February 26, 2018
FROM: Sustainable TamAlmonte, 215 Julia Ave., Mill Valley, CA 94941
TO: Marin County Council of Mayors & Councilmembers (MCCMC), Attention: Legislative Committee, c/o Secretary/Treasurer Rebecca Vaughn, Town of Corte Madera, 300 Tamalpais Drive, Corte Madera, CA 94925
Re: OPPOSE Pending Senate Bill 828 (Wiener) - Land use: Housing Element
Dear Legislative Committee of the Marin County Council of Mayors and Councilmembers (MCCMC),
We urge you to place Senate Bill 828 (Wiener) on your agenda. We further urge you to recommend the Marin County Council of Mayors and Councilmembers to oppose and lobby against the bill.
ABOUT PENDING SENATE BILL 828:
Senate Bill 828 would change housing-element law and especially target communities with high rates of income growth (and/or) high rental and home prices. The bill would dramatically raise the Regional Housing Needs Allocations (RHNA) that cities and counties are required to plan for. It would do this by: changing the methodology that assesses a community’s housing need; requiring a jurisdiction to automatically plan for 200% more housing units than its assigned housing allocation; and by rolling over a previous unmet housing allocation and adding it to the current allocation; among other methods.
CONSEQUENCES:
SB-828 would ignore traditional growth patterns and dramatically increase the housing allocations that cities and counties must plan for, whether it makes sense or not. The subsequent growth in housing development and population would increase the risk of adverse impacts on the environment, public health and safety, traffic congestion, infrastructure, utilities (water supply), public services (schools), neighborhood character, and quality of life. Moreover, there is no funding for dealing with these impacts.
Excerpt about SB-828 from Stephanie Moulton-Peters’ (Mayor of the City of Mill Valley) letter to Senator Scott Wiener in opposition to SB-827 and SB-828:
“The City of Mill Valley also opposes SB 828, as the City is not a developer and does not control the number of new housing units proposed by private parties nor those approved and/or built in a given year. The City of Mill Valley Housing Element provides a structure that allows for flexibility in gauging what a local jurisdiction can do in meeting its housing goals including: housing affordability, neighborhood quality and character, equal housing, sustainability and government collaboration. We should not lose sight of this process that is currently in place and works. The Regional Housing Needs Allocation process is a sensitive and difficult process. To think that a local jurisdiction can accommodate 200% of RHNA is unreasonable.”
CONCLUSION:
Communities should not plan for more housing and population growth than that which is sustainable. Once again, we urge you to place Senate Bill 828 (Wiener) on your agenda and then recommend that MCCMC oppose and lobby against the bill.
Thank you in advance for your conscientious consideration.
Very truly yours,
/s/
Sharon Rushton, Chairperson
Sustainable TamAlmonte
Cc: Rebecca Vaughn, MCCMC Secretary-Treasurer