Why Phoenix City Council voted against a new self-storage business
A Phoenix City Council member went against staff recommendations and convinced all her colleagues to vote against a new business in her district.
On paper, it looked close to a done deal. The property owner of the southwest corner of 35th Avenue and Paradise Lane — that’s between Greenway and Bell roads — went through the process to pitch a self-storage business by filing an application and requesting a minor zoning change.
“You have commercial property on it today, the property owner has owned it for over 10 years, it’s been commercially zoned for over 20,” said David Richert, the applicant’s representative. “What we’re offering here is a special permit that ties it down to a specific use of single-level self-storage facilities.”
Before reaching the City Council on Wednesday, the case went before the Deer Valley Village Planning Committee and the city’s Planning Commission. Both groups recommended approval.
“There were only one person on each who really had anything to say and it seemed to be more of a, 'We are ... sick and tired of self-service storage facilities,'" Richert said.
Councilwoman Ann O’Brien’s district includes the 1.5-acre site.
"This is a neighborhood I grew up in and at a time, where we are in a housing crisis, I expect that we could have opportunities for some housing here," O’Brien said.
O’Brien said her office was willing to work with the applicant while Richert said, “... Nobody ever came forward to do multi-family on this site, and I think that’s where Councilwoman O’Brien is and what she’d like to have done. However, that’s not a very receptive idea in the neighborhood.”
In 2020, the Phoenix City Council approved policy initiatives to create or preserve 50,000 housing units by 2030. As of Thursday, the city reported 25,157 units had been preserved or created.
Rent Cafe analyzed 100 markets and found the Valley ranked fifth most active for self-storage construction with 10 million square feet between 2012 and 2021. During the same period, metro Phoenix ranked fifth in volume for multifamily housing with 62,000 new apartments in buildings with more than 50 units.
Rent Cafe, an apartment and self-storage search website, projects 1.6 million square feet of new storage will be available across the Valley in the next two years.
