San Francisco Chronicle, Vivian Zalvidea Araullo, Executive Director of the West Bay Pilipino Multi Service Center, which provides “services to underserved Filipino and other ethnic minority youth,” advocated forming an independent task force to examine the feasibility of building affordable housing on some of San Francisco’s six public golf courses.
“San Francisco has tried historically to solve its affordable housing shortage through stop-gap measures that many believe to be counterproductive,” Araullo wrote. “What Mayor Ed Lee and the Board of Supervisors might consider is an independent task force to examine the feasibility of building affordable housing on some of the city’s six public golf courses that sit on more than 3,000 acres.
“If half of the public golf courses were available for development, San Francisco could build up to 160,000 affordable housing units,” Araullo said.
“San Francisco has nine golf courses, six of which are public,” Araullo noted. “The number of golfers, however, is declining in part due to changing demographics, including tech workers, renters and homeowners who prefer other sports to golf.
“The three largest [city] golf courses account for 1,330 acres,” Araullo added. “If the high-density zoning laws for [San Francisco’s] South of Market [region] were used, each acre could include up to 150 housing units. These units could all include public open spaces and recreation centers. They could also be tied to a new transit system that could bring workers to downtown within 20 minutes. This would clearly be of interest to developers presently facing community opposition, years of delay and millions of dollars in penalties.
“The key question is, what impact would this have on the city’s golfers?” Araullo added. “Probably zero, since three public golf courses would remain, as would three private courses in San Francisco and another 44 within short driving distance of the city.
“More than 100 years ago, San Francisco’s planners took a comparable step by barring the building of more cemeteries within the city on the grounds that the land was too valuable for cemeteries,” Araullo concluded. “It is a similar situation that we confront now. What’s a few golf courses in exchange for some 160,000 units of affordable housing?”
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