From HSCA Minutes: Multifamily dwellings/density

11/12/2010

Question to consider: Should we either push for a legislative change or an exemption to increase density to more than 5 unrelated people. ( California Supreme Court defined “family” as people who eat together.)

Answer:

We need to propose a change of that code to our county council members. The county code is vague. If he gets 22 people living in a house that are all related, it is legal.  Yet if there are 6 college students living together, that is not legal.  “Individual” is defined as one family unit.  So there might be five couples, and they are counted as five “individuals”.

Multiple dwellings on one land Parcel

-there is no code that permits several houses on one property for an extended family.  Nothing says that there has to be 50 feet between outbuildings and the main building, but the county tries to enforce that.  Can’t have an ohana on ag land anymore.

11/24/2010

John:

* Need for people/dwelling density on a piece of land can potentially be addressed via zoning type changes. For example, there are basically zero acres in all of Puna district zoned multifamily residential. Yet multifamily residential zoning categories already exist in county zoning code. And there is a process for requesting a change of zoning type.

Townhomes, condos, apartments are typical multifamily building patterns; co-housing is a more people-community-eco-focused recent evolution. It is a long shot to rezone Puna ag land to multifamily, and, it really needs to happen in particular in and around existing village centers and/or intended future village centers. Nothing sustainable about low density auto-based sprawl as we know it, regardless of how otherwise “alternative” it may be.