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It’s moments like watching her 1-year-old daughter take her first wobbly steps on the Cañada College campus that make Michiko Kealoha really feel part of the community.
Kealoha, an employee of the community college, moved with her family into a two-bedroom, below-market-rate apartment in the Cañada Vista complex on campus in October. The development is located at 1 Olive Court on 3.8-acre of land annexed from Woodside to Redwood City in 2008.
“Visiting with my colleagues has really meant a lot,” said Kealoha, a student life and leadership manager at Cañada. She moved in when she was returning from maternity leave when the campus reopened following the COVID-19 pandemic lockdown. “Housing in the Bay Area is difficult, impacted and expensive. The timing worked out beautifully. My spouse just started at a brand new job in Redwood City and we are able to build up a community which has been so incredible.”
She said she’s been saving about $800 to $900 a month by living on campus, in addition to not having to fill up her gas tank to commute from her former home in Pacifica. She intends to stay through her seven-year lease.
More housing could be coming to the Woodside community college. A quarter of Woodside’s proposed housing element plan ( 328 units total) includes developing 80 staff and faculty apartments at the college.
The San Mateo County Community College District has identified several locations on the Woodside campus where it could develop housing. There are already portions of campus designated for multifamily zoning, which was approved by the town during the 2015-23 housing element.
Cañada Vista
The Cañada Vista development includes two, three-story buildings with a mix of one-, two- and three-bedroom units, and a community/recreation center, according to the project developer’s website. A one-bedroom unit rents for $1,175 to $1,400 monthly, while a two-bedroom costs $1,450 to $1,600 per month, according to Ana Maria Pulido, the college district’s director of public affairs. The average rent in Redwood City in February was $3,255, according to Rentcafe, an apartment listing service.
On-campus district housing is available, for up to seven-year leases, to faculty and staff members who plan to be first-time homebuyers in the future, according to the district website. Employees are strongly encouraged use the money they save on reduced rent toward a down payment for a house in the area. The district also has a loan program for first-time homebuyers that helps supplement a down payment.
In the 2015 housing element, Woodside town staff said the land in the 2015 multifamily housing overlay at Cañada College could be used to develop affordable senior housing, which was not built during its eight-year cycle.
Town staff said in a recent memo to the Woodside Town Council that in the San Mateo County Community College District’s draft facilities master plan, there is a need for 250 units across its three campuses. The district noted that it doesn’t yet have the funds to construct all those units.
The master plan does not specify a number of proposed housing units at each campus location, though an official with the district said it would be fair to assume about 80 units, roughly one-third of the needed 250 units, could be at Cañada College if funding becomes available, the memo states.
A former Cañada Vista resident
Megan Rodriguez Antone, director of community relations and marketing for Cañada College, lived at the Cañada Vista for almost five years before saving enough money to buy a home in Castro Valley in 2020. She and her husband were on the waiting list for the below-market-rate housing complex for a little under a year.
“I wouldn’t have been able to save money at the rate I did without the savings living at Cañada Vista,” she said. She estimates they saved about $1,000 a month. “Now that I’m commuting I really miss living close. … It was a seven-minute walk from my apartment door to my office door. … I had the opportunity to get to know other colleagues from other colleges; you see them when walking your dog.”
The college district doesn’t track which employees who had lived in the rental housing have since bought homes, according to district spokeswoman Ana Maria Pulido.
As part of the agreement between Woodside and Redwood City, 24 of the 65 housing units required to be built in Woodside between 2007 and 2014 through the Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA) process were transferred to Redwood City’s allocation. Under the agreement, Woodside’s RHNA number was reduced from 65 to 41 and Redwood City’s number was increased from 1,832 to 1,856.
Other community college housing projects
The college district also opened the College Vista housing project at College of San Mateo in 2005, according to a town staff report.
The district is building 30 units of housing at Skyline College in San Bruno. College Ridge is a three-story complex on a 2-acre site located on campus, according to the district website.
There will be one-, two- and three-bedroom apartments in two 15-unit buildings. The buildings connect to two native landscape outdoor areas.
For more information on district housing, go here.
