June 2022 Newsletter

Written By Janine Roeth

Housing Santa Cruz County had a full and inspiring calendar of events for May's Affordable Housing Month - groundbreakings, panels, celebrations, socials, our Housers Happy Hour and several Housing Element panels.

👏 Thank you Housing Santa Cruz County for highlighting the people and organizations working hard to bring much-needed affordable housing to our community. 👏

If you missed our panel, "The Plan For More Affordable Housing: Influencing the Housing Element Process", you can check it out here.

Right now, the four cities and county of Santa Cruz are working on the most important affordable housing policy that our local governments will produce in a generation: the 6th Cycle Housing Element. How can we influence the process so Housing Elements address the injustices of housing policies and decisions, result in affordable housing in high-resource neighborhoods, avoid displacement in lower-income neighborhoods, increase overall supply and provide the variety of needed housing types for all income levels?

🗳Santa Cruz YIMBY Voter Guide - June Primary🗳

Do you still have your ballot? Use our Voter's Guide for the June primary:

Local Initiatives
❌ No on Measure D

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Santa Cruz County Supervisor
✅ District 3 - Shebreh Kalantari-Johnson
✅ District 4 - Felipe Hernandez

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California State Assembly
✅ District 28 - Gail Pellerin
✅ District 29 - Robert Rivas
✅ District 30 - Jon Wizard

Legislative Updates
@ Halfway Point

Floor votes have started in both the California State Senate and Assembly. There's good news on the YIMBY front as some priority bills have passed their first house and they are on their way to the second house. Thanks to all of you who called, wrote, and took action to make this happen - keep it up through the next half of the legislative session! (Learn more about CA YIMBY priority bills here)

SB 886 (Wiener) helps universities build student housing faster and at lower cost by streamlining the environmental review process for housing on university-owned land that is not at high risk of wildfire or in sensitive habitats.

AB 2011 (Wicks) fastracks new affordable housing on land zoned for commercial uses and includes strong provisions for affordability, labor standards, and environmental protection.

AB 2053 (Lee) establishes a new, statewide social housing program that would fund, build, and manage affordable housing for both rent and homeownership.

AB 2097 (Friedman) reduces housing costs and air pollution by eliminating expensive parking mandates on new homes built near high-quality transit.

AB 2221 (Quirk-Silva) accelerates building Accessory Dwelling Units (ADUs, aka granny flats or casitas) by clarifying ambiguities in existing law and removing arbitrary barriers that some cities have imposed on ADU development.

AB 2873 (Jones-Sawyer) advances diversity, equity, and inclusion by requiring developers that receive state affordable housing dollars to report if the firms they contract with are owned and operated by people of color, women, or LGBTQ+ people.

AB 1602 (McCarty) would provide $5 billion to the UC, CSU and California Community Colleges systems to construct affordable housing for students, faculty and staff.

AB 1778 (Cristina Garcia) would stop freeway widening projects in low income communities. These communities that are normally surrounded by freeways are already overburdened by pollution and high housing insecurity. Expanding freeways only further increases the social and health costs of living in these communities.

Janine Roeth
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July 2022 Newsletter
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The Plan For More Affordable Housing: Influencing the Housing Element Process