The low-income housing situation in Santa Maria comes down to this: the vacancy rate for income-restricted residences is 0.1 percent and the waitlist is five years long. Once people get into a unit, they stay. And it’s hard to get into a unit in the first place.
According to market study done by People’s Self-Help Housing, 57 households are on the waiting list for the 107 units of low-income farmworker housing the organization built in 1995 and 2004 south of Main Street in Santa Maria. The wait for families on that list could be five or more years. The U.S. Department of Agriculture recently awarded a $3-million, low-interest loan to the nonprofit that will go toward building another 34 units of low-income farmworker housing in the neighborhood.
“We can tell there’s a pent up demand,” said Morgan Benevedo, a project manager with the nonprofit. “With the presence of long wait lists and zero vacancies in the affordable comparables, the complex will easily be absorbed into the Santa Maria market area.”
These affordable housing units—Los Adobes de Maria I, II, and soon to be III—are earmarked for farmworkers in particular because the Central Coast has a lot of low-income workers in the agricultural industry. At least one person in the family has to be a farmworker for the household to be eligible to live in a Los Adobes unit.
“If you’re working in a packing plant or a field, you’re making less than the median income,” Benevedo said, adding that farmworkers, on average, make 60 percent or less than the median income.
With the median household income in Santa Maria at $51,675 per year for 2008 through 2012, according to U.S. census data, farmworker households are bringing in an estimated $31,005 on the high end of the income spectrum. The rents charged by People’s Self-Help are only 30 percent of that—so around $10,000 a year.
“We hear a lot from growers to do whatever we can,” said the nonprofit’s vice president, Kenneth Trigueiro.
Dinah Lockhart, the deputy director of the Santa Barbara County Housing and Community Development Administration, said the agricultural industry is an important sector of the county’s economy—about $1 billion worth—and that wages are competitive, but they’re also capped because farm owners have a certain wage they can pay in order to meet prices on supermarket shelves.
Data from the administration’s most recent five-year consolidated plan, which analyzes housing statistics and outlines where resources need to go, said that in the past, migrant workers used inexpensive motels in Santa Maria.
“However, these motels are now used year-round by individuals and families in need of affordable housing, and are not typically available as a source of migrant labor housing,” the plan said. “This [sic] underscores the need for temporary housing for migrant laborers, and low-cost housing for permanent, low-wage workers who remain in the county year-round.”
The USDA allocated the $3-million loan to help with Los Adobes as part of $29 million in loans and grants the department doled out to help build 10 different low-income units across the country that will provide affordable housing for farm laborers and their families.
“Housing is often the first step on the road to more economic prosperity for farmworker families,” USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack said in a press release. “These loans and grants will significantly improve the lives of farmworkers, who are vital to America’s agricultural sector.”
Benevedo said the USDA loan is a step toward securing the remainder of the funding People’s Self-Help will need to raise to build the units. The project is stimated to cost $11 million total.
Contact Managing Editor Camillia Lanham at clanham@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Nov 13-20, 2014.