Westminster panel to consider 30% affordable-housing density bonus

Westminster’s Planning Commission is scheduled to hold a public hearing Aug. 11 on a proposed 2040 Comprehensive Plan amendment that would allow qualifying affordable-housing developments up to 30% more density than the plan otherwise permits.

The proposal would exclude the Downtown Westminster and Westminster Station Specific Plan areas, where density allocations were based on assumptions about ultimate utility capacity, the commission’s Aug. 11 packet says. The commission has not acted on the amendment; the City Council would make the final decision.

Under the proposed definition, a new attached or detached single-family or multifamily development would qualify if at least 50% of its units serve households earning no more than 80% of regional median income as defined by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development. Related glossary language also addresses existing or proposed multifamily housing, enforceable affordability restrictions and programs recognized by HUD, the Colorado Housing and Finance Authority, the Colorado Department of Local Affairs and applicable law. It distinguishes an 80% income limit for rental properties from a 120% limit for owner-occupied properties.

The bonus is intended for future income-restricted developments, according to the staff memo. Staff’s example uses a five-acre site where the plan allows 18 dwelling units per acre: the standard calculation would allow 90 units, while a 30% bonus could allow 117. The example is not tied to a pending project. The packet identifies two affordable-housing projects approved in the past five years outside the excluded areas — Maiker at the Uplands, with 70 units, and Overlook at the Uplands, with 247 — but does not identify a project that would use the proposed bonus.

Staff lists no city expenditure or funding source for the amendment. Public Works and Utilities found the potential water-supply impact would be de minimis, the memo says, while noting that site-specific infrastructure capacity would be reviewed with future applications.

The city calendar lists the hearing for 7 p.m. Tuesday, Aug. 11, at Westminster City Hall. Staff recommends that commissioners hold the hearing and recommend City Council approval. The commission could recommend approval with conditions or denial. The current record contains no hearing result, commission amendment, council action or adoption date, and no testimony or correspondence from advocates, residents or developers about the proposal.

The amendment is separate from — but related to — Westminster’s broader rewrite of its Unified Development Code, which covers zoning and subdivision rules, parking, signs, rentals, historic preservation, telecommunications, oil and gas and floodplain regulations. The June 23 Planning Commission addendum describes a public-review draft that also includes provisions for adaptive reuse, infill, redevelopment and office and industrial development, as well as previously reported housing changes such as more housing types, accessory dwelling units and an affordable-housing density bonus.

Staff told commissioners the rewrite would replace eight separate development-rule documents with one code. The draft generally would reduce minimum parking requirements by about 40% to 50%, with further reductions possible through parking studies, shared-parking credits and transit-proximity adjustments, according to workshop materials.

Comments in the addendum questioned exemptions for the city and some affiliated public-purpose entities, including the Westminster Housing Authority and Westminster Economic Development Authority. Other comments questioned whether sustainability provisions could raise housing costs, objected to restrictions on vehicle storage or repair in parking areas, and said the affordable-housing bonus may require a companion Comprehensive Plan amendment.

The city calendar lists the June 23 item as a workshop, not a hearing or vote. Staff said it was reviewing more than 1,400 public and internal comments and expected to prepare a revised draft later in 2026, likely in the fourth quarter, before sending it to City Council. The record does not establish a hearing date, recommendation date or adoption schedule for the broader rewrite.