About a year ago when the Arlington Greens were just beginning their advocacy of a public housing authority in Arlington to better deal with affordable housing, the Arlington County manager appointed yet another “Arlington Housing Taskforce” to come up with solutions for this problem.

She and the county board refused to appoint an Arlington Green representative of course, and the taskforce has the usual group of insiders, Democratic Party supporters, government contractors, and others seeking favors or funds from the county government.

Not too many “new ideas” in that bunch. Yet another example of government appointing yet another taskforce and coming up with recommendations not likely to be implemented nor to be effective in any event even if implemented.

Then the county housing department spends $375,000 to hire a GMU professor to further “study” the issue and support this aimless group. So a county government supported group of citizens over the past year has done nothing and now needs $375,000 contractor to support it in its work which consists mostly of hot air.

What is to study about Arlington’s affordable housing program except that is an abject failure-failing to stem the tide of nearly three-quarters of existing affordable rental housing disappearing since 2000, and that the county’s nearly $60 million a year program needs to be junked.

This past week of February 21, the taskforce came up with housing principles (see link below). These principles are clichés and nonsense. For example:
http://arlingtonva.s3.amazonaws.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/15/2014/02/Housing-Study-APPROVED-DRAFT-PRINCIPLES.pdf

Affordable housing should be safe and decent.
Wow, pretty radical. Does anyone in their right mind think that housing of any sort should not be “safe and decent?” Then they have to hire a bigshot GMU professor at $375,000 to help this hapless group come up with this drivel.

No housing discrimination in Arlington!
Wow. That is also against Federal, Virginia and county law, already.

County government leaders should be involved in affordable housing solutions.
Wow again. YOU THINK?? Arlington is already the second most expensive place in the entire region and the state to rent; about three-quarters of the current affordable rental stock is gone, and you think your elected county leaders ought to be involved? Over HALF of county residents rent today; don’t you think that leaders should be worried and concerned about how tenants are treated and excessive rents?

Some cynics think that today the county board members are only concerned about the profits of big time developers in Crystal City and Rosslyn, and forget the wellbeing of the majority of people who live in Arlington who rent their homes.

Just my opinion.

The rapid exit of many Defense Department agencies from both Crystal City and Rosslyn left an astounding 25 percent of the existing commercial office buildings empty in the fourth quarter 2013, according to the Arlington Economic Development Office. The overall Arlington commercial office vacancy rate is not much lower—20 percent in the fourth quarter 2013 (Economic Indicators, http://www.arlingtonvirginiausa.com/?LinkServID=8CBD27F2-1D09-08FB-3B16404C0DD82AE3&showMeta=0

The vacancy rates in Ballston and Virginia Square area are now 15 and 17 percent, respectively. The Northern Virginia average vacancy rate is now about 17 percent so there are plenty of other vacant buildings in other Metro adjacent areas competing for office building tenants, particularly along the Tysons Corner -Reston corridor. These buildings become more attractive with the opening of the Silver Line.

Arlington vacancy rates are going to rise higher as more Defense agencies and related military contractors leave Arlington for military bases like Fort Belvoir owing to BRAC. The General Services Administration (GSA), the real estate arm of the Federal Government, has so far terminated about 20 building leases in Crystal City the most impacted area in the Metro region through the end of 2013, and will end another 34 building leases by 2019, according to a Washington Post article (“D.J. OBrien, “CoStar: Despite jump in office vacancy rate, Crystal City shows resilience,” September 29, 2013.)

The end of 20 building leases led in part to a 25-percent vacancy rate in Rosslyn and Crystal City, the end of another 34 building leases is going to raise the vacancy rate much further.

There are a total 22 million square feet of commercial office space in Rosslyn and Crystal City (9 million and 13 million square feet, respectively), 5 million square feet vacant. A typical, 11 story- office building has about 225,000 square feet of usable space, and thus there are the equivalent of 22 empty office buildings in Rosslyn and Crystal City today.

A typical residential apartment building of 11 stories can accommodate around 200 apartments; this was the size of a recent residential apartment building in Crystal City built over the old post office site. Twenty-two commercial office buildings renovated into residential apartments could provide roughly 4,400 apartments; more if the units were smaller in size.

How much would a vacant office building cost to acquire? The county recently purchased a fully occuppied 7-story office building at the Courthouse for use as a county office building and homeless shelter for $27 million. An empty office building is worth considerably less since the dollar value of a building is largely a function of the office rents received or potentially received.

If an empty 11-store office building can be acquired for $20 million and potentially converted to 200 apartments of about 1,100 square feet each, the un-renovated cost of each apartment is about $100,000. Keeping renovation costs down to $100,000 per apartment, would mean an affordable apartment could cost $200,000. If the building contained 200 small efficiency 600 square foot apartments and 100 1,100 square foot apartments, were built instead of the larger 1,100 mix, the average costs would be $170,000-$70,000 per unit acquitision and $100,000 per unit renovation.
This cost is still below what the most recent affordable apartment complext cost ($250,000 per unit at Arlington Mills).

Together Rosslyn and Crystal City have 13,000 residential units (respectively 7,000 and 6,000). Another 4,000 apartments would increase their total residential units by about 30 percent, and bring in a good mix of mixed income residents. Neither area has an abundance of affordable units; Rosslyn in particular has lost many thousands of low rise affordable apartments owing to gentrification.
Both areas are “office building deserts,” lacking a good balance of residents and commerce. From an urban planning perspective, adding 4,000 affordable apartments would be good.

Arlington today needs about 14,000 more residential apartments to meet its shortage of affordable housing, according to the Va Tech Center for Housing Research. If 4,000 affordable apartments could be acquired at a modest cost from owners of empty office buildings, it would be a major boost to meeting the shortage.

Arlington County owing to the high cost of acquiring or building new apartments (even on public land) has been unable to add even 300 units annually. In 2013, the county added only 55 units. Meanwhile market forces eliminate about 900 units annually owing to demolition, (more…)