This week in affordable housing news, the Newsom administration continues to act boldly, taking action to require the Los Angeles metropolitan area to plan for three times more housing over the next decade than local governments have proposed. According to the Los Angeles Times, after the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) released a plan this summer to zone for only 430,000 new homes in the next Regional Housing Needs Assessment cycle, the administration responded by sending a letter that set the need significantly higher—requiring the region to plan for a “minimum” of 1.3 million units. More than 40% of these homes would be required under the law to be affordable to lower-income residents.

SCAG will now have to determine how to distribute all of this new housing across Los Angeles, Orange, Imperial, Riverside, San Bernardino, and Ventura counties. This news was warmly received by the biggest city in the region: “Our housing affordability crisis demands that every city step up and say yes to more housing,” Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti said in a statement. “I applaud the state for taking bold action by proposing a target that not only plans for future growth but addresses the accumulated housing need across the region. I encourage my colleagues in other cities to support this ambitious goal.”

While the governor continues to make housing progress this year in other ways—most notably by signing a budget with $1.75 billion in new funding for affordable housing—the San Francisco Chronicle editorial board notes that in the current legislative session “revolution has failed to materialize.” Several important CHC-sponsored bills are still moving—including proposals to make permanent a portion of this year’s affordable housing funding, reduce barriers to 100% affordable developments, and help affordable developers build more effectively. But in other policy areas, the Chronicle says “the Legislature has failed to drastically overturn the status quo.” After more than 200 housing bills were introduced this year—and the vast majority failed to advance—this has put “tremendous pressure on lawmakers to pass the ones that have survived.”

STATE HOUSING POLICIES

Assembly rejects measure to lower local tax threshold at ballot
Politico California Pro
A proposed constitutional amendment to lower the vote threshold for local jurisdictions to raise taxes and issue bonds for housing and infrastructure failed on the Assembly floor Monday. ACA 1 by Assemblywoman Cecilia Aguiar-Curry (D-Winters) would have allowed voters to pass special taxes and bonds issued by cities and counties with 55 percent approval, lowering the two-thirds mark currently prescribed in California’s constitution under Proposition 13. The proposal itself would have required voter approval and would only have applied to funding for affordable housing and public works projects. The measure can still be reconsidered later this session.

Editorial: Housing crisis looms while lawmakers drag their feet
Orange County Register
Despite signs that home prices may be stabilizing, California still faces a severe housing crisis. Throughout the United States, 55 percent of households can afford to buy a median-priced home. In California, that number has fallen to 30 percent. High prices have taken their toll on the rental market also, which is fueling mistaken calls for statewide rent control – a policy that will further distort the market and reduce housing supply over time.

Editorial: The state is now targeting cities over housing. Good. It’s about time.
San Francisco Business Times
If cities that aren’t taking California’s housing crisis seriously begin to feel the heat, will they finally see the light? At least a few encouraging signs are gathering to suggest that they might — signs that mean the state needs to keep up the pressure on communities, mainly suburban, that continue to deny, derail or downsize housing projects within their borders. 

Editorial: In the final weeks of session, Sacramento can’t neglect these bills
San Francisco Chronicle
This should have been a big year for the California Legislature. Sacramento had a new Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, who promised to embrace a larger outlook than had his hyper-focused predecessor, Jerry Brown. Democratic lawmakers won a supermajority in the 2018 election, which would allow them to pursue increased social spending and other long-awaited priorities. Business lobbyists and taxpayer groups were openly anxious.

HOUSING CRISIS

Southern California must plan for 1.3 million new homes in the next decade, Newsom says
Los Angeles Times
Cities and counties in Southern California will have to plan for the construction of 1.3 million new homes in the next decade, a figure more than three times what local governments had proposed over the same period, according to a letter released by state housing officials Thursday. The decision is sure to intensify a clash between cities in the region and Gov. Gavin Newsom over the need for new construction to alleviate the state’s housing crisis.

How Fixing California’s Housing Crisis Is Like Playing Whac-a-Mole
New York Times
Like a game of Whac-a-Mole. That’s how Jenny Schuetz, a researcher with the Brookings Institution, described the task for California lawmakers if they want to get cities to build more apartments. It’s clear that the state needs them. Homeless advocates point straight to overpriced and scarce housing when they explain conditions on the streets.

California developers claim they’re scared to build in Bay Area, says survey
Curbed San Francisco
Earlier this month, UCLA’s Anderson School of Management and law firm Allen Matkins released their most recent survey of California developers and found that those with a stake in building housing are feeling gun shy about the Bay Area. The report, titled a “Commercial Real Estate Survey” but focusing on multi-family home development as well as office and retail, surveys “supply-side participants”—i.e., commercial developers and financiers of commercial development—about the immediate future.

‘Super commuters’ not slowing down in California. Lack of housing to blame
Sacramento Bee
The majority of Californians drive to work, but an increasing number face commutes well over an hour-long to reach jobs in larger cities. For now, at least, the rise of the super commuter is not slowing down, according to an analysis of census data by Apartment List. In 2017, 41 out of 58 counties saw at least moderate growth in the share of the workforce traveling longer than 90 minutes to get the work compared to 8 years prior.

Report: Bay Area teachers struggle to find affordable housing near their schools
Education Dive
Most educators in the San Francisco Bay Area don’t make enough to pay for market-rate rent or purchase a home near their schools, according to a report issued by The Council of Community Housing Organizations. Elementary and high school teachers in the region need to make 1.5 times their current salary in order to rent a one-bedroom apartment.

How a 2020 initiative to split Prop. 13 would increase commercial property taxes
Mercury News
Whether you own and occupy the building from which your business operates or you lease the premises, this column is for you. A proposition on the Nov. 3, 2020 ballot could dramatically increase property taxes for commercial properties. The state taxes those premises in two ways — through a property tax of the land and structures and through a personal business tax levied on fixtures, machinery and equipment used in the operation of a company.

Opinion: Let’s get serious about housing supply in Southern California
San Gabriel Valley Tribune
We’ve all seen the near-weekly reports that home prices are soaring, rents are skyrocketing, and housing construction is declining. California’s housing crisis only seems to be getting worse despite renewed focus from our state’s leaders. The good news is that lawmakers in Sacramento still have the opportunity to seriously address the housing affordability and availability crisis this year. If our leaders fail to act, though, communities from the Inland Empire and Orange County to Long Beach and Los Angeles will pay the price.

Opinion: Don’t blame Proposition 13 for high building fees
Pasadena Star News 
Another week, another lie about Proposition 13. Recall that last week this column burst the bubble on the myth that schools are “starved” for revenue. This week’s narrative from the Prop. 13 opponents is that California’s high fees for building homes and commercial property is due to Proposition 13 denying local governments the ability to raise revenue.

LOCAL HOUSING INITIATIVES

‘It Felt Like I Won the Lottery’: How a Bay Area Mom Helped Build Her Own Affordable Home
KQED
Julieta Aquino strolls proudly through her gleaming new home, a modest split-level condo on a busy thoroughfare in Fremont. With her 14-year-old daughter in tow, she proudly scans the still-sparsely furnished, open floor plan living room-kitchen, pointing out the glistening, stainless steel fixtures and laminate countertops.

Council Votes Unanimously to Require That Developers Allocate 20% of Housing Projects to Low, Moderate Income Units
Pasadena Now
Continuing efforts to create more affordable and moderately priced housing in Pasadena, the City Council voted unanimously Monday to approve a series of amendments to the City’s Inclusionary Housing Ordinance. “We are in a housing crisis, this is real,” Director of Planning and Community Development David Reyes told the Council, following a presentation by Senior Planner Andre Sahakian. “We are deficient in building low-income apartments,” added Reyes.

In Long Beach, the ‘missing middle’ have trouble finding houses that they can afford and meet their needs
Long Beach Press Telegram
Karla Verdesoto and her partner, David Massa, thought they had found the one: a move-in ready house situated on a quiet street in Lakewood. They toured the property last month, noticing that it checked all of their boxes: two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a yard, a driveway. The house wasn’t overly spacious, but it would suffice. Its most enticing feature, the couple thought, was that it wouldn’t require spending more money on repairs or renovations once they moved in.

HOMELESSNESS

L.A. is again considering limits on where homeless people can sleep — this time by schools and parks
Los Angeles Times
Los Angeles has long been locked in battles over where and how people can bed down on its streets and sidewalks — a debate that has played out for decades in City Hall, in the courts and on avenues lined with squalid tents and bedrolls. The city has been brushed back in court by homeless advocates, who argue that it is cruel and useless to punish people if they have nowhere else to sleep.

Homeless veterans take center stage at bipartisan congressional hearing in San Diego
San Diego Union Tribune
Veterans’ advocates and housing experts described challenges and possible solutions for sheltering homeless veterans during a bipartisan congressional hearing in Oceanside Thursday. Members of a subcommittee of the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Veterans Affairs — including Democratic Riverside Rep. Mark Takano, chairman of the committee; San Diego County Democratic Rep. Mike Levin, who chairs the subcommittee, San Diego County Democratic Rep. Scott Peters and Florida Republican Rep. Gus Bilirakis — listened to expert testimony.

He kept watch over L.A.’s $1.2-billion homeless housing bond. Now he is stepping down
Los Angeles Times
For years, Miguel Santana has been a gently scolding figure on homeless issues at L.A. City Hall. In his job as city administrative officer, Santana helped draft the $1.2-billion homeless housing bond measure, Proposition HHH. After leaving that post, he spent more than two years leading the citizens committee overseeing the program, prodding Mayor Eric Garcetti and housing officials to address rising development costs and the slow pace of construction.