MERCED (California) SUN-STAR March 10, 2006 MIGRANT WORKERS GET MORE HOUSING Soon, the housing shortage for farmworkers will be over. For the last two harvesting seasons, migrants who labor in Los Banos and Planada fields have gone without cheap housing that gives them a temporary place to stay. That has forced them to live in RVs, garages or on the streets. Now, Merced County's Housing Authority plans to open a complex in Los Banos in May. It also hopes to have a housing center built in Planada by spring 2007. Both communities used to have farmworker communities that provided shelter for dozens of field workers for little more than $200 a month. But the housing centers were torn down in 2003 because the state said they were hopelessly in disrepair, said Nick Benjamin, director of the county's housing authority. Since then, Los Banos and Planada have struggled to deal with the housing shortage. "Anytime you have to reduce available housing, it always affects the community," Benjamin said. "You get two or even three families living in one house. There's a lot of impacts there." Benjamin said the Los Banos site was originally built in 1966 and was meant to last about five years. It was torn down 37 years later. He said the new housing centers in both Planada and Los Banos will last as long as most normal homes. The Los Banos site is slated to open May 15 and was built on the same nine acres just beyond the northwestern edge of town that the old complex was built on. It will house 48 families. The old site housed 78 families. Benjamin said constraints from state and federal budgets -- which fund the housing authority -- forced a reduction in the number of housing units for the $7 million project. Meanwhile, the Planada complex was unanimously approved by the county Planning Commission this week despite objections from nearby residents who said it violated the county's general plan. The $17 million housing center, which would replace the Felix Torres Migrant Housing Center in Planada and the low-income Planada Village, would be built a little less than a mile north of town on 21 acres of land. With room for 74 families during harvesting season and another 50 families for year-round housing, the Felix Torres Farm Worker Family Housing Center would be the biggest of the four migrant housing complexes in the county. Similar to the Los Banos site, the now-demolished Planada center was built in 1968 and was intended to last only five years. At a planning commission meeting on Wednesday, Benjamin said the old site was "completely inadequate." He added, "The need for migrant and year-round housing in this county is very profound." Benjamin said the 11 acres of land where the old site was demolished in 2003 will likely be used to build houses on in coming years. He said the housing authority is "working feverishly" to start construction on the Planada project by July. But Planada activist Bryant Owens said the new center violates the county's general plan, which is a guide that tells the county how and where it should put certain types of development and where farmland should be preserved. Owens said the general plan mandates that a housing center should not be built on agricultural land if non-agricultural land in the same area is available. The site for the new complex is zoned as agricultural, but Planning Department Assistant Director Bill Nicholson said it's common and legal for farmworker housing to be built on agricultural land. He said there are many other housing centers inside and outside the county that also put such complexes on agricultural land. "It's totally consistent with the general plan and housing code," Nicholson told the planning commission. Owens said he was frustrated that the housing authority closed down the original center in 2003 without first building replacement shelter. "They closed the camp and imposed hardship on the poorest section of the community," he said. Owens also argued that the housing authority didn't consider possible alternatives to the project and should have conducted an environmental impact report before approving the new center. He noted that, according to a planning department report, Planada's Municipal Advisory Council approved the new center without actually voting on the project. Benjamin said he's satisfied with how the planning department has responded to Owens' concerns. "I haven't seen the conflicts he's talked about," he said.
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