Every city official in Key West will tell you that our affordable housing shortage is their No. 1 concern. But the way the city parceled out the 54 housing units recently granted to us by the state Department of Community Affairs (DCA) tells the real story. In a recent Key West Citizen story, City Planner Ty Symroski gushed that "at least nine" of the residential Rate of Growth Ordinance (ROGO) units would be reserved for affordable housing. But if creating affordable housing is really our top priority, how come all 54 units weren't dedicated to the cause?
Or why not even the one-third that the city requires of private developers? The answer is that most of the 45 units are going to developers on a "waiting list" that was started after the city squandered our previous allotment of ROGO units. As Mayor, I fought in vain against keeping this list, arguing that it improperly created vested rights that would limit the city's future options. I also objected to the fact that this list favored big developers— who have the resources to hire architects and lawyers years before commencing construction— over individuals and families who wanted to build only a single unit.
Of course, as the city's treatment of the 54 new units shows, they did in fact create vested rights. City residents caught in the affordable housing crunch must be wondering about the embarrassing silence coming from their elected officials. This silence is especially outrageous when you consider that Mayor Jimmy Weekley has gone to Tallahassee with his hat in his hand, pleading for more ROGO units to alleviate our affordable housing shortage.
He is quoted in the same Citizen article as saying that ROGO restrictions have "stymied local efforts to provide affordable housing."
The truth is, the main root of our affordable housing crisis has been the mismanagement of the residential ROGO units we already have. At least 1,000 of them— that we know of— have been illegally hijacked as vacation rental units.
This worsens the affordable housing shortage in two ways. First, it reduces the number of long-term units available for both rental and purchase, driving up prices for both.
Second, it creates room for more tourists, increasing the need for more service-industry employees who in turn increase the competition for long-term housing.
Right now the city's strong transient rental ordinance remains unimple-mented, pending the outcome of a legal challenge filed by property owners who illegally converted homes in Truman Annex and other places to transient use.
The law is unloved and undefended by the City Commission, which approved the measure only after being effectively forced to by their constituents and the DCA. And even if the law survives the legal challenge, city leaders' lack of enthusiasm for the measure will ensure that it is enforced as vigorously as its predecessor— that is, not at all.
So if our previous experience holds true, many of the 54 new ROGO units won't be going for housing anyway, affordable or otherwise. They will end up as vacation rentals.
When will we ever learn?