Legal Service's latest target has been Folsom. After the agency threatened to block the city's bid to expand south of Highway 50, Folsom City Council members last week tentatively agreed to help develop 650 new units of low-income housing in the next four years, and to require 15 percent of units in new subdivisions to be affordable, Noling said. But even when local governments provide a supportive environment, it's still difficult to get such projects built in wealthy suburbs, said Lynda Timbers, executive director of Project Go, a nonprofit developer. There have been 1,280 affordable apartments and houses built in Roseville since 1988. That's more than most jurisdictions, but less than a third of what the Sacramento Area Council of Governments said in 1990 would constitute Roseville's fair share of the low-income housing needed in the region.
Builders often use federal tax credits to help finance affordable housing.
But each state is allotted a limited number of credits, and the competition is intense. It's difficult for more affluent areas to compete with those that might seem needier by having a lower per capita income, Timbers said. Meanwhile, existing residents often fight the placement of affordable housing in their neighborhoods, especially of apartments that will house families rather than senior citizens. In 1995, when Project Go built a housing complex for low-income families in Roseville's Johnson Ranch development, nestled against Granite Bay, it encountered a flood of objections, Timbers said. They were worried about junker cars, crime, drugs.