Candido Rosales spent more than 30 years working at flower farms. In retirement, he is still searching for something he can afford: a home where he, his wife and their daughter can live together.
Rosales rents a room. His wife and daughter, who recently arrived from Mexico, stay in a separate home with family.
“There’s nowhere to live or for all three of us to live together. It’s very difficult,” he said in Spanish.
His struggle is part of the debate over Measure Q, which asks Half Moon Bay voters whether to uphold agreements allowing an affordable housing project for senior agricultural workers on city-owned land near downtown.
Supporters say the homes would give aging farmworkers a chance to retire with dignity. Opponents question whether the five-story development is the right size for its location.
Known as 555 Kelly, the proposal includes 39 income-restricted apartments and one manager’s unit at 535–555 Kelly Ave. The city lists the estimated cost at $41.6 million.
Half Moon Bay’s City Council adopted the ordinance approving the agreements with Mercy Housing on May 5. But opponents gathered enough signatures to force a referendum.
A yes vote would uphold the ordinance, including a 99-year ground lease at $1 a year. A no vote would reject it. The measure requires a simple majority to pass.
If Measure Q fails, the ordinance would not take effect, and the council could not reenact it for one year, according to the city.
Belinda Hernandez-Arriaga leads Ayudando Latinos A Soñar, or ALAS, the nonprofit partnering with Mercy Housing on the project.
“We have seniors here from 60 and into their 80s working in the field, believe it or not,” she said.
Hernandez-Arriaga said farmworkers live in a patchwork of accommodations, including employer-provided housing that charges rent, barracks, trailers, campers and small spaces shared with other families. Some live in their cars, she said.
The proposed development would pair apartments with community space and support services.
State Sen. Josh Becker, who secured $2 million in state funding for the project, said the 2023 Half Moon Bay mass shooting exposed substandard living conditions at farms.
For senior farmworkers who have spent decades doing physically demanding work, Becker said, the development offers a chance for a “safe, dignified retirement.”
He also pointed to its proximity to health services and a church as reasons the location makes sense.
Opponents say the project’s height could change the downtown’s character.
Hal Bogner, who helped organize the referendum through Let Half Moon Bay Voters Decide, said the dispute is about whether the city will remain a place of three-story buildings or move toward taller developments.
Opponents also cite traffic, safety and the plan for only 18 on-site parking spaces. They dispute the transit designation used to justify a fifth floor under state density-bonus law.
Former Mayor Mike Ferreira said an earlier proposal was only for a four-story building. He criticized the approval of a fifth floor, questioning the transit designation used to justify the added height.
Hernandez-Arriaga said the extra height made more sense economically and was not much taller than a building across the street from 555 Kelly Ave.
The financing plan relies on county and state grants and loans, along with tax credits, according to the city. Opponents question whether Half Moon Bay could face future costs.
Becker emphasized that the project draws on state affordable housing programs.
“It’s not funded locally,” he said. “It’s money from the state, it’s money for affordable housing programs.”
Under the agreements, Mercy Housing would be responsible for constructing and maintaining the development. It must also meet financing and other predevelopment conditions before entering into the ground lease, according to the city attorney’s impartial analysis.
The San Mateo County Farm Bureau opposes the project, arguing that many farmworkers want to live where they work.
Bureau President BJ Burns said he houses seven families and that most of his workers want to remain on the farm.”They wanna live where they’re working. The majority of them wanna stay where they’re working”, he said.
Longtime flower grower Louie Figone, the bureau’s vice president, said he has been upgrading housing on his property and installing new units.
Jeff Regan, an officer with the Yes on Measure Q campaign, questions whether farm owners’ opposition is partly financial, suggesting they see the project as competition for the rental housing they provide at their farms.
After opposing the Mercy Housing lease in May, Mayor Debbie Ruddock suggested that the county consider directing money equivalent to the project’s first five years of rent subsidies toward immediate housing on farms. Ruddock, who is seeking reelection, was unavailable for an interview for this report.
Both sides point to Stone Pine Cove, an affordable homeownership community built with state funding after the mass shooting, as a successful example of farmworker housing.
The ballot fight comes as Half Moon Bay faces a state lawsuit over its housing-planning obligations.
Attorney General Rob Bonta and the California Department of Housing and Community Development announced the case in July, alleging the city had failed to comply with state Housing Element Law. That law requires local governments to plan for their share of regional housing needs.
Approving 555 Kelly would not, by itself, settle that broader case.
Nor would a yes vote mean immediate construction. Mercy Housing’s posted schedule anticipates a tax-credit application and construction start in 2027, completion in 2029 and full occupancy in 2030. Those dates are projections.
For Rosales, it all comes back to the family he wants to bring under one roof.
He described his hope in Spanish: the three of them living together, coming home in peace and having a place to rest.
