Redco’s Willow Glen Apartments Advance After Appeal Defeat

A controversial mid-rise apartment project in San Jose’s Willow Glen neighborhood is moving forward after the city’s Planning Commission rejected an appeal aimed at scaling it back.

Commissioners voted to deny a challenge from nearby residents to Redco Development’s proposed 126-unit building, the Mercury News reported. Opponents argued that the seven-story structure at 940 Willow Street violated local design standards and would disrupt the surrounding neighborhoods filled with single-family homes.

The project qualifies for construction under California’s builder’s remedy, a provision of the state’s Housing Accountability Act that allows certain housing developments to bypass local land use laws and zoning rules in jurisdictions that lacked a compliant housing element at the time an application was filed. Redco submitted its preliminary application in June 2023, months before San Jose’s housing plan was certified by the state. That timing shields the proposal from many of the city’s typical planning constraints.

Redco’s project would replace a 5,500-square-foot commercial building occupied by a liquor store near Willow Street and Kotenberg Avenue. The plans call for 52 studios, 50 one-bedroom, 20 two-bedroom and four three-bedroom units. About 30 percent of the units would be income-restricted with 15 percent set aside for very-low-income households and another 15 percent for moderate-income renters. In Santa Clara County, very-low-income is generally defined as a maximum annual income of $70,350 for one person or $100,450 for a household of four. Without the builder’s remedy provision, the property’s commercial zoning could have required the project to be 100 percent affordable housing.

More than 1,800 residents signed a petition opposing the development, citing concerns about traffic, sewer capacity and the building’s scale in a low-rise neighborhood. Planning Commission member Michael Young acknowledged the project’s unpopularity but said the city had little legal footing to block it as it faces a growing housing crisis.

“There’s no question the developer has the legal ability to do the project,” Young said. “There’s a reason why the state has passed all the building and planning bills that they have… We don’t want anything to change. We just want our single-family neighborhoods to stay the same. [The] problem is that can’t happen anymore.”

The City of San Jose, under its housing element, must plan for 62,200 new units by 2031.

— Chris Malone Méndez