The Ketchum Planning and Zoning Commission will meet this evening to once again consider the merits of the proposed Warm Springs Ranch Resort.
The meeting, scheduled to begin at 5:30 p.m. at Ketchum City Hall, will include a new proposal from the developer to provide a revenue stream to fund affordable community housing.
Park City-based DDRM Greatplace hopes this proposal will help entice the commission to recommend the project for approval to the City Council, as it did in June. The commission is taking a second look at the project due to a council remand resulting from the developer's requested increase of up to 60,000 square feet for the block of the property that would contain the hotel, townhomes, workforce housing and the Warm Springs Ranch Restaurant.
Though the project's design includes workforce housing for 93 of the resort's employees, well over the 44 required by city ordinance, it previously had no provision for affordable housing available to the rest of the community.
Normally, city ordinance requires that community housing be provided based on the percentage of a hotel development not used for hotel operations. Because this is a planned-unit development application, the city can choose to waive the community-housing requirement if it decides there are enough ancillary benefits to the community.
When the commission approved the 77-acre, five-star resort in June, it waived any community housing requirements on the basis that the resort would provide economy-boosting, high-end "hot beds," meaning those available for rent, and had a significant workforce housing plan in place.
At a meeting in early December the commission deliberated on whether the request for significant additional square footage nullified the project's eligibility for such a waiver.
But before the commission could reconvene to continue the discussion, DDRM Greatplace CEO Stan Castleton stepped in with a proposed solution.
In a letter to the city on Dec. 16, Castleton offered to impose a 0.5 percent transaction fee on the sale of any unit or lot in the resort project. The money would be given to Ketchum once the sale is closed with the understanding that a "significant portion shall be used for community housing."
Castleton's proposal includes a requirement that the city match that amount with the additional property tax revenue it will receive through its urban renewal district as a result of construction of the resort. Richard Caplan, economic consultant for the city, said the tax revenue could total $13 million during the first 10 years of the project.
Castleton expects to make $600 million from sales of the resort's condominium suites, townhomes, villas and estate lots. Under the terms of his offer to the city, Castleton's program would net the city $6 million. The transfer fee would also be imposed on every subsequent re-sale of the properties.
In addition to this funding system, Castleton said that since the resort could employ up to 275 people, the developer would help those not housed on-site with rental housing subsidies, down payment assistance and mortgage buy-down programs.
"We understand and agree that one of the underlying premises of the WSRR project is to be a stabilizing source of economic and social benefits in the city on a long-term basis," Castleton wrote in his letter. "Community Housing is one of the several ways that WSRR will be able to contribute to such stabilization. In short, WSRR wants to be a good 'partner' and therefore proposes ... a more global solution."
The City Council is scheduled to meet next month to make a final decision on the project.
Stan Castleton
