Single-family zoning could soon ease in California

SB 10, if signed, would streamline the process for rezoning some single-family lots to contain up to 10 housing units in transit-rich areas within a half mile from transit, while SB 9 would allow up to four housing units on a previously single-family lot by allowing owners to divide lots into two and build duplexes on each. 

Critics of the bills allege the legislation could increase speculation, causing vulnerable homeowners to be displaced as developers purchase properties in hopes of building denser housing to turn a profit. Concerns have also been raised that the bills do not specifically require that any of the new housing will be affordable, and that the bills undermine local control.

Yet more than two-thirds of California’s residential land currently allows only for single-family homes, according to Wiener. The bills are part of a broader push to ease zoning restrictions proponents say caused a statewide housing shortage and environmental damage caused by water-sucking urban sprawl and long vehicle commutes as Californians are priced out of housing near urban centers where jobs exist.

“California’s severe housing shortage requires many strategies, and making it easier and faster for cities to zone for multi-unit housing is a critical piece of the puzzle,” Wiener said in a statement. “This voluntary tool will help local governments throughout California fundamentally reshape their zoning in infill areas, and help our state climb out of the housing crisis we face.”

In the case of SB 10, local governments would be able to choose whether individual projects would be ministerial or subject to discretionary approval, while SB 9 would require cities to ministerially approve two units or two-unit subdivision on single-family parcels, so long as they lie within an urban area and are not located in a hazard zone for fires, earthquakes or floods or a historical district.

Though the bills represent watered-down versions of previously attempted legislation — such as Wiener’s SB 50 which was voted down by the Senate last year — they have sparked fierce opposition. 

Among the most vocal opponents is Livable California, a nonprofit group that advocates for “empowerment of local governments to foster equitable, livable communities and truly affordable housing,” according to its mission statement.

“We reject the notion that these bills are equity tools. Instead they speed up the forces of gentrification by rewarding speculation-induced displacement,” Isaiah Madison, a Livable California board member, said in a statement.

Local control

Former Foster City Mayor Linda Koelling, who has long advocated against such bills, raised a list of concerns, ranging from increased water use from new construction, reductions of green space, to affordable housing and eroding local control.

“I think they’re egregious bills, they don’t do what they seemingly promise to do,” she said. “Local jurisdiction control is continuously being usurped. I don’t believe blanketing the whole state is the way to go. We’re individual communities and I think we can come up with some solutions on our own, and I think it should be allowed.”

But according to Michael Lane, a state policy director with SPUR, a nonprofit public policy organization in the Bay Area, allowing individual communities to implement solutions is exactly what these bills would do.

“SB 10 can only be implemented if the local city council says they want to do that,” Lane said. “In the case of SB 9, the homeowner is the one who decides what they want to do with their property — so that’s the ultimate local control, the state’s not mandating anything.”

Sacramento and Berkeley, for example, cities that have both expressed interest in allowing fourplexes, could expedite those laws with the help of SB 10 without potential litigation brought on by the California Environmental Quality Act, Lane said.

CEQA generally requires state and local governments to inform the public about and mitigate potential environmental impacts of projects, leading sometimes to additional studies and reports being required that delay or block construction. SB 10, however, would allow for upzoning in already urban areas or those near transit to bypass this process. 

Local legislative votes

Assembly Speaker pro Tem Kevin Mullin, D-South San Francisco, and Assemblymember Marc Berman, D-Palo Alto, both voted in favor of SB 10. 

“Should a city, as a result of their own best judgment and knowledge of their local needs and circumstances choose an area to upzone, the cumbersome CEQA process will not stand in the way of getting a project underway in a timely fashion and in the process, create housing that is affordable to young people and working families,” Mullin said in an email.

“For as long as I’ve been in the Assembly, the cities in my district have requested additional, voluntary tools to build more housing. That is exactly what SB 10 does, which is why I supported it,” Berman said in an emailed statement.

Lane says the bills, while not adequate for solving the housing crisis on their own, are a step in the right direction in a state where the median home price is $800,000.

The median home price in San Mateo County was $1.7 million as of June 2021, according to Redfin.

SB 10 will return to the Senate for reapproval after amendments before heading for a final signature from Gov. Gavin Newsom.

corey@smdailyjournal.com

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