Napa County

DC&E led a consultant team in a multi-pronged update of Napa County's Housing Element. The project included the following components:

• Preparation of the Housing Element itself, which was eventually certified by the State Department of Housing and Community, resulting in Napa County's first certified Housing Element in 13 years.
• Identification of fourteen sites in four different areas of the county as potential locations for affordable housing development.
• Draft language for a new affordable housing zoning overlay.
• Combined programmatic and project-level environmental analysis of the Housing Element Update under Section 65759 of the California Government Code. On the programmatic level, the DC&E team analyzed potential environmental impacts from the Draft Housing Element Update ranging from new policies to encourage the construction of farmworker housing to changes in the number of annual permits allowed for affordable housing development. On the project-level, the DC&E team analyzed potential impacts from the addition of an affordable housing zoning overlay on the fourteen sites.
• An urban design study to consider the conversion of the 220-acre Syar industrial site to residential use. This site is one of the last developable, non-agricultural parcels in the county that could provide land for badly-needed housing. DC&E developed conceptual site plans for multi- and single-family housing and supporting commercial uses on the site.
• An analysis of the reauthorization of the County's growth control ordinance, known as Measure A.

One alternative developed for the General Plan Amendment Area includes a community park and elementary school along Soscol Avenue to form an open space transition between the road and the residential neighborhoods.