Housing and Community Development

Hello!  Our local component's Advocacy team has been tracking interest from our local planning department in developing "pre-approved" housing typologies (pattern book) for missing-middle scale housing. I noted that the new federal law includes "Authorizing a new grant program to help communities establish pre-approved housing designs, or pattern books, to help streamline and expedite local construction processes and build more homes", which will likely increase municipalities seeking to implement this kind of program. 

I have seen several examples of ADU typologies, but not necessarily town home and multiplex typologies. Does anyone have experience with this directly?  Is anyone aware of other jurisdictions actively working on this? 

Questions and concerns our group has raised:

• Liability and ownership of documents?
• Are you really saving time when each plan will need to be adjusted to meet the site constraints?
• Lack of accountability in CA process 
• Responsibility for modifications

Look forward to hearing input!

Best,

Amy Daniels, AIA

Chair, Government Relations AIA Middle TN 

So the city of Bend OR has issued 6 ADU plans that are "pre approved" but of course need the utilities specifically designed for the site. Our foundations here are not required to have a soils report as we are on lava rock and the plans do include raised foundation designs. What the city had to do was go to a local builder and have them produce the plans as the liability insurance requirements for architects or designers were untenable. Having to indemnify the city for instance. No local architect or designer wanted to touch it. They tried using the Chamber of Commerce first but they did not attract anyone either. Now we hate to give up work but the need is great and in the end I don't think it will hurt our local design community. Below is a link to the program.

 Pre-Approved Plans Program - City of Bend

Seattle has a series of pre-approved accessory dwelling unit plans available to browse here:  https://aduniverse-seattlecitygis.hub.arcgis.com/

In 2020, the city ran a competition to select up to 10 cottage designs to be 'pre-approved' (an expedited permit process for a standard stock plan).  As memory serves about 180 entries were submitted.  

Our firm had one cottage selected. We paid for the engineering and completed the permit set, while the city comped the review fees. They highlight our design on their site, along with other resources to lower the barriers for people interested in building a cottage, and when someone wants to proceed, they contact us directly.  They do not accept any liability for the use of the designs.  

The City restricts the cost of the license to use the pre-approved plan, but because each site is unique, we provide a complement of services to cover zoning, site planning, etc and assist the owners through the permitting process (which can be exceptionally daunting for most people). We're generally involved in the process through construction, even though the structure's design is already baked. Modifications to the design kick the owners out of the expedited permit track.  

Over the last five years, we've done thirty-plus cottages based on our initial pre-approved design.  Other jurisdictions in the Puget Sound are hopping on the wagon, each with different inflections on the policy:  Kirkland, Olympia, Everett, Lynnwood.  

Seattle has just closed a second call for designs to refresh the cottage designs available and expand to include middle housing. We submitted a range of projects, up to a sixplex, and it will be interesting to see the range of projects proposed!

There is a CA State bill proposing this. It's not approved yet.

https://calmatters.digitaldemocracy.org/bills/ca_202520260ab748

Also related, there is a non profit that has put together a pre-approved home catalog for Altadena fire rebuild. it's not TH or multifamily but a good example. 

https://www.foothillcatalog.org/