With the legislative session behind us, we are starting to prepare for the year ahead of us—this includes a series of CHC policy committee meetings around the state and a new opportunity to collaborate closely with the Treasurer on upcoming reforms to the state tax credit system.

Before we get there, we’re mindful of one thing: Three CHC-sponsored bills are now sitting on the governor’s desk, along with several other important bills we support, and our work this year won’t be done until he signs them.

If you haven’t already, please be sure to send a letter to the governor expressing your support in particular for AB 1763 (Chiu)—the only major affordable housing production bill to emerge from this year’s legislative session. This bill will allow every new 100% affordable project in the state to add 80% more units, with additional density bonuses for developments near transit. We’re proud to sponsor this legislation, and we expect it to give a boost to affordable projects statewide starting on January 1—expanding access to affordable housing for the Californians who need it most. (Download a sample letter to the governor here.)

We will share more legislative news as we have it before the October 13 bill signing deadline. While this year’s legislative push continues, we’re also beginning to look ahead to next year, and I’m pleased to announce a new partnership between CHC and the Office of the State Treasurer to form a taskforce that will explore options for updating California’s low-income housing tax credit and tax-exempt bond regulations. Treasurer Ma has been studying this issue closely since taking office in January—conducting a series of listening sessions around the state to get feedback on how to improve the tax credit system to increase affordable production, contain development costs, spur new technology, and expand benefits to underrepresented groups.

In order to build consensus and find common ground among the industry’s diverse stakeholders, CHC offered to establish a taskforce to propose specific recommendations for updating the tax credit system to achieve these goals. The group, co-chaired by Mercy Housing’s Doug Shoemaker and The Pacific Companies’ Caleb Roope, will include a diverse group of 20-25 affordable housing experts, who will spend the next 8-10 months working on this issue. The taskforce’s goal will be to provide recommendations to the Treasurer by July 1, 2020.

On a related note, CHC has scheduled a separate series of policy committee meetings this month in northern and southern California to begin to set CHC’s agenda for 2020 on a range of issues. Please contact Marina Wiant for more information about participating in these CHC meetings. Thank you for your support, and we look forward to seeing more of you this month to chart CHC’s course for 2020!

Sincerely,

Ray Pearl
CHC Executive Director