14 MONTEREY COUNTY WEEKLY OCTOBER 2-8, 2025 www.montereycountynow.com It’s been a long seven years of stops and starts for a proposed 75-unit, 100-percent affordable housing development on East Market Street in Salinas, but the pace is picking up, in part thanks to state legislation that streamlines approvals for the much-needed housing. Instead of multiple public hearings that could bog down the process, the project got a single informational hearing before the Salinas City Council on Sept. 23 as it heads toward administrative approval through the city’s Community Development Department. Sibley Simon is founder and president of New Way Homes, a nonprofit that makes use of investor funds to build affordable housing. “It’s taken a lot of work to figure out this site in a lot of different ways and work with the city on this, but we hope we’re at the point we can move more rapidly now,” he told the council. The project sits at 467 and 479 East Market St., currently the site of an aging storage unit business and a vacant lot. Simon formed Envision II LLC for the project—Envision II purchased the vacant lot in 2019 for $799,000. Simon said they will soon own the storage unit property as well. The first plan drawn up was eventually determined to be too expensive to build, given the rise in material costs over the past five years. “Housing is just a lot more expensive to build now,” Simon said. In the meantime, they discovered that the vacant site had a leaking gas tank underground that wasn’t on any records. The company received a $2 million grant from the state to clean up the site. Simon said there is more testing and cleanup ahead they hope to complete next year. New plans are being drawn up that Simon said they think they can get funding for. Those include a six-story building with five floors of housing, from studios to three-bedroom apartments, and above-ground-floor commercial space that will feature a kitchen incubator with nonprofit El Pájaro Community Development Corporation. El Pájaro CDC works with entrepreneurs to help them start, maintain and expand small businesses, in this case, food-related businesses. Simon hopes to break ground by spring 2027. Envision II submitted a Notice of Intent to use Senate Bill 423 and Senate Bill 330, also known as the Housing Crisis Act of 2019, both of which streamline the process to build affordable housing. SB 423 took effect on Jan. 1, 2024, extending the provisions of Senate Bill 35 that created a ministerial approval process for urban infill projects that provide multi-family or mixed-use where at least two-thirds of the square footage are for residential use. The public hearing on Sept. 23 fulfilled one requirement of SB 423, to hold a public meeting in order to give the public and the council an opportunity to comment. “I’m very happy that we’re moving forward,” Councilmember Gloria De La Rosa said. “If there are any barriers please let us know, so we can get this project and other projects that are going to come forward, so we can get housing built for everyone.” Speed Up A 100-percent affordable housing development in Salinas finally gets going. By Pam Marino A rendering of the design of a proposed 100-percent affordable housing development on East Market Street in Salinas. A previous design was deemed too expensive to build. NEWS “I’m very happy that we’re moving forward.” NEW WAY HOMES FUND
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