A new plan allocates 1.34 million housing units to Southland municipalities through October 2029.
Southern California leaders voted Thursday to adopt a new housing plan for the 2020s that will triple future homebuilding goals, acting over repeated objections that the number is too big.
Thursday’s vote by the Southern California Association of Governments — made up of elected officials from 191 cities in six counties — requires local cities and counties to draft plans to zone for 1.34 million new homes by the end of 2029.
That’s equivalent to adding almost as many new homes in the region as now exist in Orange and Ventura counties combined.
The measure passed with a 64-1 vote, with one abstention. Unlike past meetings, Thursday’s session drew little debate, as leaders accepted a state order imposed on the region 1½ years ago.
“We (already) have debated this issue night and day,” Long Beach Vice Mayor Rex Richardson, SCAG’s president, said at the beginning of the meeting. “We’ve done our job as a region.”
Under the 43-year-old Regional Housing Needs Assessment program, or RHNA, regional agencies are required to plan for current and future housing needs at all income levels in five- to eight-year periods, or planning cycles. SCAG revises its plan every eight years.
Some leaders complained state housing laws adopted in the past three years increasingly usurp local authority. In response, SCAG adopted a resolution calling for reforms in the state’s home-planning process and restoring local control over planning and zoning decisions.
“The appeals were not successful. We had discussions about litigation,” Huntington Beach Councilman Mike Posey said. “The resolution spells out what the potential cures are, and that’s legislation.”
SCAG staff originally recommended in June 2019 that Southern California’s housing goal should increase to 659,174 new homes, up from 412,137 during the 2013-21 period. State housing officials overruled that SCAG recommendation.
“While I’m disappointed that we’re not continuing to protest the (state housing mandate), I do appreciate that we’re acknowledging that objection in the resolution,” said Anaheim Council Member Trevor O’Neil. “It’s important that we keep that part of the record.”
The final RHNA plan now will go to the state Housing and Community Development Department for final approval. Local governments have until October to revise the “housing element” of their general plans to ensure there’s enough zoned land in their jurisdiction to build all their mandated homes during the region’s “sixth planning cycle,” running from October through October 2029.
While local governments rely on private developers to do the actual construction, recent state laws provide some incentive for cities to get housing built.
The new plan, two years in the making, applies to all 197 cities and counties in Los Angeles, Ventura, Orange, Riverside, San Bernardino and Imperial counties.
As California’s most populous region, SCAG’s housing allotment is the state’s biggest. Housing officials are raising allotments across the state to meet lawmakers’ and Gov. Gavin Newsom’s goal to solve the housing crisis.
A housing department report concluded the state needs to build 1.8 million new homes during the decade ending in 2025, or 180,000 new homes a year. California averaged just over 108,000 new homes over the past five years.
After getting its allotment, SCAG spent the past 1½ years dividing the number among local jurisdictions.
Some cities will see their homebuilding goals increase as much as a thousand-fold.
For example, goals will increase to 11,760 new homes for Costa Mesa, 9,759 for Westminster and 3,735 for Bellflower, up from just two units apiece in the current planning cycle.
Beverly Hills’ goal will increase to 3,104 new homes, up from 3.
Appeals by 47 jurisdictions were heard in January, but just two — Pico Rivera and Riverside County — got their allotment reduced.
Los Angeles and Orange counties have the biggest allotments, with more than a four-fold increase each. L.A. County must plan for 812,060 new homes — almost as many as Long Beach and the San Fernando Valley combined have today.
Orange County needs to prepare for 183,861 new rooftops, or almost as much as Anaheim and Santa Ana currently have.
Riverside County’s housing goal will increase 65% to 167,351 new units; San Bernardino County’s goal will more than double to 138,110 new units; and Ventura County’s goal will rise 28% to 24,452 new homes.
Imperial County’s allotment dropped 3% to 15,993 new homes. In all, allotments decreased in just 17 jurisdictions.
Housing goals are divided into four income levels. In Southern California, local governments must collectively plan:
• 351,796 homes affordable for very-low-income residents or those earning less than half of their area’s median income.
• 206,807 homes affordable for low-income residents, or those earning 51-80% of their area’s median income.
• 223,957 homes affordable for moderate-income households, or those earning up to 20% above their area’s median income.
• 559,267 “market rate” homes affordable for above-moderate-income households, or those earning more than 20% above their area’s median income.
A Southern California News Group review found that just 18 of California’s 539 cities and counties were on track by the end of 2019 to meet their current housing goals, which are much smaller than the future ones.
Local leaders long have complained SCAG’s future allotment is unrealistic.
Rolling Hills Estates Mayor Pro Tem Frank Zerunyan complained at a committee-level review last week that just a fraction of those 1.34 million new homes will get built.
“With this much resistance and opposition we have heard on this issue, I can’t believe that this policy is right,” Zerunyan said on Feb. 23. “But the train has left the station, and we don’t have much choice but telling the HCD and the state that this was pie in the sky.”