Approves amending Encinal Terminals Plan and lease with Pacific Pinball Museum
On January 7, City Council accepted an update on the Code Enforcement Program. The update highlighted code enforcement improvements and collaborations during 2024, sources of an increasing workload, and plans for the future. Plans include revising enforcement priorities, re-evaluating permit fees, establishing property maintenance standards, training staff for disaster response, and establishing new funding sources.
Council unanimously voted to modify intermediate milestones on a plan to develop multifamily housing at Encinal Terminals and to execute a three-year lease with Pacific Pinball Museum for a portion of Building 169 at Alameda Point.
Code Enforcement update
The Code Enforcement team in the City’s Building Division aims to preserve housing stock, alleviate blight, and address public nuisances. Building Official Oscar Davalos reported that they want to update their priorities to make life safety issues such as dangerous buildings, illegal housing units, environmental hazards, and removal of offensive graffiti their most urgent priority.
The next highest priority would be work without permits, repeat or escalated violations, and significant noise and air quality complaints. Lower priorities would include community nuisances such as abandoned vehicles, minor safety concerns, litter and waste complaints, aesthetic issues, and non-urgent noise.
Davalos highlighted recent low-cost changes to improve efficiency, such as using yellow door hanger notices for lower-risk violations. The tags address violations in plain view, such as overgrown vegetation. The yellow tags free staff from direct interactions to focus on more critical cases.
Davalos shared recent successful collaborations, such as with the Department of Public Works, to address issues of street cleanliness and illegal structures. In one case, Code Enforcement worked with the Rent Program to successfully relocate a family with young children living in two sheds before demolishing the structures.
In 2024, the Division’s workload more than doubled compared to 2020, when COVID-19 issues took precedence. The current increased workload results from an increase in complaints received, the Division being more proactive due to the prevalence of aging properties and unpermitted work, recent updates to state and local laws—including tenant protection and rent control ordinances, which add complexity to cases—and the rising cost of maintaining homes, particularly for fixed income seniors.
The Bay Area’s high cost of living and shortage of affordable housing particularly contribute to unpermitted conversions, overcrowding, blight, and deferred maintenance. Davalos acknowledged that addressing these challenges requires not only more proactive code enforcement but also consideration of economic realities.
Future plans
The Division plans to conduct a fee study to confirm that building permit fees support cost recovery for the City, remain within the cost of providing the service, and do not discourage property improvements. This past year, staff identified instances where fees for some permits, such as residential seismic upgrade permits, were unnecessarily high, potentially discouraging homeowners from making safety improvements.
Davalos reported that as Code Enforcement has expanded its responsiveness to address more non-building violations, its work has been increasingly underfunded. He asked the Council to consider increasing the General Fund contribution to the Division from 25% to 50%. Permit fees would cover the remainder of their budget. He would also like to establish a Code Enforcement Abatement Fund to fund immediate abatement of serious health and safety issues when the property owner cannot respond. Finally, he intends to apply for a $500,000 grant from the Department of Justice to enhance tobacco licensing enforcement.
Other plans include increasing the number of employees trained and equipped for disaster response and establishing property maintenance standards, thus providing clearer enforcement guidelines.
Davalos added that he began enforcement work as a volunteer in the City of Corona’s court enforcement program in Riverside County. He wants to start a similar volunteer program in Alameda. He concluded by saying, “I really appreciate working for this city. It’s beautiful. I believe our court enforcement program has a responsibility to maintain that.”
Council comment and vote
Council members acknowledged the hard work of the Building Division and Code Enforcement Team, emphasizing their critical role in public health and safety and the need for additional funding beyond permit fees, which are often prohibitively expensive. Mayor Marilyn Ezzy Ashcraft highlighted a specific case where high permit fees deterred a contractor from working in Alameda.
The mayor also expressed her strong support for leveraging volunteers to assist with code enforcement, noting that the City receives many more applications for boards and commissions than there are spaces to fill, and applicants often express their desire to serve their community. Council voted unanimously to accept the Code Enforcement Update.
Amending the Encinal Terminals Plan
Council voted to amend the Master Plan and Development Agreement for Encinal Terminals, a vacant lot at 1521 Buena Vista Avenue designated in the Housing Element as a housing opportunity site. The amendment will extend certain intermediate milestones by three years due to the current economic climate that makes implementation infeasible. The modifications will not change the 2037 end date of the Development Agreement or the design or scope of the proposed development. The design includes up to 589 multifamily housing units with 50,000 square feet of commercial space, a 160-slip marina, and 4.5 acres of public open space.
Mike O’Hara, who represented the developer, Tim Lewis Communities, highlighted the challenging economic conditions, noting that the project has faced difficulties since 2022. Rents have fallen by approximately 10% to 16%, while townhome sales prices have decreased by about 5%. Mortgage rates have more than doubled, rising from 3.25% for a 30-year fixed rate in 2022 to 7.25% in 2024. In the meantime, construction costs have increased by roughly 10% since mid-2022. This combination of factors has caused multifamily residential construction to slow throughout the East Bay, including in Alameda. The developer has nonetheless completed state approvals and legislative actions critical to the project’s viability. At the December 9 Planning Board meeting, O’Hara noted that the 15-year timeline included slack to accommodate periods of economic uncertainty.
Mayor Ashcraft stressed the need to maintain fences and prevent unauthorized access in the meantime. She expressed concern about whether extending the timeline would disadvantage a subsequent buyer but said she trusted staff’s expertise and experience in handling such matters.
Council voted unanimously to grant the milestone extensions on the condition that steady progress be made on forming the project’s assessment district and that biannual written reports be submitted to the City tracking economic conditions.
Pacific Pinball Museum lease
Council unanimously voted to authorize a 36-month lease for a portion of Building 169 at Alameda Point to the Pacific Pinball Museum, a nonprofit organization dedicated to preserving pinball culture and inspiring interest in science, history, and art through pinball. The building at 1680 Viking Street comprises two suites. The Museum has occupied Suite 101 as a warehouse and repair facility for pinball machines and related administrative functions since 2006. The Museum subleases a portion of the space to Navier, an electro-hydrofoil watercraft company. The Pacific Pinball Museum has a public-facing museum and art gallery on Webster Street.
Contributing writer Karin K. Jensen covers boards and commissions for the Alameda Post. Contact her via [email protected]. Her writing is collected at https://linktr.ee/karinkjensen and https://alamedapost.com/Karin-K-Jensen.
