This week in affordable housing news…:

State Update:

• California’s homeless population grew by 22,000 during the pandemic, according to a new CalMatters analysis of the latest point-in-time count—pushing the state’s overall homeless numbers to over 173,000 people. “We have to solve this rotting core in the center of California, which is that we are a million units short of housing for extremely low-income workers,” said Margot Kushel, director of the UCSF Benioff Homelessness and Housing Initiative. While the state is spending more than $14 billion on homelessness initiatives—and has created more than 14,000 shelter beds in the last three years—CalMatters says there still aren’t enough permanent, affordable housing to bring people indoors for good. “Most people, most politicians, when they talk about homelessness, it’s, ‘We’re going to build X number of shelters.’ It’s shelter, shelter, shelter,” said Christopher Weare, president of the Center for Homeless Inquiries. “Well, all of this construction of shelters doesn’t really change the scope of the problem.” 

• Building permanent supportive housing often comes with its own challenges. Case in point this week in the Sacramento region, where CHC member Excelerate Housing Group filed a lawsuit against the City of Elk Grove for refusing to approve what would have been the city’s first PSH project—saying city officials “unlawfully ignored” state laws that should have allowed the 67-unit project to move forward. A Sacramento Bee editorial blasted the city for siding with NIMBYs against the project, saying the “lawsuit is right, Elk Grove discriminated against homeless.” A few days later, HCD followed up by sending the city an official Notice of Violation echoing all of the same points made in the lawsuit—including violations of SB 35, the Housing Accountability Act, and fair housing law: “The project is deemed consistent with all standards,” HCD said after analyzing the city’s objections. “The city’s response should include, at a minimum, a specific plan for corrective action, including allowing the project to move forward.” 

• Homelessness funds were the focus of an informational hearing this week hosted by the Assembly budget subcommittee responsible for housing and homelessness programs. The hearing, the first in a series on how counties are spending state homelessness resources, was chaired by Asm. Wendy Carrillo (D-Los Angeles). This week’s meeting centered on the Bay Area, with presentations from the counties of San Francisco, Santa Clara, and San Mateo—several of whom highlighted the need to ramp up state support for operating subsidies and permanent supportive housing. The Los Angeles region will be the focus of the next hearing. Details on the hearing and presentation materials are available here.  

ICYMI – Top news stories:

Bay Area cities running out of time to convince the state they can build 441,000 new homes 
San Jose Mercury News 
Bay Area cities are running out of time to devise plans for enough new homes to ease the region’s deepening housing crisis—and so far, state officials are sending most of their plans back to the drawing board. Local jurisdictions have until Jan. 31 to finalize their so-called housing elements—detailed roadmaps to meet their dramatically increased state-mandated housing goals. Between 2023 and 2031, the nine-county region is on the hook for approving over 441,000 new homes for residents of all income levels, more than double the amount for the current eight-year cycle. As of last week, HCD had rejected drafts from 14 of the 15 Bay Area municipalities—with Alameda the lone success. The agency told San Francisco, Oakland, Sunnyvale, Mountain View, Redwood City, Antioch and others to rewrite their drafts to provide proof the sites identified for future homes have a realistic chance of development. 

California is actually making progress on building more housing  
New York Times 
One big reason for the chronic housing shortage in America’s most prosperous regions is that state governments have ceded control to local governments that behave like private clubs. In California, the heartland of the housing crisis, the state is starting to take power back. The state’s political leaders are clearing the way for housing construction by restricting local interference, prioritizing the needs of all Californians—and those who might like to be. Every year for the last half-dozen years, the California Legislature has passed a set of bills that shift the balance of power toward building. Among the latest batch are bills easing the conversion of commercial buildings into homes and banning parking requirements for housing and retail developments near public transit. Perhaps even more important, Mr. Newsom’s administration is working to enforce the laws. 

How parking lots explain California’s housing crisis 
Gimme Shelter Podcast 
The cost of constructing low-income housing in California is the highest in the nation, with some apartment buildings totaling more than $1 million per unit to build. One of the reasons? It’s expensive to set aside land for parking lots and build underground garages. On this episode of “Gimme Shelter: The California Housing Crisis Podcast,” we talk about a forthcoming state law, AB 2097, that eliminates minimum parking requirements for new housing near mass transit. The hope, supporters of the law say, is that the policy will spur more development at lower cost while also helping California meet its climate change goals. Our guest is Donald Shoup, an urban planning professor at UCLA and author of the book, “The High Cost of Free Parking.”