Sugar Land City Council passed in August the updated Land Use Plan with a 12 percent limit on multifamily housing.

Throughout this five-year journey, the Land Use Advisory Committee has worked to develop policies guiding future land-use decisions that will preserve Sugar Land’s single-family residential neighborhoods while maintaining the amenities that make the city an attractive option for residents and visitors.

To achieve the 88-to-12-percent ratio, walkable activity centers would address the growing demand for living close to shopping and entertainment, according to the finalized LUP document, which is intended to guide the future development and redevelopment of the city.

“The plan supports a ratio of 88 [percent residential] to 12 percent [multifamily housing],” Director of Planning Lisa Kocich-Meyer said. “One of the elements that is important in making sure that all of the other elements, such as the neighborhood and regional activity centers’ specific guidance, in terms of the use of the formula, [is] all of those things work together to help achieve the ratio.”

District 2 Council Member Bridget Yeung, who abstained from the final vote, said her concern with the formulas in the LUP is it will limit the number of apartments that can go into the areas that need to be redeveloped.

“I believe developers won’t even come forward because of the formulas. They won’t believe there’s enough multifamily that can go into those areas to make it profitable to them,” Yeung said. “I know we have a lot of areas in our town that need redevelopment. If they do not get redeveloped, they can start being a blight to our community.”

Regional Activity Centers will be new or redeveloped areas and will serve as destinations for the city and region. Neighborhood Activity Centers will be new or redeveloped smaller mixed-use developments that provide amenities to nearby neighborhoods, according to the plan.

“In District 1, you would get no support for removing the limit on multifamily [housing] in a Neighborhood Activity Center,” District 1 council member Steve Porter said. “There are creative ways to do redevelopment, but making large multifamily insertions would not be supported in the identified areas in District 1.”

Sugar Land aims to provide a variety of housing to meet the needs of people at all stages of life, including primarily single-family dwellings along with apartments, condos, townhomes, senior living developments and multigenerational homes. Only rental apartments and condos would fall into the multifamily category, according to the plan.

Sugar Land has 7 percent of undeveloped land in its city limits and extraterritorial jurisdiction, making decisions critical when determining use for the land, the plan states.