The Trust for Public Land released its 2018 ParkScore Index ranking the park systems in the 100 largest US cities. Minneapolis has the best park system in the US for the third consecutive year. Public spending on parks reached $7.5 billion in 2018, a $429 million increase over the previous year. According to the nonprofit, 70 percent of residents live within a 10-minute walk of a park. San Francisco was the highest-ranked California city, at fifth, with a score of 79.6. Irvine was tenth. One of the lowest ranked cities was Fresno, which was 94th on the list with a score of 30.9. Some Northern California cities that made the list were Sacramento 22, San Jose 27, Fremont 32 and Oakland 38. Southern California overall fared worse than the Bay Area cities but ten cities made the top 100 list: San Diego 16, Long Beach 21, Riverside 57, Bakersfield 65, Los Angeles 66, Anaheim 68, Glendale 71, Chula Vista 76, Stockton 80, and Santa Ana 87. Low-Income Housing Production Plummets in Kern County According to a new report from the California Housing Partnerships Corporation, Kern County has seen an 85 percent reduction in low-income housing production since 2016. The report found new construction of affordable housing units was reduced from 199 units in 2016 to just 15 units a year later. Rehabilitation of existing buildings for affordable housing dropped from 407 to 75 between 2016 and 2017. Statewide there has been a 45 percent reduction in affordable housing construction as of 2017. One of the major reasons for the drop in production is that state and federal funding that helped fund those types of projects dried up, leaving builders with little incentive to construct affordable homes when luxury housing is more lucrative. The report found funding dropped 21 percent since the 2008-09 fiscal year. The State also provides funding for low-income housing construction, but that has decreased 18 percent since the recession as well. Kern County has about 13,000 applicants on a waiting list for low-income housing through the county’s housing authority. Applicants usually have to wait five to seven years to get housing. BART Directors Scuttle Livermore Extension; Opens Antioch Extension BART’s board of directors voted , 5-4, to focus on rebuilding and modernizing its existing system before it commits to building more extensions, nixing a proposed $1.6 billion extension to Livermore. The board also voted against proceeding with plans for a BRT system that would have directly connected to the Dublin/Pleasanton Station after Livermore residents said they weren't interested in the idea. However, the Tri-Valley-San Joaquin Valley Regional Rail Authority, created last year, could come up with its own plans, and financing, for a rail connection between the Altamont Corridor Express commuter train, which stops in Livermore, and BART. The vote comes at the same time that service is beginning on a new extension between Pittsburgh and Antioch. The extension is a separate line, requiring a transfer, that uses smaller biodiesel trains rather than heavy rail BART trains. The ten-mile extension cost $525 million compared to the estimate $1 billion it would have cost to build a conventional BART system. Bakersfield Adopts Downtown Station Area Plan The Bakersfield City Council adopted the “ Making Downtown Bakersfield ” Station Area Vision Plan and certified its environmental impact report, which will serve as the plan to continue revitalization efforts and guide future development in the downtown area. The plan is a partnership between the California High-Speed Rail Authority and the city who spent almost two years engaging with the community on their vision for downtown Bakersfield.The plan focuses on multi-modal (pedestrian, bicycle, automobile, transit) transportation, establishes an urban design, and creates an economic development strategy that optimizes future growth in Downtown. Other areas examined in the Station Area plan include: jobs, housing, retail, entertainment, art, cultural amenities, pedestrian and bicycle access, parking, streetscape improvements, lighting, wayfinding, open space and recreation, and sustainability. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) Report Identifies Sites At-Risk if Offshore Drilling Resumes  According to a report by the National Parks Conservation Association and the NRDC, six national park sites in the Bay Area would be in danger of being sullied by oil spills if President Trump goes through with his plan to expand offshore oil drilling along the California coast. The parks at risk in the Bay Area would be the Golden Gate National Recreation Area, Point Reyes National Seashore, Fort Point National Historic Site, Port Chicago Naval Magazine National Memorial, San Francisco Maritime National Historical Park, and Rosie the Riveter/ World War II Home Front National Historical Park. The oil spills would ruin fisheries and endangered birds, sea turtles, whales, sea lions, and other marine mammals; oil spills could hurt the local economies of the coastal cities. Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke announced earlier this year that they were offering 47 new offshore leases in federal waters off Alaska, the West Coast, the Gulf of Mexico, and the Atlantic Coast. The proposed leases include six areas along the California coast. Mountain View Considers Tax on Large Employers A three-member subcommittee of the Mountain View City Council endorsed a concept of a tax on the number of workers a company employs within the city limits. The “Google headcount tax” will go before the full city council that will decide whether it will order city staff to prepare a ballot measure for voters in November. Government officials are referring to the concept as a restructuring of the business license tax. As Councilman John McAlister said, “When you think of the six-figure incomes that tech companies pay their employees, a tax of $200 per employee doesn't seem to be that much more to pay.” The maximum required from Google would be roughly $5.5 million in the first year, and the amount could rise over time due to inflation. The revenue generated from this new tax would go towards reducing greenhouse gases, improving quality of life, and transportation projects. CARB Conducts Workshops on SB 375 The Air Resources Board is conducting numerous workshops across the state on the new Senate Bill 375 Sustainable Communities and Climate Protection reporting requirements and program evaluation guidelines. At these workshops, CARB staff will share preliminary findings for feedback on its analysis of data and present concepts for changes to the framework, information exchange process, and important considerations for quantifying GHG emissions reductions. The public workshops will be held on June 18 in San Diego, June 19 in Los Angeles, Fresno on June 25, and June 28 in Sacramento. California Grew 0.78 Percent in 2017 According to the latest demographic repor t from the Department of Finance, California added 309,000 new residents in 2017 bringing the state’s total population to 39,810,000. The state grew 0.78 percent over last year. Growth was strongest in the more densely populated counties in the Bay Area, Central Valley, and Southern California. The three fastest growing counties were Merced (1.8 percent increase), Placer (1.7 percent increase) and San Joaquin (1.5 percent increase). The City of Los Angeles grew by 33,000 residents (0.8 percent) and San Francisco added almost 10,000 new residents. A total of 85,000 units were completed in 2017. Of California’s 482 cities, 421 saw gains in population, 57 saw reductions, and 4 experienced no change. Of the ten largest cities in California, Sacramento had the largest percentage gain in population (1.43 percent, or 7,000) edging out San Diego (1.42 percent, or 20,000). Sacramento surpassed 500,000 for the first time. California’s birth rate fell to its lowest level in at least 100 years in 2017 according to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. The state’s birth rate fell to 11.9 births per 1,000 residents, there were 21 births per 1,000 residents in 1990 and the height of the Great Depression there were 13.1 births per one thousand Californians. Many California women are waiting longer to have children or deciding not to have children at all. Quick Hits & Updates The San Francisco Board of Supervisors will vote on a proposed ordinance that would blunt landlords' abilities to raise rents to pay down mortgage loans and property taxes. The ordinance had unanimous approval from the Rules Committee. Most cities allow landlords to “pass-through” operational and maintenance costs such as a new roof or rising water or garbage collection rates. San Francisco is the only major city in the Bay Area that allows landlords to pass on portions of their property taxes and corporate debt to tenants. Under the city’s current unfair loophole, landlords may permanently increase rents up to seven percent on top of the annual allowable increases. The Del Mar City Council proclaimed that “planned retreat” will not be part of its long-term strategy for dealing with sea-level rise, despite the Coastal Commission recommendation. Planned retreat is the strategy of removing seawalls, roads, homes and other structures gradually over the years in advance of sea-level rise. However, the California Coastal Commission strongly encourages all coastal cities to include planned retreat along with sand retention, beach replenishment, and river-channel dredging. Del Mar is one of the first California cities to create its adaptation plan. The City of San Diego updated its Midway area community plan to eliminate the 30-foot height limit in order to allow for redevelopment of the Midway District . The update would allow denser housing, especially more affordable housing. Planning Commission approved the update in late April and City Council will vote on the plan in June. A new report released by the San Diego Housing Federation found the loss of redevelopment funding was a major cause of the city’s housing and homelessness crisis. The state used to allow redevelopment districts were cities could capture extra property tax funding, called tax increment financing. Under the TIF, San Diego had about $120 million a year for affordable housing and now it has less than one-third of that amount. San Diego County needs 143,800 more affordable rental homes to meet current demand. The city’s Housing Federation wants to put a local housing bond on the abllot this year, a proposal will come before the city council rules committee next month. A coalition of groups released a report, “ Housing Underproduction in the US ” which partially explains why the nation has strayed so far from its housing goals. The report found the US produced 7.3 million fewer homes than it needed between 2000 and 2015. Out of the 23 states that are under-produced the worst was California, short by nearly 3.4 million homes. The other states that under-produced as more than 15 percent of 2015 housing stock were Nevada, Arizona, Hawaii, Maryland, Rhode Island, and Massachusetts. The Ceres City Council approved an updated General Plan after two and a half years of planning. The updated document will guide growth through 2035. The two tricky points were how to treat Faith Home road which originally was planned to be a six-lane expressway and zoning for land at McGee and Roeding roads near the Berryhill school campus which originally was zoned light industrial but is now low-density residential. RentCafe ranked the 20 " most prosperous cities " in the US with populations exceeding 100,000. The group looked at six indicators of prosperity: population, median income, home values, share of inhabitants holding a higher education degree, poverty rate, and unemployment rate as well as how these cities have changed between 2000 and 2016. Odessa, Texas ranked first but five California cities made the list: Fontana fourth, Santa Maria 12th, Los Angeles 17th, Clovis 18thand Pasadena 20th. Fontana, the authors note, began as a small agricultural town but has now turned into a regional hub for the trucking industrial with the population almost doubling between 2000 and 2016. San Francisco and Sacramento made Redfin's list of the nation's  Most Bikeable Cities of 2018,with fifth and tenth, respectively. The cities were ranked on their Bike Score, a tool by Redfin company Walk Score, which rates locations based on their access to bike lanes, road connectivity and hilliness. In 2015, San Francisco was ranked 2ndand Sacramento 8thmeaning both cities fell in their rankings. Save the Redwoods League, a nonprofit group based in San Francisco, will pay $3.3 million to buy 160 acres of sequoias, the second-largest grove of giant sequoia trees left in private ownership in the world. The trees, some more than 250 feet tall and 1,500 years old, sit in a remote part of Tulare County.  The Institute for Transportation and Development Policy (ITDP) released a new report on dockless bike-sharing and integrating it into cities public transportation systems. The report highlights success stories internationally, Dublin and Guangzhou, where issued guidelines and a code of conduct helped control dockless bike-share. The report said Washington DC is a good example of a city that is trying to phase in dockless more slowly as it extends its pilot program. Los Angeles Superior Court Judge James Chalfant ordered a number of revisions to the EIR for Redondo Beach ’s redevelopment plans for its pier and waterfront in response to a lawsuit filed by Building a Better Redondo. Among the changes Chalfant ordered are that the city and developer must assess the “visual impact” of a proposed hotel on views from Czuleger Park and the “human health impacts” of demolishing Seaside Lagoon to make way for a new beach. The State of Arizona started a large-scale, multi-day exercise to prepare for a possible mass exodus of 400,000 Californians in the event of a major earthquake. More than 1,000 participants from government agencies, volunteer organizations, and the private sector will play out a variety of scenarios to ensure they have the mass shelter and food for the evacuees. This is the first time the state has engaged in a mass migration and care scenario on this scale. The group is following a framework provided by the federal government. San Francisco transportation officials are asking the state to require driverless car companies to share GPS and other data if they are going to be allowed to carry passengers. California Public Utilities Commission has planned to vote May 31 to approve regulations allowing passengers in driverless cars in a limited program. However, companies testing autonomous vehicles have asked the commission to conceal driverless car trip data under tight confidentiality agreements, shielding it from the public.

Voters in a dozen or so cities and counties decided on 15 land use measures June 5, with a fairly typical array of questions. They ranged from multibillion-dollar statewide bond measures to technical questions about overlay zones in small jurisdictions.

An increasingly crucial part of 12-step and other addiction recovery programs, sober living homes have proliferated wildly in California in recent years. Though there is no strict definition of sober living homes, they are generally group homes that do not provide medical treatment but instead allow recovering addicts to live for a short while, often upon release from intensive detoxification centers. The idea is to give addicts comfortable, conventional places to live where residents can mutually support each other.

The California Housing Partnership and Southern California Association of Non Profit Housing released three reports that outline how the elimination of the redevelopment agencies and public sector support for affordable housing has affected Southern California. Riverside County and San Bernardino County have a nearly 137,000-unit shortfall in affordable rental housing.The San Bernardino County report explains that renters in the county need to earn $30.96 per hours (or 2.8 times the state minimum wage) to afford the median monthly rent of $1,610. The report found the county needs 72,032 more affordable rental homes to meet current demand. The Riverside County report found an 11 percent increase in homelessness between 2016 and 2017. Riverside County’s lowest-income renters spend 66 percent of income on rent. The final report focuses on Los Angeles County and found the county needs 548,255 more affordable rental homes to meet current demand. The LIHTC housing production declined 54 percent in 2017 in L.A. County. The reports propose an “aggressive campaign” in support of a $4 billion housing bond that has qualified to appear on the November ballot. Other recommendations include bringing back redevelopment funding for affordable housing and reducing the threshold for voter approval of local funding of affordable housing and infrastructure from 67 to 55 percent. Plan to Upzone SoMA Moves Forward The San Francisco Planning Commission unanimously approved a massive neighborhood rezoning plan for the South of Market (SoMA) neighborhood that includes more potential housing than the original plan. The Centra SoMA Plan is projected to bring up to 33,000 new jobs and 8,300 homes to the neighborhood over the next 30 years as opposed to the 40,000 jobs and 7,000 homes proposed in the original plan. The plan calls for 33 percent of the homes to be affordable. Through fees and taxes levied on the new development, the plan is expected to generate roughly $2 billion in public benefits that would be funneled back into neighborhood improvements such as transit, streets, and facilities needs. The plan must still be approved by the Board of Supervisors. SANDAG Requests Reduction in Housing Targets The San Diego Association of Governments board voted to ask state officials to reduce the county’s Regional Housing Needs Assessment targets for housing production in the county. The state has asked SANDAG, through RHNA, to plan for more than 171,000 new homes between 2021 and 2029. SANDAG staff has recommended asking the state to lower housing production goals “to better reflect realistic condition in the region.” The housing goals are rarely met in any region of California, and every city in San Diego County except Lemon Grove, is failing them. The county has permitted less than a third of the homes allowed for in the current 2020 plans. Nine Proposals Unveiled in Resilient by Design Challenge The nine teams that participated in the Resilient by Design Bay Area Challenge over the past year presented their final designs to the public. While some include lofty language and no concrete plans, all projects have helped raise awareness around flood risks and come up with unique ideas. Each team worked on a different site in the Bay Area. One plan is to raise State Highway 37 twenty feet off the ground to create a “Grand Bayway” that would speed traffic and allow tidal flows to restore the marshlands underneath. Another group has planned a network of flourishing greenways that would provide recreation and ecological benefits, as well as a buffer against raising bay water, in San Leandro. Now the projects will have to find funding to begin construction and implementation. Resilient by Design is intended to develop innovative solutions to address the effects of sea level rise, severe storms, flooding, and earthquakes in communities around the San Francisco Bay. Study Identifies Undeveloped Parcels in Big-City Downtowns CommercialCafe released a study on vacant developable parcels in central business districts in 25 cities across the country. Parcels of at least 0.5 acres were identified, with 584 acres total identified in the study’s 25 cities. The study also looked at the amount of construction that had taken place in each city since 2013. The California cities that were analyzed were Los Angeles, Sacramento, and San Jose — all of which ranked in the bottom half. The study found Los Angeles had 12.61 vacant acres and almost 5 million square feet of CBD construction since 2013, of which 3.3 million square feet was housing. Sacramento was found to be one of the densest urban cores with only 6.54 vacant land — the smallest amount except for Tampa. San Jose almost 15 acres of vacant developable land. Survey respondents in San Jose also showed stronger preference for expanded coverage of subway transport. Dallas had the most undeveloped land, with 86 acres. The study revealed little correlation between amount of vacant land and amount of development. Los Angeles Groups Sue to Block Homeless Housing Amid cries to solve Los Angeles's homelessness crisis, the Oxford Triangle Association and Fight Back, Venice filed identical lawsuits against the City of Los Angeles over a pair of recently passed laws that are intended to ease requirements for sheltering homeless people. The Venice group alleges that the city failed to fully consider the environmental impacts of the two laws. The ordinances being challenged make it easier to build permanent supportive housing and to convert motels to units for homeless people. The plaintiffs want full environmental review completed for the projects to provide opportunity for comment or feedback. The law slashes parking requirements and allows permanent supportive housing projects to be built taller or denser than otherwise allowed. Quick Hits & Updates According to a new report from commercial realty brokerage CBRE, the office market in downtown Oakland and San Francisco are the tightest in the nation with lower office vacancy levels than those in Manhattan or Boston. During the first quarter of 2018, office vacancy rate in downtown Oakland was 5.3 percent, downtown San Francisco was 5.7 percent, and 6.5 percent in Manhattan Midtown South. Downtown San Jose has an office vacancy rate of 11.9 percent, which CBRE reports is a healthy level. However, with tech giants such as Google, Adobe Systems, Facebook, and Apple buying or leasing properties for major campus expansions in Silicon Valley, vacancy rates could dwindle in San Jose as well. Oakland City Council approved an “exclusive negotiating agreement” with the Oakland A’s , allowing the two to begin talks about constructing a ballpark at the Coliseum. The nine-month agreement will allow the team President Dave Kaval to study whether the 112 acre East Oakland site is the right fit. Last month, the A’s and the Port of Oakland agreed to study Howard Terminal as a potential site. The opening of San Francisco Muni’s Central Subway from Caltrain to Chinatown is already a year behind schedule, but it could be pushed into 2022 after discovery that a contractor installed 3.2 miles of the wrong grade of rail. In mid April, Muni told contractor Tutor Perini that it would reject the standard-strength rails as not meeting the specifications of the contract, and called for them to be removed and replaced with high-strength rails at the contractor’s expense. The difference in rail is not a safety issue, but rather life expectancy. A second Metrolink stop has opened near Burbank Airport. The new station at Hollywood Way and San Fernando Road on the Antelope Valley Line will run from downtown LA through the San Fernando Valley and up to Lancaster. The trains will run to the airport on weekends, although only every 2.5 hours. The new station is about a mile from the Burbank airport terminal and a free shuttle will meet every train, until a new terminal is built so travelers can walk. A new study from real estate website Trulia, found millennials are disproportionately affected by the housing crisis in the Bay Area. Millenials, ages 20 to 36, are the largest prospective home buying generation, but 98 percent of those hoping to become homeowners in the next year have encountered obstacles such as starter homes in San Jose starting at $700,000 (an increase of 12 percent from a year ago). Sonoma County leaders are moving forward with plans to move out of their sprawling north Santa Rosa government campus and free up the space for at least 1,400 housing units. The government buildings have a maintenance backlog of $258 million and county officials think building a newer, denser office complex elsewhere and freeing up land for homes would be a better use of space. The new locations for the government center include an existing site centered in the area around Administration Drive, downtown Santa Rosa, the county airport business park, or another location proposed by a developer. If the county moves downtown, it could opt to share a site with the Santa Rosa city government. The Board of Supervisors will consider the options this month. Thousand Oaks City Council approved amendments to the land use element of the city’s general plan that would allow the construction of 1,088 new residential units. The amendments would zone change seven residential neighborhoods to adjust their density downward to match their existing density. The adjustment resulted in 1,088 potential new residential units to be added into Measure E’s “Bank” for possible development elsewhere in the city. Los Angeles Metro has amended its proposed budget to include $500,000 to begin the environmental study of the Crenshaw Line Northern Extension . Metro could start the draft EIR review by next summer, if directors can agree on a set of alternatives to study. WeHo’s advocacy had a letter-writing campaign to Metro exhorting the transit agency to “fund and commence an EIR… as promised” in preparation for a desired construction start date of 2020.  The project is expected to receive $2.2 billion under Measure M’s expenditure plan with an expected opening date in the late 2040s. The City of West Hollywood enthusiastically supports the extension. A Fresno Superior Court judge ordered the city of Fresno to rescind an ordinance that would have shut down a majority of local recycling centers by restricting where they could operate as a way to deal with homeless people and crime. The ordinance unanimously approved in September by the City Council was set to go into effect this week. The ordinance was a response to complaints from businesses and residents who said the city’s 22 California Redemption Value recycling centers attract homeless people and drug addicts into their neighborhoods.  Judge Jane Cadoza granted a mandate, sought by the California Grocers Association, which argued the law violated CEQA and conflicted with the state Recycling Act. The city of West Sacramento launched a yearlong citywide microtransit pilot this week. The pilot includes a fleet of 10 six-passenger Mercedes vans in response to the strain that ride-sharing services have put on the finances of traditional mass transit systems like buses and trains. West Sacramento partnered with Via, a New York City-based microtransit company that partners with cities around the world and also operates its service independently in some places. For a flat fee of $3.50 ($1.75 for seniors), anyone can hail a van from anywhere in the city, by smartphone app or regular phone call. The vans will not go exactly where the rider wants, but will drop passengers off within a block or a block and a half at most. U.S. Rep. Ken Calvert of Riverside County has included a provision in a budget bill that would prohibit state or federal lawsuits against “the Final Environmental Impact Report/ Final Environmental Impact Statement for the Bay Delta Conservation Plan/ California Water Fix… and any resulting agency decision, record of decision, or similar determination.” Calvert said after more than a decade of studies and more than 50,000 pages of environmental documents, all project stakeholders have had opportunities to express their thoughts and concerns. MWD, the state’s largest water district, agreed to contribute $10.8 billion to help pay for construction of the two tunnels. Los Angeles City Council approved , 13-1, a new levy system that would allow developers, businesses and homeowners who are required by the city to replace or plant trees to instead pay a fee to get out of the obligation. City officials say the new fee will raise money to fund tree planting in nearby areas. Other California cities such as San Francisco have similar fees to pay for trees. Large developers will be charged $2,612 for a tree while smaller developers and homeowners $267. The board of the California High Speed Rail Authority approved a new business plan. Board chairman Dan Richards said, “we are going to deliver high-speed rail for the people of California.” The goal is to build the train between LA and San Francisco by 2033 at an estimated price of $77 billion. The business plan is required every two years. CEO Brian Kelly wants the Legislature by 2021 to approve a financing plan that would allow the authority to borrow money for construction against revenue from the state’s cap-and-trade program that charges polluters to release greenhouse gases. Kelly is also asking lawmakers to extend cap-and-trade to 2050, beyod its current expiration date of 2030. The measure to allow homeowners 55 and older to take a portion of their Prop. 13 property tax benefits with them when they move within the state is eligible for the statewide ballot in November. The measure is sponsored by the California Association of Realtors and has exceeded the 585,407 valid petition signatures it needed to qualify.

A new California EPA report finds that the more intense forest fires, longer droughts, warmer ocean temperatures, and shrinking snowpack in the Sierra Nevada are an “unequivocal” evidence of climate change. The 350-page report tracks 36 indicators of climate change, including a comprehensive list of human impacts and the effects on wildlife, the ocean, lakes, rivers and the mountains. Although the state has had a 90 percent drop in black carbon from tailpipe emissions over the past half century, CO 2 levels in the atmosphere and in seawater are increasing at a steady rate. While temperatures have increased steadily since the early 1980s, the most alarming fact is that night temperatures have increased 2.3 degrees over the past century. The largest glaciers in the Sierra have shrunk by an average of about 70 percent since 1906 and water temperature in Lake Tahoe has warmed one degree since 1970. Senate Bill 32, puts California on course tor educe emissions an additional 40 percent below 1990 levels by 2030, the state expects to drop below 1990 levels within the next two years. Report Contends Rent Control Leads to Higher Rents, Constrained Supply The National Multifamily Housing Council (NMHC) Research Foundation released a report, The Impacts of Rent Control : A Research Review and Synthesis, evaluating rent control policies that cap rents and are usually implemented with the goal of improving housing affordability. The literature review includes cases from Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Santa Monica (as well as other non-California cities) between 1972 and 2017. The report found that rent control and stabilization laws lead to a reduction in available rental supply, lead to higher rents in the uncontrolled market, do a poor job at targeting benefits, and cause overcrowding or renters to live in units that are too small, large, or not in the right location. Other findings were that significant fiscal costs are associated with implementing a rent control program and that rent-controlled buildings can suffer from deterioration or lack of investment. Instead of using rent control policies, NMHC suggests working with public and private stakeholders to come together and find ways to build more housing and reduce housing costs. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) Geographic Economic Disparities Widen in California  Next 10 released three reports highlighting the deepening divisions in California’s economic prosperity, depending on residents’ income and where they live. The reports show job growth and wages has increased, low-income earners haven’t seen the same paycheck increases at a comparable pace. The first report, Current State of the California Housing Market, highlights the high cost of housing in the state and the slow housing construction rate. Most jurisdictions are far behind their RHNA housing goals. California Migration analyzes the main drivers for the over 1 million people who moved out of California between 2006 and 2016. As housing prices near an all-time high, low-paying workers are leaving the state for more affordable lives. The report, California Employment by Income, finds the average annual pay for those making under $27,000 has increased by only 17 percent while those making on average $55,000 have seen wages rise 29 percent. High-wage earners- those making an average of $83,000- saw 42.5 percent increases compared to ten years ago. The San Francisco-San Jose area saw the greatest growth in high-wage employment between 2007 and 2017, followed by San Diego, but the rest of the state’s major metro areas saw a decrease. U.S. Supreme Court Declines to Take Up Railroad Case The U.S. Supreme Court declined to take up the case between the North Coast Railroad Authority and two environmental groups regarding plans to restore nearly 150 miles of railroad between Napa and Willits. The California Supreme Court ruled that the railroad restoration project must comply with state environmental laws, which the railroad authority argues the federal law preempts it from having to conduct state environmental reviews. The decision now goes back to lower court, which has to figure out how to implement the state Supreme Court’s decision. The case stemmed from a 2011 suit filed by Californians for Alternatives to Toxics and Friends of the Eel River, which contended that the original environmental impact report for the railroad was inadequate. The case may be moot as state legislation is pending that would turn the right of way into a hiking and biking trail.  Voters May Decide on $2 Billion Bond for Homelessness State. Sen. Kevin de León (D-Los Angeles) is proposing a new ballot measure to redirect $2 billion on housing homeless Californians. This measure is a do-over for the 2016 measure that was passed by the Legislature to redirect $2 billion towards building homeless housing from a voter-approved 1 percent income tax surcharge on millionaires that funds mental health services. A Sacramento attorney sued and argued the move violated constitutional rules on approving loans without a public vote and that lawmakers shouldn't take money away from mental health treatment. This new version of the measure would go to voters in November. SB 1206 is schedule for its first hearing in the Legislature this week. It was co-authored by Sen. John Moorlach (R-Costa Mesa). California Cities Lead Nation in Ethnic Inclusivity A new report published by the Urban Institute found smaller cities have become more racially and economically inclusive compared to larger cities. The report analyzed 274 of the country’s largest cities over three decades. While economic and racial inclusion do not always trend together, the report did note a correlation with economically healthier cities tending to be more inclusive than economically distressed ones. California cities Fremont, Daly City, Torrance, Santa Clara, Elk Grove, West Covina, Sunnyvale, and Carlsbad all made top ten for their overall inclusion efforts. San Bernardino and Fresno were the only California cities that made the bottom ten list for economic inclusion. Brookings Analyzes Sacramento Metro Economy The Brookings Metropolitan Policy Program released an independent assessment of the economy of the six-county Sacramento region and examined the economic drivers of the region compared to national markets with similar characteristics. The report found that Sacramento region is relatively productive and prosperous, but the region has struggled over the past decade and is in the bottom-third of the 100 largest metro area in composite rankings measuring improvements in growth, prosperity, and inclusion. In order to take advantage of the changing market, the region must respond to globalization, technological change, demographic transitions, and declining national investment in economic growth and opportunity. Quick Hits & Updates The American Institute of Architects LA Chapter announced the winner of the competition to design the organization’s Mobile Center for Architecture and Design. Entry was open to students at architecture schools throughout the region. The winning design came from Woodbury University student Stephanie Green enables the AIA|LA to host a variety of activities within an eighteen-wheel truck. The Capsule “allows for the Mobile Center to be bigger than ‘just a container’ on the back of an eighteen-wheeler” observes past AIA|LA president Douglas Teiger. LA Metro released its draft Vision 2028 Plan end of April and is having a four-week public comment period. The Metro Vision 2028 document is the agency’s big picture plan to improve mobility in LA County over the next decade. The Metro Board will consider adopting the Plan at their meeting on June 28. San Diego City Council unanimously approved legislation that would shrink fees to build accessory dwelling units. The goal is to help alleviate a severe local shortage of affordable housing by incentivizing construction of more accessory units. San Diego only had 64 granny flat applications last November compared to 1,980 in LA, 583 in San Francisco, and 166 in San Jose. Fees to build granny flat units in San Diego ranged from $30,000 to $49,000 per unit. The new legislation lowers that by as much as 50 percent depending on a variety of factors. The leading contenders in San Francisco’s mayoral race signed a campaign challenge to secure 1,000 units of housing for homeless people in their first year in office. Tipping Point Community charitable organization issued the challenge. Angela Alioto, London Breed, Jane Kim, Mark Leno and Amy Farah Weiss all signed the pledge. LA City Council unanimously backed a proposed set of rules that would allow residents to host night-to-night rental only in their own homes, but bar the from renting out a house or apartments if it is not their primary residence. The rules must still be vetted by the Planning Commission, before the council can vote them into law. The City of San Jose reached a tentative deal with AT&T to allow the installation of about 170 small cell devices on streetlights. The city would receive $5 million in lease revenues from the carrier over the next 15 year. City Council will consider the proposal at the next meeting. The U.S. Navy released a map that would put large areas of the state off limits to future offshore wind farms , including all of San Diego and Los Angeles coastlines, extending up to the Central Coast. However, the military does not have the final say and federal and state officials, as well as wind energy companies and one member of congress, are working with the U.S. Department of Defense to develop a more flexible plan. Anschutz Entertainment Group is advancing a $1.2 billion proposal to expand the LA Convention Center and the adjacent JW Marriott hotel. The center hasn’t been expanded since 1997 while San Diego and Anaheim invested in upgraded their facilities. The group is requesting tax incentives from the city for the project. Kanye West announced on twitter his plans to launch a new architecture arm called “Yeezy Home” that would include architectural and urban design. In the tweet, Kanye said he was calling for “architects and industrial designers who want to make the world better”. West says he was inspired by a recent visit to Los Angeles-based Southern California Institute of Architecture.  A long-awaited mixed-use project at Pier 70 in San Francisco broke ground last week. Work will begin immediately on the project which includes 1,100-2,150 residential units and more than 1 million square feet of commercial space, with local retail and services, arts and light industrial space on 28 acres. Phase one consists of four buildings, one park, new utilities, and two new streets connecting Dogpatch and the waterfront. According to data released by the Legislative Analyst’s Office, state taxes on legal marijuana sales in California are coming far short of projections. Approximately $34 million in the first quarter of 2018, about a third of the revenue that was anticipated. Gov. Jerry Brown’s budget proposal predicated that $175 million would pour in from excise and cultivation taxes in the first six months. The figures reflect how difficult it is to set up a large regulated market when an illegal one already. Some jurisdictions have banned marijuana cultivation and sales altogether while others have dragged their feet in passing regulations, which are required before a state license can be issued.

That was fun, wasn’t it? Introduced as stentorian rejoinder to California’s anti-development voices in January and progressively muted into something resembling compromise by its third draft, Senate Bill 827 surely was not as awful as its critics contended nor as revelatory as its strongest supporters contended. It had big, possibly overstated goals and strategic flaws and surely would have been revised within an inch of its life had it not died in committee April 17. It was, in short, a typical legislative process. And yet, few land use laws captured the public imagination and animated the land use community the way SB 827 did in its three short months on this earth. I mean “imagination" literally. Opponents especially took to hyperbole and, occasionally, graphic design to vilify the bill. My favorite meme depicts Sen. Scott Wiener, the bill’s author, and Sonja Trauss, head of the YIMBY group San Francisco Bay Area Renters Federation, wearing business suits and odd ninja-esque hairstyles, pledging to invade new territories against a backdrop of endless apartment towers that appear ripped from Shanghai or Hong Kong. Other memes inexplicably depict Wiener ready to enter a dance-off against  John Travolta . I think we can all agree thatyou’ve really arrived in politics when your opponents equate you with disco. (Wiener praised the memes as “exceptionally gay.”)

Residents of San Francisco’s Bayview Hunters Point neighborhood have filed a class action lawsuit against Tetra Tech Inc., the firm contracted by the U.S. Navy to rid the area’s former naval shipyard of radiation. The lawsuit, filed by attorney Charles Bonner on behalf of over 34,000 residents, is seeking $27 billion in damages for “blatant, conscious, callous disregard of Bayview Hunters Point residents live, born, and unborn”. Tetra Tech has recently come under fire for allegedly falsifying testing to suggest that the $1 billion cleanup effort, conducted mostly between 2006 and 2012, had proceeded properly. The property must be remediated in advance of the redevelopment of 500 acres, including over 10,000 homes, according to a master plan approved by the city in 2010. “Tetra Tech stands by its work at Hunters Point. Our work was done properly and to the standard required by the U.S. Navy,” accordingly to a company statement quoted in the San Francisco Chronicle  “We believe so strongly in the quality of our work that we have offered to pay for independent testing to demonstrate the false and misleading allegations, such as contained in this lawsuit, are wrong.” (See prior CP&DR coverage .) San Jose Sharks Sue over BART Construction Sharks Sports & Entertainment, parent company of the San Jose Sharks NHL team, is suing Bay Area Rapid Transit and Valley Transportation Authority alleging that they failed to adequately plan for construction impacts and lost parking near the SAP Center. The company’s President John Tortora said, “we are completely supportive of BART coming to San Jose” but is concerned about loss of parking and impacts from construction. Sharks representatives said the wrangling of single- versus double-bore tunneling methods and trying to obtain federal funding quickly, resulted in promises for a construction management plan without many details in the plan itself. VTA and BART are seeking $1.5 billion in federal grants, about one third of the $4.7 billion project cost. The lawsuit asks VTA rescind approval of the project and stop all work until it completes a clearer plan for managing the construction phase and proving it can provide adequate parking for BART riders. San Jose Mayor Sam Liccardo said the city is planning Diridon and downtown “for people, not cars”, although he has not responded to this lawsuit. SACOG Approves ‘Green Region Plan' The Sacramento Area Council of Governments board approved the Green Region Plan , which outlines programs aimed at reducing vehicle emissions, and moving towards a zero emission future. The three goals are: bringing existing and new partners together to work on a cleaner regional transportation system, showcase region’s ability to come together and create a zero emission system that the state will help fund, and work with existing efforts at SACOG and around the region to create an equitable approach to meeting air quality and GHG goals. The five program areas are disadvantaged communities; personal vehicles; shared rides and vehicles; public and private microtransit and shuttles; and medium and heavy-duty fleets. Supreme Court Upholds Ruling Striking Down S.F. Eviction Law The California Supreme Court denied an appeal filed by tenants rights groups to overturn an ruling striking down an ordinance limiting evictions. The ordinance was approved unanimously by the Board of Supervisors and took effect in April 2016. Appellants include groups protect school employees, families with children, and childcare center workers from evictions during the school year in San Francisco. The law requires landlords to wait until summer before evicting families or school employees to remodel the property, convert it to a condominium, or demolish it. Supporters of the measure say most teachers could not afford to live in the city with the districts average income of $65,240 a year and one-bedroom apartments at the median rent of $3,500. The ordinance was in effect for less than five months before Superior Court Judge Ronald Quidachay overturned it, saying state law barred local governments from limiting the ground for eviction. Los Angeles’s Rent Burden Remains Worst in U.S. Los Angeles tops Forbes’s list of worst cities for renters in 2018. The average monthly price to rent an apartment was two-third higher than the national average and rent eats up 41 percent of the local median household income. Vacancy rates are low in LA, 3.8 percent, allowing landlords to raise rents at a much faster pace than in the rest of the country. San Francisco is second on the list with the average monthly price to rent an apartment at $3,288 which eats up 35 percent of the local median household income. Other California cities on the list are San Diego (fourth), Riverside-San Bernardino tied for fifth with Miami, San Jose eighth, Orange County ninth, 11 is Sacramento, and 13 is Oakland.  According to a survey released by the Luskin School of Public Affairs at UCLA, residents across LA County are increasingly anxious about the cost of living , with housing the top concern . This is especially apparent in younger residents who must live further from their work to have cheaper housing. The survey calculated the “quality of life index”, which in LA went down to 56 from 59 the year before. Cost of living was the lowest ranked of all nine categories. Quick Hits & Updates  The US Supreme Court has asked environmentalists who sued tech financier Vinod Khosla to respond to his appeal. This is the first sign that the highest court might take up Khosla’s attempt to block the public from Martins Beach and potentially rewrite the state’s Coastal Act. While this does not mean the court will hear the case, it is significant and increases the likelihood that the court will take it up. Four of the nine justices must agree to take up a case. The LA County Transportation Committee approved Metro’s plan to expand the bike share program in the city. The $17.5 million expansion plan would be over two years and add a total of 1,700 bikes in the greater downtown area and Westside. The cost would include capital, operations and maintenance. Around 22 new stations are planned for the USC area and communities along the Expo line. LA would pay 50 percent of the capital costs and 65 percent of the operations and maintenance costs. Chariot has been issued San Francisco’s first private transit operator permit according to SF MTA. Under the permit, Chariot must share GPS and passenger data with the city. The company has already changed about 100 drop-off/pick-up spots to legal curb spaces, and must relocate another nine percent of its 204 stop locations by late summer. MTA spokesman Ben Jose wrote in a blog post, the new permits ensure that private transit services “have minimal impact on public transit, implement business practices consistent with city policies and respond more effectively to the needs of our communities.” Los Angeles County won possession, through eminent domain, of a four-acre property in South Los Angeles  that has sat empty since the building burned down during the 1992 riots. The county argues the 16 parcels would accommodate affordable housing, boarding school, transit plaza and community-serving retail. The county has set aside $15.7 million in taxpayer money to obtain the land. However, neighbors of the vacant site say the county’s plan is overwhelming. San Diego State University provided details on how its proposed 35,000-seat stadium could be expanded to 55,000 seats and accommodate an NFL franchise. SDSU director of athletics John David Wicker said in a news conference, “ we knew we needed to ensure our Aztec Stadium site could accommodate an NFL venue should an owner want to build at SDSU Mission Valley”. While only four NFL stadiums are shared between NFL and college teams, Wicker said “it’s a discussion. It’s a negotiation, perhaps.” Proponents of an initiative to give residents the power to weigh in on large projects in Irvine failed to submit enough signatures by the deadline. Opponents of the initiative say it could hurt economic growth and slow down crucial developments in Orange County’s third largest city and employment hub. In 2013, the cost to move AT&T, PG&E, and other utilities out of the way of the High-Speed Rail section from Fresno to Madera counties was estimated at $25 million. The cost has ballooned to $400 million, according to a new analysis. The agency currently has three active construction contracts for the 119 miles between Madera to north of Bakersfield. This has increased the budget of this section of construction from $1.2 billion in 2013 to $1.5 billion today. The agency still has to acquire 607 of the 1,900 land parcels necessary for construction in Madera, Frenso, Kings, Tulare, and Kern counties. The Los Angeles Board of Harbor Commissioners voted unanimously to approve a permit that allows SpaceX to build and operate a facility at the Port of LA to develop its BFR rocket and spaceship system. The formal approval came days after LA Mayor Eric Garcetti announced SpaceX would build its next-generation rocket and spacecraft at the 19-acre site at the former Southwest Marine Shipyard at Berth 240. Production and fabrication of the rocket would begin in about two or three years. SpaceX will have an initial 10-year least at the port with rent around $1.38 million a year. LA Mayor Eric Garcetti said he would consider extending rent restrictions in the city to cover newly build apartments if California voters repeal the Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act , which bans cities and counties from capping rent increases on apartments build after 1995. Garcetti said it “seems to be unjust” that tenants in newer buildings do not have the same protections from hefty rent increases. Republican activists have collected enough signatures for an initiative to repeal recent increases in California’s gas tax and vehicle fees and qualify the measure for the November ballot. The initiative targets a law approved last April that is expected to raise $5.4 billion annually for road and bridge repairs and improvements to mass transit. The money comes from a 12 cents per gallon increase in gas tax, 20-cent increase in diesel fuel excise tax, and a new annual vehicle fee ranging from $25 to $175. Former Dodgers owner Frank McCourt has proposed a gondola that would take passengers from Union Station to Dodger Stadium in five minutes.  The gondola would be one of several major infrastructure investments proposed by LA County that would not be built by Metro or funded by taxpayers. Frank McCourt’s investment firm would fund a portion of the project’s estimated $125 million cost and would seek private financing for the remainder.  Mayor Eric Garcetti told reporters, “I am absolutely confident that this will happen. It’s not actually crazy.” According to a new report from nonprofit Circulate San Diego , the Metropolitan Transit System maintains hundreds of parking spaces at most of the trolley stops but some of the park-and-ride fields are only 30 percent full at peak hours. The report says MTS controls some 57 acres of prime developable land and could construct more than 8,000 homes. Circulate San Diego found the agency has not issued request for proposals in more than ten years. AIDS Healthcare Foundation announced it has purchased the historic King Edward Hotel on the edge of skid row as the next step in its initiative to provide affordable housing for homeless people. The foundation’s new homeless division will refurbish the hotel and lease its 150 rooms at rates as low as $400 per month. President Michael Weinstein said the project will demonstrate how homeless people can be housed quickly and at far lower costs than through the construction of housing program pursued by the city. The foundation’s goal is to open 10,000 units in five years. AHF backed Measure S, a slow-growth citywide ballot measure that failed last year. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) A report by consultants at Keyser-Marston found that rising construction costs related to a labor shortage and President Trump’s tariff plan may hinder high-density housing development in San Jose. The reports predicts rents would be even more unaffordable in order to make residential tower construction profitable for investors. Mayor of San Jose, Sam Liccardo, told the Mercury News that the city might need to slash developer fees to counteract market forces. UrbanFootprint  has partnered with the State of California to offer over 500 California cities, counties, and regional agencies access to its cloud-based, city planning software. This partnership will give public agency planners, designers, and officials throughout California access to a comprehensive data library, advanced scenario planning capabilities, and real-time analysis modules built to evaluate plan impacts in terms of emissions, land consumption, water use, energy use, walking and transit accessibility, and more.

The California State Transportation Agency announced that $2.4 billion from increases in the gas tax and vehicle fees will be spent on dozens of transit projects statewide, including works to prepare Los Angeles for the 2028 Summer Olympics. The money will be divided between six Metro expansion projects, including light-rail extensions to Torrance and Montclair, speeding up Amtrak Pacific Surfliner and Metrolink, and additional rapid transit service along congested corridors. In the Bay Area, the funds will help complete the BART line to San Jose and create new SamTrans express bus routes along the US 101 corridor. These funds are part of the $5.4 billion expected to be raised annually for road and bridge repairs and mass transit improvements that was approved last year by the Legislature and Gov. Jerry Brown. However, Republican activists are preparing to file more than 830,000 signatures in an effort to qualify a measure for the November ballot that would repeal the 12-cents-per-gallon gas tax increase, 20- cent diesel fuel excise tax increase, and new annual vehicle fees. Audit Faults State’s Approach to Homelessness The Legislatives Analyst’s Office released an  audit finding the state’s response to homelessness needs to be improved. The audit was ordered last year in response to complaints from state Sen. Scott Wilk (R-Santa Clarita) that the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority was shortchanging the Antelope Valley in shelter funding. The report found “California has more people experiencing homelessness than any other state in the nation, and it does a poor job of sheltering this vulnerable population.” According to the audit, California did not have a single statewide entity for addressing homelessness and no mechanism for coordinating the many homeless programs that the state funds until recently. The recently created Homeless Coordinating and Financing Council has no permanent staff and the audit recommends the Legislature provide funds for a staff, including executive director, and direct the agency to develop and implement a statewide strategic plan by next April. Lung Association: Unhealthful Air Persists in California  According to the American Lung Association’s annual “ State of the Air ” report, eight of the nation’s ten most polluted cities are in California.  Los Angeles/Long Beach is the most ozone-polluted city, and has been for nearly the entire 19-year history of the report. Bakersfield was second on the list, Visalia-Porterville-Hanford third, Frenso-Madera frouth, and Sacramento-Roseville fifth. San Diego-Carlsbad came in sixth, Modesto-Merced seventh, and Redding- Red Bluff was ninth. The only non-California cities on the top ten list were Phoenix which was eighth and New York which came in tenth. While California has the most cities on the list, it also has the most stringent environmental regulations. However, the Lung Association says California has done more than any other state to counteract air pollution. San Jose-San Francisco-Oakland were 13th on the list of most ozone-polluted cities, tenth on year-round particle pollution and sixth on short-term particle pollution.   UCLA Study Predicts Volatile Weather from Climate Change According to a new study released by researchers at UCLA, California should expect more dramatic swings between dry and wet years as the climate warms. The study warns that California’s volatile climate will become even more volatile as human-cause climate change tinkers with atmospheric patterns over the eastern Pacific Ocean. While the long-term average of annual precipitation in the state is unlikely to change much, there will be more extreme wet years and more really dry years. Such sudden wings between drought and intense storms will increase the threat to aging dams and flood-control networks, accentuate the wildfire threat and make management of the state’s complex waterworks even more daunting. The scientists found California will experience a 100-200 percent increase in very wet years by the end of the century. In Southern California, the frequency of extremely dry years is expected to rise 200 percent. Los Angeles Touts Progress on Green Goals The City of Los Angeles has released its third annual Sustainable City pLAn progress report at Los Angeles Business Council’s annual Sustainability Summit. The city had an 11 percent reduction in greenhouse gas emissions in 2016 and created 6,464 green jobs, a 31 percent increase over last year. In the third year of the Sustainable City pLAn, the city has met or exceeded 55 of the 61 targets set for 2017 and two goals set for 2025. The city has an ambitious goal of a 45 percent reduction by 2025. The reduction in GHG emissions is largely due to a shift away from coal-powered energy, as well as an increase in renewable sources. The city also launched the BlueLA Electric Car Sharing Program, the nation’s largest EV car sharing program for underserved communities and secured $35 million in state funding for Watts from the Transformative Climate Communities grant program which will fund affordable housing, urban greening, emission-free transportation, and energy efficiency retrofits. Bay Area Cities Fare Well in Survey of Dog Parks; S. Calif Cities Do Not The Trust for Public Land released its annual city parks survey and found that dog parks are among the fastest growing park amenities in the combined parks systems of the 100 largest US cities. There are currently 774 dedicated dog parks in the 100 largest cities, an increase of 38 over last year. Oakland is 7th on the list with 3.8 dog parks per 100,000 residents (16 parks), San Francisco 8th with 32 parks (3.7 per 100,000 residents, Fremont 12th with 6 parks, Sacramento 17th with 11 parks (2.2 per 100,000 residents), Bakersfield and Long Beach were tied 19th with 2.1 per 100,000 residents.  Other California cities include Chula Vista (23), Fresno (34), San Diego (43), Stockton and San Jose (46). Towards the bottom of the list are Riverside and Anaheim (69), Irvine (84), Los Angeles (91), and Santa Ana (96). Forest Service Bans Extraction in San Gabriel Mountains The US Forest Service released a management plan that bans new oil, gas, mineral exploration and development in the San Gabriel Mountains National Monument. The plan prioritizes environmental protection over economic development, and even bans overnight camping along the East and North forks of the San Gabriel River and Aliso Creek Canyon due to the ecological toll. Rare and endangered species including mountain yellow-legged frogs, red-legged frogs and the Santa Ana sucker live in these “critical biological land use zones.” President Obama established the 346,000-acre monument four years ago. Quick Hits & Updates The Ninth Circuit court judges reaffirmed a lower court decision stating endangered wildlife would not be threatened by the housing development at Newhall Ranch and the EIR was properly administered. The Friends of the Santa Clara River and the Santa Clarita Organization for Planning and the Environment filed a complaint in October claiming the US Army Corps of Engineers did not properly administer the development’s EIR. Grading for the project began late last year. Groundbreaking on construction for the project’s first two phases is scheduled to begin later this year. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) Backers of the SoccerCity  proposal in San Diego filed a lawsuit saying the rival SDSU West Initiative is violating state law by misusing the SDSU name and earning a place on the ballot by “cynically tricking voters into signing the petition.” The suit argues that San Diegans have been led to believe that the SDSU West proposal has been sanctioned by the university and violates the state’s Education Code, Government Code and Elections Code by using the SDSU name for private development. Friends of SDSU called the lawsuit a “desperate attempt” to “eliminate voter choice” about the use of the stadium site. Oakland’s Port Commission is entering into exclusive negotiations with the Oakland A’s  for the second time in four years for the Howard Terminal as a possible ballpark site. The first step will be to do a feasibility analysis to address both the challenges and what would be required approvals from the State Lands Commission, Bay Conservation, Development Commission, and other regulatory agencies that have jurisdiction over the port.  (See prior CP&DR commentary .) San Francisco’s latest vision for Caltrain would alter the current alignment putting a new tunnel beneath Pennsylvania Avenue, starting at 25th  Street, to avert problematic street-level rail crossings at 16th S treet and Pennsylvania Avenue and Seventh Street and Mission Bay Drive. The $6 billion plan would take until 2027 to complete. A study, after over three years of work, will be released this week. An earlier version of the plan, proposed by then mayor Ed Lee, would have demolished a portion of I-280 and rerouted the train through Mission Bay to help grow the neighborhood. San Francisco Mayor Mark Farrell announced the city is taking steps to become carbon-neutral by 2050. The first step is to plant 2,000 trees, which will cost roughly $4 million. Farrell says its imperative for cities to take up the mantle of climate stewardship because the federal government is reluctant to confront climate change or even directly acknowledge its existence. The city also announced that all public and private San Francisco Bay ferries and tour boats would shift to run on renewable diesel fuel made from organic matter to cut emissions by 22,000 metric tons a year. Murrieta City Council upheld its approval of spending $5,000 to join a coalition of other cities and counties for Revitalize California Cities Tax Increment Financing membership. The goal is to have the state return a portion of Redevelopment Funds that were taken away in 2011. Chula Vista’s Bayfront redevelopment has received the financial backing to begin its $1.1 billion hotel and convention center. Chula Vista and the Port of San Diego approved a development agreement, revenue-sharing plan and public subsidy for the project. Houston-based RIDA Development will put up $785 for the project, while the city and Port pay $343 million. Additionally the Port will forego ground lease revenues for 38 years, resulting in a $245 million subsidy. To fund their portion of the development, the city and Port created the Chula Vista Bayfront Financing Authority and will issue taxable and tax-exempt bonds. A Washington, D.C., Circuit Court panel upheld a lower court’s ruling denying a challenge to the proposed North Fork Rancheria of Mono Indians’ plans to build a casino on Highway 99 north of Madera. The panel reaffirmed an earlier ruling that the Interior Department has the authority to take the land into a trust, and the project complied with federal laws. One of the major concerns of those opposed to the proposed casino is that it does not sit on a tribal reservation but is 35 miles away. San Diego leaders have said preservation of existing low-rent apartments is part of a new initiative to solve the city’s affordable housing crisis. Countywide, more than 1,200 subsidized apartments have been lost over the last 17 years because their government-sponsored ret restrictions expired. Another 2,400 apartments face the same risk over the next half decade, including 1,300 within the city. Executive Director of the San Diego Housing Federation, Stephen Russell, said, “preservation is inherently more cost-effective than building new housing. So we have to preserve the housing stock that is there and protect the existing public investment we’ve made.” However, vice president of the local chapter of the Building Industry Association says the city should remain singularly focused on increasing housing supply. The PolicyLink All-In Cities Anti-Displacement Policy Network is a group of city leaders finding solutions to improve affordability and reduce the burdens of evictions. The effort launched in late March and includes teams from ten U.S. cities, which met at the Summit in Chicago in mid April. San Jose is the only California city to participate. The Trump administration has approved a new oil well and small pipeline in the Carrizo Plain National Monument in an old oil well that has been slated for restoration. The conservation groups, including the Center for Biological Diversity, are challenging the approval and say the project falls short of the high environmental standards required to drill on protected lands. However, E&B Natural Resources Management Corp., an independent oil and gas company, says the oil field has been around for decades and is in a previously disturbed area which minimizes land disturbance and is an environmental best practice. Santa Ana City Councilmembers unanimously agreed to bring legal action to bring all 34 Orange County cities into a homelessness lawsuit under the jurisdiction of federal Judge David O. Carter, who has warned cities they need to expand homeless shelter options. The move would grant Carter the ability to follow through on his warnings about banning enforcement of anti-camping laws it city officials, especially south county city officials, don’t make progress in picking one or more shelter locations. Carter has repeatedly said Santa Ana has done its share to host emergency homeless shelters and services and its time for other cities to step up with a “proportional” share of services. The Governor’s Office of Planning and Research (OPR) has prepared minor updates to its Technical Advisory on Evaluating Transportation Impacts in CEQA. A copy of the April 2018 Technical Advisory is available at on OPR’s  Transportation Impacts (SB 743) webpage . OPR will continue to update the Technical Advisory as needed over time, and as more public agencies implement vehicle miles traveled (VMT) and provide real-world case studies.  The Mountains Recreation and Conservation Authority purchased an 11-acre plot of land near the Angeles National Forest for $4.4 million in state and other public funds. The land provides a critical natural habitat, and an idyllic backdrop to Sunland-Tujunga’s residential communities. Authority officials say they will halt illegal vehicle access onto the land, clean-up dumped trash, and begin studying what habitat restoration efforts are needed. The land will be preserved as publicly owned open space. The  California Air Resource Board  is holding several community meetings they are holding across the state through May 11 to seek public input for the upcoming revision of the  California Climate Investments  funding guidelines. CARB wants to ensure that the guidelines best fit the needs of the communities that would be using them. The  California State Coastal Conservancy  is soliciting applications for a new round of Climate Ready grants. The Conservancy seeks to support multi-benefit projects that use natural systems to assist communities in adapting to the impacts of climate change. Applications are due July 2.

Wary as I am of hyperbole, I reckon that Jeremy Stoppelman deserves five stars.  Stoppelman is the CEO of Yelp, the popular online rating website and app. As reported by the San Francisco Chronicle, Stoppelman appeared on a panel last week alongside Sonja Trauss, of YIMBY group S.F. Bay Area Renters Federation, and State Senator Scott Wiener, still on the speaking circuit after the demise of his Senate Bill 827. Stoppelman was there to explicitly support SB 827 and to reaffirm his support for the YIMBY movement.  Stoppelman, whose company is based in San Francisco, knows that their wages have to correspond with their employees’ cost of living. If YIMBYs can get more housing built, companies like Yelp will indirectly benefit.  “You end up paying more,” said Stoppelman, as reported in the Chronicle. "That’s the most straightforward solution.” Last year, Stoppelman wrote a $100,000 check to SF-BARF. This donation got Trauss in trouble with some of her anticapitalist critics, who  complained  that she was just doing the bidding of big business. I’d like to think, though, that it’s the other way around: this is one instance in which business is doing the bidding of — or at least supporting — the common good.  Frustratingly, when it comes to housing, Bay Area Tech companies have a long, proud history of doing…. nearly nothing. After promoting some half-assed programs to assist employees, Facebook is just beginning to understand that its employees have to live somewhere in the real world with a proposed development in Menlo Park. Google is planning a campus in downtown San Jose, presumably with housing. As for Apple… they’re too busy polishing the doorknobs on their new headquarters to care about anything else that happens in Cupertino .  Meanwhile, down in Los Angeles, the B Team of Silicon Beach — including Snap, Hulu, and Dollar Shave Club -- has been similarly oblivious to the pot of rising rents that threaten to boil their employees alive.  Stoppelman called out his fellow tech giants directly the other night: "Google and Facebook have started to engage locally, Stoppelman said, and he’s surprised that “'more tech leaders weren’t paying attention to this problem as it was developing,’” according to the Chronicle. Not exactly damning criticism, but it’s a start.  All of this gets me thinking: What’s different about Yelp?  A few months ago at an event in Los Angeles on a similar topic, a speaker made a chilling observation: wherever they may be located, tech companies do not consider their neighbors to be their customers. People in Detroit buy automobiles. People in Pittsburgh buy ketchup. People in Rochester (used to) buy cameras. Even if a hometown customer base constitutes a small fraction of a company’s global base, local customers still tie companies to their respective locations. They humanize the business relationship.  What did this mean for cities? Involvement and largesse: everything from sponsoring Little League teams to funding museums (to, yes, tax breaks and political pressure). Say what you will about capitalism: baseball and art are OK by me.  What happens, though, when you don’t really have “customers”? Or, if you do, what if they come in the form of usernames and avatars, not corporeal humans? You end up with companies with all the civic spirit of a plague of locusts.  Yelp’s users come from the same faceless mass of bits and bytes that Facebook’s, Google’s, and Snap’s do. But, whereas those other companies seek to create their own “communities” online Yelp is one of the few tech companies whose product is linked, intrinsically and immutably, to the real world. (No offense to Pokémon Go.) Stoppelman spends most every waking moment figuring out not how to improve and monetize the online experience but rather how to improve (and, yes, monetize) the real-world experience. Particularly the urban experience.  Yelp has lent crucial support to independent businesses — the very businesses that help make cities vibrant, interesting places. I mean, if you’re going to Applebee’s, you’re not doing it because of a review. But if you’re in a new part of town, or a new town entirely, you probably turn to Yelp to find a nice place to get lunch, get your suit cleaned, or fix your computer. Cities thrive when Yelp works properly, and Yelp thrives when cities work properly.  I don’t want to psychoanalyze Stoppelman. But I don’t think it’s a stretch to say that his business sensibilities inform his urban sensibilities. For one thing, he’s in Oakland, not Silicon Valley. And anyone with urban sensibilities in coastal California knows that we need more housing. And the type of dense urban housing that YIMBY's often promote goes hand-in-hand with the local businesses that populate the upper reaches of Yelp's ratings. It stands to reason, then, that Stoppelman would keep his feet on the ground while others have their heads in the Cloud.  Now, whether the YIMBY approach is the right approach is open to debate. But let’s give Stoppelman credit for trying. And, though I know tech billionaires are supposed to be iconoclastic, with their black turtlenecks and all, I hope some of his counterparts will also try to raise their ratings as corporate citizens.  This article has been updated since its original publication.

Los Angeles Board of Building and Safety Commissioners tentatively signed off on a proof of concept tunnel for The Boring Company , a tunneling company based in the Los Angeles area and founded by engineer-entrepreneur Elon Musk. The proposed initial segment for the rapid transit tunnel to be built with the company’s highly touted tunneling technology will run 2.7 miles down Sepulveda Boulevard, north of Pico Boulevard until the intersection with Washington Boulevard in Culver City. City Councilmember Paul Koretz has introduced a motion, which was unanimously approved by the City Council’s public works committee, that would exempt the proof of concept tunnel is from CEQA and therefore the Bureau of Engineering could begin issuing permits. However, the public works committee recommended that the Boring Co. seek approval from Metro before digging can start. A memo from Metro CEO Phil Washington expresses skepticism about the project and asserts Metro’s jurisdiction over any such project. Construction of the proof of concept tunnel is expected to take nine months. A Boring Co. spokesperson said the tunnel would only be used for testing and would complete and EIR and secure all necessary permits before any passenger service begins. (See prior CP&DR  commentary .) San Francisco Groups May Invoke SB 35 in Tenderloin  Mission Economic Development Agency and the Tenderloin Neighborhood Development Corp. submitted an application to invoke Senate Bill 35, which allows developers to skip expensive and lengthy environmental review in exchange for building a certain amount of affordable apartments. The proposed project is a 130-unit family housing project on 681 Florida Street, a site that was donated to the city as part of the community benefits package for a 195-unit, market rate development at 2000 Bryant Street. The developers must commit to at least 50 percent affordable units. Additionally, under HOME-SF passed last year, the developer will be able to build two extra stories in exchange for 44 additional units. This will be the third project in California to seek to invoke SB 35. (See prior CP&DR coverage here and here .)  Report Analyzes Mobility and Environmental Impacts of Shared-Mobility Technologies NRDC and Nutter Consulting released a report and recommendations “ Los Angeles Shared-Mobility Climate and Equity Action Plan ,” which studies whether technology-enabled shared mobility options, such as Uber, Zipcar and shared bikes and scooters are helping the environment while providing more accessible mobility options or adding more traffic and worsening air pollution and urban sprawl. The report presents a policy framework for how shared mobility can help cities reach their climate and equity goals. The research has six recommendations: (1) design shared-mobility programs and policies with and for underserved low-income communities; (2) manage city assets to prioritize walking, biking, public transit, and shared mobility over private vehicles; (3) electrify shared-mobility fleets and install ubiquitous charging infrastructure; (4) create seamless and widely accessible transit rider information systems, including payments and real-time transit data; (5) require that shared-mobility providers and the city exchange data; and (6) design system-wide shared-mobility policies and programs to enable the best environmental and social performance from all shared-mobility modes. For each of the recommendations is an action item such as eliminating minimum parking, creating an equity advisory committee, incentives, data gathering, and piloting a "Go Zone." Court Strikes Down S.F. Eviction Ordinance The First District Court of Appeal in San Francisco struck down a San Francisco ordinance that requires landlords who evict their tenants and go out of the rental business to wait 10 years before rebuilding or renovating any of the formerly rented units, under the Ellis Act. This local law was enacted in December 2013 but the court said it penalizes property owners for exercising their rights under the Ellis Act and thus conflicts with California law. The lawyer who represented owners in the case said, “we’re hopeful that San Francisco will take heed of the decision… and be more respectful of the rights of small property owners.” Palo Alto Adopts Zoning to Facilitate Affordable Housing Palo Alto City Council approved , 7-2, the creation of an “Affordable Housing Combining District”, a new zoning designation that will loosen development standards for affordable-housing projects, granting them greater density, higher heights, and less stringent parking regulations. These new developments would be located near transit. The Council also voted to go with the broader definition for affordable that would apply to residents who make up to 120 percent of area median income ($102,000 for a two-person household) instead of the more restrictive 60 percent AMI. Each affordable housing project would still need to be reviewed by the City Council on an individual basis before receiving approval. According to a citizen group focused on expanding housing and transportation options, Palo Alto Forward, the city has not approved any affordable housing since 2009. The ordinance currently only applies to commercial zones where 100-percent affordable housing were not allowed in the past. San Francisco Starts to Regulate Scooters San Francisco Board of Supervisors unanimously approved an ordinance that requires motorized scooters to obtain a permit to be parked on a sidewalk. The ordinance created by Sup. Aaron Peskin allows SFMTA to create rules for the stand-up vehicles unceremoniously dropped in the city last month by LimeBike, Bird and Spin. While some people praised the scooters as environmentally conscious alternatives to cars, others have said they are dangerous, clutter the sidewalks, and that tech companies are unfairly using public roadways to run a business. Earlier this month, the city’s Department of Public Works impounded dozens of scooters in response to complaints that they were blocking sidewalks and building entrances, and creating a hazard for pedestrians, especially those in wheelchairs. City Attorney Dennis Herrera sent a cease-and-desist letter to each of the companies, calling their scooters a “public nuisance.” (See prior CP&DR commentary .) Hunters Point to Become ‘Incubation Zone’ for New Tech Businesses San Francisco’s Office of Community Investment and Infrastructure unanimously approved a comprehensive reimaging of the 400-acre former Hunters Point Naval Shipyard project as an “incubation zone” with a hotel, schools, and maker spaces. The city commission assumed oversight of the property in 2011 after Gov. Jerry Brown abolished local redevelopment agencies. The new plan will make the shipyard more diverse and eclectic neighborhood than originally envisioned. The plan by developer FivePoint would increase housing from 10,500 to 10,672 units and would add a 120-room hotel, two or three educational institutions, a building for micro manufacturers, and would preserve several historic buildings that had been slated for demolition.  The vote took place even as the U.S. Navy has admitted that the $1 billion clean up of the Superfund site was done incorrectly with widespread fraud and cheating. The proposal still needs approval from the Board of Supervisors, who will most likely consider it this fall. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) Feds Tie $1.4 Billion in Rail Funds to Safety The Federal Transit Administration took the unusual step of issuing a public warning to California and 29 other states of a looming deadline for those states to prove they have complete programs to oversee and promote rail safety. Without meeting the safety requirements, California is at risk of losing at least $1.4 billion in federal train funds next year. Several national Amtrak crashes recently have highlighted the push for more safety. Officials with the State Public Utilities Commission, which oversees train safety in California, says they are finalizing the application and hope to submit to the federal government next month. California is second behind New York with the most to lose funding-wise. The deadline for meeting the safety requirements is April 15, 2019. SPUR Launches Regional Planning Initiative in Bay Area San Francisco Planning and Urban Research (SPUR) is launching a major new project: the development of a regional strategy for the Bay Area. The organization is working with groups such as the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, Facebook, Genentech, John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, Sage Foundation, and Stanford University to “ask an important set of questions, engage the civic community and propose bold ideas that will define the public conversation over the coming years.” SPUR will develop a Regional Strategy for the Bay Area over the next three years through research, scenario planning, and analysis from SPUR policy staff and a team of consultants. The final product will attempt to advance a coherent vision of what the Bay Area can be in 2050 and a set of strategies to realize that vision. Quick Hits & Updates California Association of Realtors announced it has submitted almost a million signatures for a stationwide initiative aimed at expanding Prop. 13 for senior homeowners to qualify for November’s ballot. Election officials must verify the petitions to make sure they contain the required 585,000 voter signatures required. If approved, the Prop. 13 “portability” measure would allow homeowners over 55 to take their low property tax base with them after selling their home and buying a new home anywhere in the state. There would be no limit on how many times they can use the provision and no limit on home prices (although buying a more expensive home would result in a slightly higher “blended” tax assessment). Bay Area venture capitalist Tim Draper says he has received enough signatures to qualify dividing California into three states on the November ballot. The CAL 3 campaign plans to deliver the 600,000 plus signatures, which Draper says represents all 58 counties, next week. Only 365,880 signatures are required by state law to get the initiative on the ballot. The Northern California state would be the entire northern portion north of Monterey, California would include Monterey County to the Orange County border, Southern California would include central California and the counties surrounding LA County. Officials from nonprofits and public agencies met for the first time recently to begin updating the LA River Master Plan from 1996. However, some people are wondering why an update is required. The goal would be to have one unified plan for the whole river. The committee will meet seven more times and hold nearly two dozen subcommittee meetings to focus on specific aspects of the river from now to December 2019, when a draft review of the master plan update is expected to be made public. The California Association of Counties selected one of its own key staff members to serve as its new Executive Director. Graham Knaus served as Deputy Executive Director or Operations and Member Services for the past three years. CSAC is the voice of California’s 58 counties at the state and federal level. The High Desert Corridor Joint Powers Authority, in charge of multimodal transportation links between Victor and Antelope valleys, has been studying extending Metrolink service from Palmdale to Victorville. Potentially, stations would be built in Adelanto and Victorville. Currently, an ambitious 63-mile connection between the two adjacent valleys with a four lane in each direction toll freeway is under construction. However, XpressWest, the privately funded high-speed rail would bridge Las Vegas and Victorville, and later Los Angeles. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) The California Coastal Commissions supported Santa Cruz’s cap on short-term rentals, 8-2. The new rules would cap hosted rentals at 250 and phase out non-hosted rentals for vacationers in the city. Santa Cruz currently has about 330 short-term rentals with permits, half hosted with the owner on the premises and half non-hosted. An AirDNA report prepared for the city estimates 1,000 units have been listed on Airbnb at some point, with the state agency estimating “roughly 600” short-term rentals in the city. California Coastal Commission staff called the proposal a ban, and recommended the commissioners reject the proposal. UC Davis has released an updated Long Range Development Plan and Draft EIR. The DEIR assess the potential environmental impacts of the proposed plan along with new housing projects and is available for public comment through end of May. Since 2015, the university has had extensive public outreach through forums, events and the “Campus Tomorrow” website. A public hearing to take comments about the report will be held May 3. The plan creates capacity for an additional 8,500 students, with two million square feet of additional classrooms, research labs, administrative and support space, as well as two new housing projects with approximately 5,200 beds. The U.S. Department of Transportation’s Inspector General has announced it will audit the $3.5 billion in federal grant money awarded to California’s high-speed rail project. State auditors are currently conducting a review on the $77 billion project. The inspector general’s office did not provide a timeline for when the federal audit will be completed. The federal money awarded to the state comes with specific conditions that the Authority’s new CEO Brian Kelly has promised to meet. These include completing a 119-mile segment of track now under construction in the Central Valley and finishing environmental reviews for the full line by 2022. San Luis Obispo City Council began reviewing proposed new zoning laws currently under draft by city staffers with input from the Planning Commission. The vision for SLO is a denser city with smaller-sized and tiny homes, rooftop decks and more bikers and walkers. The city is concerting new development to its interior areas while preserving green spaces on the outskirts. The new policy would be the city’s first zoning update in 15 years as it moves towards its estimated population of about 57,000 by 2035. The city currently has about 46,000 people. Union City and county officials are voting to divert $75 million in funds earmarked for a new BART station to build a new, wider road instead. The complex 3-mile roadway project is expected to cost upwards of $320 million and comes as city officials contemplate declaring a fiscal emergency and asking residents to raise their taxes to cover basic city services. City officials say the new road is critical for the station- and the proposed development around it- to thrive. San Francisco’s Capital Planning Committee voted unanimously to put a $425 million bond measure to kick-start vital repairs to the city's seawall on the November ballot. The proposed general-obligation bond measure needs to be approved y the Board of Supervisors before going before voters. If the bond measure wins a two-thirds approval from voters, the money raised would fund the majority of the first round of planning, construction and repair work on the seawall. A poll conducted earlier this year found that 73 percent of voters would support a bond for seawall improvement. The owner of the Mall of America is negotiating to acquire the 47-acre site of the former rocket-engine manufacturer Aerojet Rocketdyne in LA’s West Valley. The property is expected to sell for approximately $150 million and would be developed as an urban neighborhood with 3,950 residential units, office space, shops, restaurants, and a 210-room hotel. The California Coastal Commission wrote two letters to the City of Del Mar emphasizing that "managed retreat" must be one of the tools in the toolbox in dealing with sea-level rise. The city has decided to include “managed retreat” as a last-resort option despite widespread objections from homeowners. Managed retreat is a term that describes planning for ways to remove homes, roads, public buildings, and other structures from the path of the rising sea. The idea is controversial in Del Mar, where hundreds of multimillion-dollar homes are built near sea level on the northern end of town near the beach and San Dieguito River. Residents of the city prefer a combination of beach replenishment, sand retention, and flood management projects. LA Mayor Eric Garcetti proposed $91 million to fund Vision Zero , an initiative to eliminate traffic-related deaths in the city by 2025. Garcetti is releasing the budget this week, but revealed during a City Hall news conference that he has tripled the amount that was budgeted for the program last year.  (See prior CP&DR commentary here and here .)

Nobody expected Sen. Scott Wiener’s SB 827 to bite the dust so quickly. The controversial bill overriding local zoning power around transit stations had received so much publicity nationwide that everybody thought it had legs, even if Wiener had to amend it pretty significantly to get it through. Jonathan Chiat in New York magazine talked about how the bill was “the great test for progressive politics”; it even got some publicity in Houston. Indeed, just two weeks ago, I told the assembled planning commissioners of California at a League of California Cities event in Monterey that they had to get ready because “something like” SB 827 was coming down the pike. And yet we were all wrong. The bill failed its first committee test this week and now it’s dead for this year at least. There will be a lot of post-mortems as to why this happened. But the important question is: Will SB 827 – or something like it – be back next year? And if so, what are the odds of its success? I can’t say for sure what a future SB 827 – or a package of bills designed to promote housing – might look like. But I will say this: In the last two years, Wiener has succeeded in transforming the entire policy debate about housing in California. He’s done it by taking a well-documented issue that nobody wanted to face and moving it forward with provocative bills that nevertheless seems to have a chance of passing. His SB 35 last year passed in part because it was part of a larger package of housing bills and because – though it encompassed the same general idea of overriding local zoning to build housing – it was more limited in scope. As we documented not long ago, SB 35 has already given developers more leverage in both Berkeley and Cupertino . But SB 35’s success, coupled with SB 827’s failure, points to a couple of strategies that seem to increase likelihood of success for a local override bill. The first is limiting the override to affordable housing. And the second is tethering the override to the housing element. Developers can use SB 35 only in cities that have not met their production goals under the housing element – though, practically speaking, this means virtually all cities in the state . That’s why it’s important to keep an eye on Wiener’s other major bill – SB 828, which would essentially require cities to double the amount of housing they zone for in order to account for the existing shortage of some 2 million housing units across the state. (Liam Dillon in the Los Angeles Times recently provided an excellent overview of the bill.) Unlike SB 827, SB 828 is still alive. It may be just nerdy and obscure enough to pass – and that will change the world of housing even more, at least for local government planners around the state.

The San Diego Association of Governments agreed to settle the remainder of a lawsuit challenging the environmental review of its 2050 Regional Transportation Plan adopted in 2011. SANDAG prevailed at the California Supreme Court on a key issue of the dispute, but has now agreed to pay $1.7 million attorney’s fees to the plaintiffs (Cleveland National Forest Foundation, Sierra Club, the Center for Biological Diversity, and others). San Diego Forward: The Regional Plan and its EIR in 2015, has superseded that plan and has received no legal challenges. In March 2015, the Supreme Court agreed to hear the case, focusing on the issue of whether the EIR for a regional transportation plan must include an analysis of the plan’s consistency with the greenhouse gas emission reduction goals in Executive Order No. S-3-05 to comply with the California Environmental Quality Act. In the ruling released last summer, the court concluded that SANDAG properly conducted the GHG analysis in the environmental review and “sufficiently informed the public, based on the information available at the time, about the regional plan’s greenhouse gas impacts.” Los Angeles County Faces Loss of 11,000 Affordable Units According to a draft report released by the California Housing Partnership Corporation, Los Angeles County is at risk of losing roughly $3 billion worth of affordable housing over the next five years. The report found 11,000 units countywide that are at risk from being converted from affordable housing to regular apartment rentals. Many of the apartments that are in areas that are gentrifying or close to transit, have found landlords more willing to opt to get out of the affordable housing business, especially as properties age and become more expensive to maintain. However, with Prop HHH, 24 projects with 1,800 units have been approved so far which will construct more affordable units. LA City Council recently approved a linkage fee with the money going into an affordable housing fund. Federal resources are disappearing, specifically low-income housing tax credits. According to CHPC President Matt Schwartz, LA County saw a 21 percent decline in tax credit funding for new affordable housing developments in 2017. CHPC is expected to present recommendations to the LA County Board of Supervisors and lobby the state legislature and governor’s office for more investments in affordable housing. Big City Mayors Clamor for State Funds to Combat Homelessness Mayors from California’s 11 biggest cities have formed a coalition to  lobby in Sacramento for Assembly Bill 3171, which would allocate $1.5 billion from the state budget to cities addressing the growing homelessness crisis. California’s homeless population is around 134,278 according to 2017 statewide counts- and increase of 16 percent from 2015. Many cities across the state are using money from their own general funds and voter–approved ballot measures to provide shelter and services, but are asking for state funding. AB 3171 was authored by Assemblyman Phil Ting (D-San Francisco) and Senator Ricardo Lara (D-Bell Gardens) and is scheduled for its first legislative hearing before the Assembly Housing and Community Development Committee on April 25. Some of the cities included are San Diego, Los Angeles, San Jose, Anaheim, Santa Ana, Sacramento, and San Francisco. SANDAG Study Projects Major Housing Shortfall SANDAG officials  unveiled estimates they’ll use to update the region’s growth forecast and found the county will fall 152,000 homes short of what it will need by 2050 even if San Diego cities build all the housing they expect to allow over the next three decades. SANDAG staff concluded city and county plans permit 357,000 more units between now and 2050, falling far short of the 509,000 additional homes SANDAG estimates the region will need.  SANDAG conducted an analysis of existing housing stock in San Diego County and found about 57,000 homes, or nearly five percent of the total stock in the region, are either vacation or second homes, and are often vacant. These types of homes can exacerbate the housing crisis because they are unavailable to people who work and live in the region, or would like to. This is part of the county’s regional planning agency effort to project how many homes the region needs to build by 2050 to keep up with demand. The new analysis suggests the county has nearly double the number of homes unavailable to residents than it has been able to permit over the last three years. The research relied on census tract-level vacancy rate estimates from the 2010 census, population projections from the state Department of Finance, and regional land use information from the San Diego County Assessor’s Office.  Settlement Reached over Amador County General Plan  After nearly two years of litigation, the Foothill Conservancy and the County of Amador settled over the terms of the county’s General Plan. Under the settlement, the county will consider code amendments to better protect homes from wildland fire areas; reduce likelihood of agricultural lands conversion; preserving wildlife, aquatic resources, and water quality; require applicants for commercial projects of 5,000 square feet or more to conduct an economic impact analysis; as well as ordinances to protect rural scenic quality along county roads, establish design standards to protect community character, and limit light pollution. Google’s Downtown San Jose Plans Taking Shape  A top company executive at Google  told the Mercury News that the company is nearing ownership of enough downtown San Jose properties and parcels to create a “viable” transit-oriented development near Diridon train station. At the recent meeting of the Station Area Advisory Group, the first major presentation of its development philosophies and plans were shown. Google and its development ally Trammell Crow have spent at least $221.6 million buying properties on the western edge of downtown San Jose, beginning north of the SAP Center and reaching south nearly to I-280. (See prior CP&DR coverage .) Quick Hits & Updates The Town of Windsor approved, 4-1, its 2040 General Plan update, General Plan EIR, and Statement of Overriding Considerations. The EIR revealed two impacts that were significant and unavoidable: agriculture and transportation/ traffic. If fully built out, the General Plan would result in conversion of farmland however the loss of land is less than was written into the previous 2015 General Plan. California Supreme Court justices unanimously denied a ruling by a state appeals court that said Oakland was violating a state law, enacted in 2010, that requires cities to set up independent appeals boards to hear property owners’ challenges to their penalties, or let their City Council itself hear the appeals. The court said the state law was intended to direct a property owner’s appeals “outside the enforcing agency” rather than having them heard by an officer chosen by the “very enforcing agency whose decision is being appealed.” A coalition of environmentalists, including the Sierra Club, has filed a complaint with state water officials seeking to force the Santa Clara Valley Water District to protect endangered steelhead trout in the Guadalupe River. The group is claiming SCVWD has not released enough water from its dams into the creeks that feed the Guadalupe and that the concrete barrier the district built on the upper river roughly 50 years ago to diver water to recharge underground aquifers is killing the fish. Superior Court Judge Joanne O’Donnell overturned the City of Los Angeles's approval of a 27-story apartment tower in Koreatown and is ordering a full environmental impact report for the 269-unit residential project. Judge O’Donnell says more study is needed to assess the tower’s effect on traffic, public safety services, and land use patterns. In the four-page ruling, O’Donnell wrote the city did not obtain input from the city’s police and fire departments and the school district,  Caltrans, and other agencies expressed concerns about car trips generated by the project. San Luis Obispo City Council unanimously passed a new policy that will increase development fees for larger-scale homes but drop for smaller buildings. The new general cutoff for fee reductions is homes built under 1,400 square feet, though fees related to water and wastewater are lowered for homes under 1,200 square feet. Under the existing fee program, two new single-family homes of 1,100 square feet and 1,800 square feet would both be charged $38,617. The city’s new development impact program is expected to generate $146 million. According to a Chapman University poll, 59 percent of Orange County residents support rent control , which is a major disconnect between local attitudes and laws. Only one of OC’s 34 cities, San Juan Capistrano, has any form of rent control, and its limited to mobile homes. The rest of the local city councils have repeatedly rejected calls for rent control in recent years. Urban land Institute Los Angeles has named Marty Borko its new executive director. Borko left his post as principal at Gensler architects in LA to command the day-to-day working and long-range planning of one of ULI’s largest and most active regional chapters. The City of San Diego has purchased a former indoor skydiving facility for $7 million. The three-story downtown building will be re-outfitted as a “housing navigation center” to help connect homeless people with supportive services. The 26,000 square foot center is part of a multi-pronged, multi-jurisdictional response to the housing crisis in the region. If everything goes according to plan, the center will open August 1. The Coastal Commission is poised to approve a $1.45 million settlement with the owner of an oceanfront apartment complex in Pacifica that the agency says failed to properly maintain a seawall and public access stairs to the beach, then illegally graded a public beach and covered it with giant boulders. Under a state law signed by Gov. Jerry Brown in 2014, the commission was given the authority to issue fines of up to $11,250 a day for people who block public access to California’s beaches. Alameda County supervisors agreed to negotiate the sale of their share of the Coliseum complex to the City of Oakland in the hopes of keeping the A’s in the city. Because the city controls land use at the site, supervisors say it makes sense for Oakland to become the sole owner and bargain with the A’s for the property. In addition to keeping the A’s in Oakland, supervisors hope the sale of the Coliseum will spur development around the area. Los Angeles lawmakers tentatively backed new rules that would bar residents from renting out a house or apartment to night-to-night guests if it is not their primary residence. This rule is meant to prevent homes from being turned into “de facto hotels."  The draft regulations would also cap rentals at 120 days annually, but hosts could get city permission to exceed the cap if they are in good standing.  MTC, Muni, BART, Golden Gate Transit, and Caltrain are proposing a 20 percent discount to low-income riders in an effort to make public transportation fares more affordable. If the plan is enacted, anyone with an annual income of less than 200 percent of the federal poverty level: $24,280 for a single person, $32,920 for a couple of $50,200 for a family of four would be offered the discounted fares. The proposal will be discussed at the next MTC committee hearing. Los Angeles City Council unanimously approved a $4.9 billion elevated train that will bring passengers in and out of Los Angeles International Airport 's central terminal area and carry them to a car rental facility, ground transportation hub, and a station on the Metro Crenshaw Line. The project will break ground this year and is expected to being service in March 2023. Oyster Point Development CEO Chau Wu asked that its application to add housing to a previously approved project in San Francisco be put on hold. The proposal to build as many as 1,200 housing units on the waterfront at Oyster Point faced opposition from South San Francisco’s powerful biotech industry. Genentech and the California Life Sciences Association has argued that the two uses--life sciences and housing--are incompatible and adding several thousand residents could hamper the research and development.