San Francisco Chronicle - (Sunday)
Don’t let politics stop housing
Of all the places in California that deserve a pass from state officials when it comes to fulfilling their obligations to plan for more housing, the tony Southern California suburb of South Pasadena sits near the bottom.
South Pasadena is an ideal place to build homes. It’s less than 10 miles away from downtown Los Angeles and connected by light rail. Its school district is frequently cited as one of the best in California. And although South Pasadena is just 3.44 square miles, there’s plenty of room to build: Much of the city is zoned for very low or low-residential density.
South Pasadena also has a history of racist housing policy that for decades blocked people of color from owning homes in the city and building wealth. Last year, the City Council passed a resolution condemning its history as a “sundown town” — meaning it prohibited nonwhite citizens from living in or even being within city limits after dark — and “past practices of institutionalized racism.” The city pledged to support state and county legislation that would reduce racial disparities.
Yet when the chance recently arose for the city to start living up to these promises — by meeting state requirements to plan for 2,067 new homes, more than half of which would be set aside for very low or low-income residents — local housing activists say South Pasadena brought in big political guns to help them duck responsibility.
On July 8, 2022, the California Department of Housing and Community Development sent South Pasadena a letter warning that its already-overdue housing plan needed substantial revisions. On July 19, South Pasadena requested a meeting with state Sen. Anthony Portantino, followed by a July 26 request for a “highlevel meeting” with Assembly Member Chris Holden.
The two Democrats, both of whom represent parts of Los Angeles County that include South Pasadena, are among the most influential lawmakers in Sacramento: They lead their respective chambers’ Appropriations Committee, which oversee critical points in the legislative process that help determine which bills get sent to the governor’s desk and how the state spends its money — including on budgets for agencies such as Housing and Community Development, or HCD.
The meeting requests were uncovered in emails obtained through public records requests filed by Josh Albrektson, a radiologist and South Pasadena pro-housing activist. The documents offer a glimpse into behind-the-scenes machinations in Sacramento, where politics, personalities and power can conspire to shape policy.
In the July email to Portantino’s staff, Tamara Binns, assistant to South Pasadena’s city manager, expressed concerns that HCD “appears to be requesting more of South Pasadena than other neighboring agencies” and asked whether Portantino might be “willing to write legislation to help cities like South Pasadena.” On Sept. 12, a Portantino staffer asked South Pasadena if it had heard back from HCD after Portantino “text(ed) his contact there.”
Asked for comment, Lerna Shirinian, Portantino’s communications director, said: “The senator recalls simply asking a state agency to return the city’s phone call. Nothing more than common courtesy.”
Holden’s office, meanwhile, sent a high-importance email to HCD to set up a phone conversation between Holden and department Director Gustavo Velasquez. “This is an important and urgent matter for Assemblymember Holden,” wrote Kevin Mulligan, a legislative staff member. Mulligan also requested that no other HCD staff member be present on the call, according to an email reviewed by The Chronicle.
In an email statement to The Chronicle, Holden denied any impropriety. “South Pasadena asked for help seeking a timely response on a solution that works for their community. I helped facilitate a conversation only.”
South Pasadena Deputy City Manager Domenica Megerdichian, meanwhile, said some of the emails and meetings were “taken a little bit out of context.” She added that the city had reached out to Portantino and Holden because it had requested technical assistance numerous times from state housing officials and hadn’t heard back. The Department of Housing and Community Development did not respond to requests for comment.
But activists say the city got more than technical assistance out of these requests. In an Oct. 28 letter rejecting South Pasadena’s revised housing blueprint, HCD nevertheless seemed to ease up on some of its aggressive demands. Online outrage ensued. After the stir, HCD rejected South Pasadena’s housing blueprint again on Jan. 27, this time more forcefully. South Pasadena seems to have gotten the message. The City Council is expected to vote in early March on whether to send a drastically revised draft to the state for approval that would, among other things, significantly raise height and density limits in parts of the city.
“Folks are realizing this housing element and this process is different than any housing element process in the past,” Megerdichian said when asked about the sea change. “Any relics or approaches of the past just isn’t helping you get to the end goal.”
The sudden reversal is surely due, too, to public scrutiny resulting from housing activists like Albrektson and organizations such as Californians for Homeownership, which secured a legal settlement that set a May 31 deadline for South Pasadena to adopt a housing plan and acknowledged that until then it’s subject to the builder’s remedy, which allows developers to bypass zoning requirements for projects with a certain share of affordable housing.
Whatever level of political interference was attempted in South Pasadena appears to have failed. But here’s why the story still matters:
As local governments across the state move from planning their housing elements to implementing them, the opportunity for political shenanigans will only grow. Robust
and fair state enforcement will be key. That’s why the appearance of impropriety in South Pasadena remains concerning. State housing officials can’t afford to emit even the slightest whiff that politics is corrupting policy.
They didn’t meet that threshold in this case.
Thankfully, some notoriously housing-averse jurisdictions appear to be doing their part to make the state’s job easier. This week, for example, San Francisco Mayor London Breed issued an executive order that aims to make it easier for the city to accomplish its plan to build 82,000 housing units in the next eight years.
But others will almost certainly try to go the South Pasadena route. Some already are: Several Bay Area cities are openly discussing building segregated facilities for developmentally disabled adults to avoid having to make space for low-income residents.
These types of efforts can’t be allowed to succeed.