As the debate over SB 50 and other state legislative efforts to boost California’s housing supply heats up, it’s worth reviewing some of the data about how dire the housing situation is in the state. Here are some tidbits:
High Home Prices and Rents:
- According to the California Legislature’s Legislative Analysts Office, the average California home costs about two-and-a-half times the average national home price, at $440,000 (and much higher in major metro areas). This price divergence began in the 1970s, when California home prices went from 30 percent above U.S. levels in 1970 to more than 80 percent higher by 1980.
- Per the California Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD), the majority of California renters (more than 3 million households) pay more than 30 percent of their income toward rent, while nearly one-third (more than 1.5 million households) pay more than 50 percent of their income toward rent.
- Per a Hope Center for College, Community, and Justice study, 19% of community college students in California are homeless, while 60% are considered “housing insecure.”
- Almost one-quarter of all homeless people in the country live in California, according to federal data.
Extreme Housing Shortage Relative to Demand:
- California ranks 49th among all U.S. states in housing units per resident, behind only Utah, where residents tend to have large families in single homes, per a 2016 McKinsey study. The McKinsey analysis showed that California has 358 homes per 1,000 people, whiles comparable states like New York and New Jersey have more than 400 homes per 1,000 residents.
- HCD calculated that the state needs to build 180,000 additional homes annually, but over the last ten years housing production has averaged fewer than 80,000 new homes each year (and is currently declining).
Local Zoning is a Key Barrier:
- While the 2016 McKinsey study presented a goal of 3.5 million units needed to address the shortage and stabilize prices, UCLA’s Lewis Center found that California cities and counties currently only zone for a combined 2.8 million new housing units. And many of these zoned parcels are located in rural areas far from jobs, which is not where housing is needed.
- The New York Times recently mapped the local zoning in some major cities and found that 75 percent of Los Angeles and 94 percent of San Jose is zoned exclusively for single-family homes.
- UC Berkeley’s Terner Center documented via a statewide survey of local governments that in two-thirds of California’s cities and counties, multifamily housing (i.e. apartments) is allowed only on less than 25 percent of the available land.
- The Terner Center similarly showed that fully one-half to two-thirds of all land in California is reserved exclusively for single family homes.
- In 1933, according to University of Texas’s Andrew Whittemore, less than 5 percent of Los Angeles’ zoned land was restricted exclusively restricted for single-family homes. By 1970 though, half of the land in Los Angeles was zoned only for single family residences, per UCLA’s Greg Morrow.
- Morrow noted that zoning in Los Angeles went from allowing up to 10 million residents in 1960 to 3.9 million residents by 1990.
Local Permitting Processes Remain a Major Barrier:
- The Terner Center estimated that local permit and impact fees on new units average $150,000 per unit.
- Environmental review under the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), triggered when local governments make permitting decisions discretionary as opposed to ministerial, ranked as the ninth biggest barrier to housing overall, according to the Terner Center survey of planners.
- The Rose Foundation found that CEQA litigation affects fewer than 1 out of 100 projects not already exempt from the law, while litigation has been steady at about 195 lawsuits per year on average since 2002.
These numbers on California’s housing crisis show not only the human cost of the shortage, but the need for a strong policy response to fix the governance system that exacerbates the problem. We’ll see if this legislative session brings any change.
The UN climate conference in Madrid last month may have ended poorly, but conference attendees had a big success story right in front of them. Spain’s success achieving efficient – and enjoyable – land use and transportation outcomes is a model other countries and states should emulate to address climate change.
Spanish cities and towns feature many remarkable urban spaces, not unlike those found in other European countries. These areas tend to prioritize compact apartments located within walking distance of abundant transit, shops, bike lanes and jobs, with many containing pre-automobile-era narrow cobblestone streets built for people and not vehicles. Cities are often built around plazas, typically along with town halls and churches. They also protect against sprawl by prioritizing open space and agricultural land, particularly in the central and southern part of the country. Meanwhile, a high speed rail network connects most of the country’s major urban areas.
The result? While many factors probably come into play, US News in 2019 ranked Spain tops among all countries in terms of the overall happiness of its citizens. The country also ranked 18th in overall quality of life and among the top in food and culture.
You can see this effect on the ground. Spanish cities and towns are among the most walkable and enjoyable cities I’ve experienced. Particularly in the capital city of Madrid, where the UN conference was held, residents can access most destinations by transit or on foot, and the central city is closed to vehicles not registered to central city residents, while any other entering vehicle must meet low- or zero-emission standards. As a result, the Madrid city center is a quiet and clean pedestrian playground. And this same dynamic is present in cities and towns throughout the country, based on my travels there. It’s likely a major reason for the country’s success in terms of emotional well being.
This urban walkability has positive environmental effects, too, particularly on greenhouse gases. According to World Bank figures, Spain’s per capita carbon emissions is 5 metric tons, ranking it approximately 60th on the list of 192 countries, despite having a GDP per capita that ranks roughly 30th. These emission figures stand in stark contrast to the 16.5 metric tons of emissions for the average United States resident, more than 3 times as much as the average Spaniard. And even similarly developed and urban countries like Japan and Germany have almost twice the emissions per capita of the Spanish, with 9.5 per Japanese resident and 8.9 per the average German.
To be sure, some of this climate progress is due to their increasingly clean electricity grid, which has seen a significant deployment of renewables over the past decade. But smaller homes and walkability that decreases driving miles helps, too. For example, overall driving miles (or kilometers, in this case) in the country is relatively low for a developed nation, at approximately 400 billion per year. With 47 million residents in Spain, that equals roughly 8,500 km per person, or 5,287 miles per year (14.5 miles per day per person). By contrast, according to the Eno Center, the average Californian drives 50% more miles than the average Spaniard, at 8,728 miles per year, or 24 miles per day (rural states do even worse, with Wyoming at a whopping 16,900 miles per year, or 46 miles per day per person).
The lessons learned? Policy makers should design towns to maximize walkability and transit access, limit private vehicles, prioritize public spaces like plazas, and preserve surrounding farmland and open space from sprawl. Hopefully attendees at the UN Climate Conference experienced some of these Spanish practices on land use and transportation firsthand. Because the climate-friendly results mean cleaner and happier living overall, something worth achieving everywhere.
Some media appearances from me this week on a range of energy, housing and rail topics:
- “Greater LA” on KCRW radio in Los Angeles covered the conspiracy theory that auto companies dismantled the vast Los Angeles streetcar network in favor of freeways, interviewing me for the segment based on my Railtown book.
- CalMatters reported on a new state legislative analysis of California’s renewable energy program, finding significant emission reductions and many research gaps, which helps deflate a Republican proposal to pause the program (with some quotes from me).
- KPCC’s AirTalk radio program featured a live discussion on Wednesday on the proposed “California Green New Deal” legislation, which in part seeks to boost affordable housing and a just transition for workers out of fossil fuels. I was joined on the program by Sylvia Chi from the Asian Pacific Environmental Network and Christopher Thornberg, founding partner of Beacon Economics.
With the legislative session just beginning, I expect the media to continue to focus on the numerous proposals to address our ongoing energy and climate needs. Happy Friday!
California State Senator Scott Wiener launched his third legislative attempt today at boosting California’s housing supply. SB 50 aims to address the state’s massive housing shortage, which has resulted in high home prices and rents, gentrification, displacement, inequality, homelessness, and a mass middle-class exodus to high-emission states like Texas and Arizona.
Because this housing undersupply is caused primarily by restrictive local land use policies in the state’s coastal job centers, Wiener’s approach has been to require cities and counties to allow apartment buildings near major transit centers. His first attempt in 2018 (SB 827) died quickly in committee. His second attempt last year (the birth of SB 50) was unilaterally shelved for a year by State Senator Anthony Portantino, who represents the affluent Southern California city La Cañada Flintridge (that city quickly became a poster child to housing advocates for high income single-family homeowners who don’t want to allow new residents in apartments into their neighborhoods).
The clock is now ticking on SB 50 in 2020. Under legislative rules, the bill must pass the full Senate by the end of this month — and first make it out of Sen. Portantino’s committee.
So Sen. Wiener is trying again, unveiling at an Oakland press conference this morning a critical amendment to delay statewide implementation for two years in order to give local governments the opportunity to develop their own plans that meet or exceed the housing, equity and environmental goals of SB 50. Otherwise, SB 50’s provisions relaxing height, parking and density requirements around major transit stations will automatically prevail.
Specifically, the state (through the Governor’s Office of Planning and Research) will develop guidance for these “local flexibility plans” by mid-2021. Cities and counties must then submit their plans for approval to the California’s Department of Housing and Community Development. That agency will then certify that the local plans are as stringent as SB 50. The local plans must be in place by January 1, 2023 in order to avoid defaulting to SB 50 statewide standards.
Otherwise, the substance of the bill remains essentially unchanged from last spring (here’s my rundown on the last changes before Sen. Portantino shelved it).
These new amendments seek to mollify critics who complained that the statewide approach undercuts local flexibility to meet the targets in a more tailored way. For example, rather than having uniform four-story apartment buildings around a major transit stop, perhaps a city would prefer to meet the overall housing production goals with a taller building in one spot and a shorter building across the street.
Will these changes be enough to satisfy local government objections? Probably not in many cases. The objections are less about local control and more about visceral dislike for apartment buildings and the residents they may bring. Arguments about local control — and relatedly against market-rate housing and instead building only subsidized affordable units — are often not made in good faith. Critics quickly move the goal posts as soon as amendments are made in their direction.
Take for example Sen. Portantino’s initial reaction to these amendments, complaining about not enough affordable housing, per his spokesperson to the San Francisco Chronicle:
“It was the senator’s hope that by taking a breath with SB50 it would focus efforts on actually building affordable housing as opposed to the market-rate housing predominant with SB50.”
This comment ignores that SB 50-type reform would result in the biggest boost to subsidized affordable units in the state’s history, at possibly a seven-fold increase. All without raising taxes or issuing bonds, and without delay about where to build these units even if public funds are available.
Still, these amendments may persuade critics who are on the fence. And perhaps most critically: will Governor Newsom now throw his weight behind the measure to help it pass? This is a big test for the governor on one of his signature campaign issues.
All in all, the next few weeks will be instructive as to whether or not California leadership can meaningfully address the the housing shortage and its severe equity, economic and environmental consequences.
I began working on climate change law and policy on January 20, 2009, the day I joined Berkeley Law, which was coincidentally Barack Obama’s Inauguration Day. So it’s been a full decade for me focusing exclusively on this subject (I focused on related land use and transit issues prior to 2009), roughly coinciding with the 2010s now coming to a close.
As we mark the end of this decade, two things stand out: remarkable progress reducing the price and deploying critical clean technologies, and dispiriting failure to reduce overall greenhouse gas emissions, with more severe climate impacts happening each year.
I noted some of these trends in a foreword to “Climate Change Law in the Asia Pacific” from Berkeley Law, which features articles from scholars in places like Japan, Korea, and Taiwan, as well as California.
To summarize the good news on clean technology:
- From 2009 to 2017, the levelized costs for utility-scale solar photovoltaic dropped 86 percent;
- Wind power levelized costs dropped 67 percent from 2009-2017; and
- Lithium ion battery prices (central to electric vehicles and grid energy storage) have dropped 85 percent from 2010 to 2018.
This progress is the key reason for optimism on climate change. With the price decreases, support for deployment has increased across the political spectrum and allowed for some remarkable success stories on emissions reductions, such as California’s ability to achieve its 2020 carbon goals four years earlier, due primarily to renewable energy deployment.
But despite the progress, we have this sobering data:
- Carbon parts per million have increased from 385 in 2009 to 411 (and counting).
And unsurprisingly, the bill is now coming due. This decade has brought some of the predicted severe climate impacts, such as unprecedented wildfires, droughts, extreme rain events and hurricanes, and warming oceans.
On the positive side, the extreme weather has helped shift public opinion in favor of climate action. But it’s come at a significant cost to human life, happiness, and ecosystems.
Hopefully in the 2020s we’ll see the widespread deployment of clean technologies and other climate-smart practices that we need to stabilize and reduce emissions. And while climate impacts will inevitably worsen, perhaps our ability to withstand them will improve, such as through electricity grid resilience in the face of wildfires and using natural infrastructure to lessen storm surges and flooding.
And to make any of these positives happen, we will need smart policies and public support and political leaders to enact them. I’ve had the good fortune to work on climate policy now for over a decade, and as the 2020s dawn, much work remains.
On this morning’s 10am edition of Your Call’s Media Roundtable, I’ll interview Ben Ehrenreich, a columnist at The Nation magazine, about the coverage of the just-concluded UN climate conference in Madrid. The high-profile failure of the event was punctuated by thousands of young activists protesting the lack of action by big polluters.
Then, later in the program, we will talk about the Trump impeachment vote in the U.S. House of Representatives and what comes next. I’ll interview:
- Michael Winship, a senior Writing Fellow at the website Common Dreams and longtime Bill Moyers writing partner; and
- Dan Froomkin, founder of Press Watch, a media project that monitors political reporting and encourages more responsible, informed and informative campaign and government coverage.
You can stream it live at 10am today or listen to 91.7 FM in the San Francisco Bay Area. Call 866-798-TALK with questions or comments!
The dark winter months are a reminder that critical renewable resources like solar PV won’t be available to keep our electricity clean. And if the wind isn’t blowing, wind power is unavailable as well to meet demand. Absent baseload renewables like geothermal power, how do we achieve a 100% carbon-free in the dark, still winter time?
The answer is bulk — or seasonal — energy storage. This means massive energy storage facilities that can capture surplus renewable power like solar PV in the summer months, and store it for months until the winter.
Not many technologies can achieve this mass, seasonal storage, but Utility Dive offers a helpful list, summarized here:
- Pumped Hydro: this relatively common technology involves pumping water uphill with cheap surplus electricity and then releasing it downhill to generate power when needed. It’s been in use since the 1890s, and by the end of 2017, the US had about 22 gigawatts installed.
- Compressed Air Energy Storage: this technology involves pumping air into a confined space, like a container or underground cavern, then releasing the pressure to generate electricity when needed. It’s a capital-intensive system constrained by geography. To date, I only know of two facilities in operation, although more are in the planning stages.
- Lithium-ion battery banks: with falling battery prices, these have been a “go-to” recently for energy storage. But it’s unclear if we can produce and deploy enough batteries to store power for months at grid-scale, particularly since many of these batteries will be needed for electric vehicles.
- Other batteries: By the end of 2017, the U.S. had 708 megawatts of large-scale battery capacity other than lithium, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.
- Gravity-based systems: more developers are experimenting with gravity-based systems, such as trains that power uphill and then go back downhill to release energy when needed, as I blogged about a few years ago. As another example, Switzerland-based Energy Vault unveiled a crane mounted on a steel tower 300 feet high, which hoists 35 metric ton concrete “bricks” into stacks. To discharge, the crane lowers the bricks to the ground.
- Hydrogen: liquid hydrogen gas can be a form of energy storage, if it’s produced with surplus renewable power. It can be stored without degrading and used to power a fuel cell or gas turbine (or to power fuel cell vehicles like hydrogen trucks).
Other technologies may exist or be in the planning stages to overcome this seasonal challenge with providing 100% carbon-free power all year. As more jurisdictions seek to meet this clean power goal, these bulk storage technologies will become critical in the near future.
UC Berkeley Law’s Center for Law, Energy and the Environment (CLEE) is today releasing a new report on lessons learned to advance electric vehicle (EV) deployment in France and California. Electric Vehicles and Global Urban Adoption: Policy Solutions from France and California is based on a June 2019 international conference at UC Berkeley, co-sponsored by CentraleSupélec and Florence School of Regulation (FSR) in France, featuring speakers from California and French utilities, energy regulators and industry.
Electric vehicles are important to both California and France because transportation accounts for approximately 20 percent of emissions in Europe, 30 percent in the United States, and 40 percent in California (and even more when factoring in emissions from oil refineries). Yet electric vehicles still represent a small share of the overall vehicle market worldwide, at under 10 percent of new car sales in California and under 2 percent in France, despite aggressive policy targets.
Deployment in California and France is more perhaps more complicated than other jurisdictions, given that approximately 40 percent of residents in both places live in multi-unit dwellings, such as apartments, townhouses, and condominiums. Many of these dwellings are in urban areas with little or no access to charging, given the lack of dedicated parking spots and lower vehicle ownership rates. French law requires builders of new apartment buildings to install chargers, but residents of existing buildings don’t receive those benefits.
As leaders in California and France seek to boost EV adoption, speakers at the conference identified the following challenges, also summarized in the report:
- Lack of access to affordable, convenient private electric vehicles;
- Complexity and cost of installing charging in urban settings and existing multifamily buildings;
- Declining federal incentives and insufficient vehicle demand;
- Electricity rate design decreases the financial viability of charging stations;
- Difficulty of adopting optimal charging practices that could benefit users and electric utilities;
- Difficulty of adopting optimal charging practices that could benefit users and electric utilities; and
- Need for grid infrastructure upgrades to avoid high costs on first-movers.
The conference speakers also discussed priority solutions, as the report details, including:
- National and state governments could require owners of existing multifamily buildings to install charging stations;
- National and state governments could assist transportation network companies (TNCs) like Uber and Lyft in encouraging electric vehicle adoption among their drivers, through support for the deployment of fast-charging hubs, driver education programs, and new pilot projects; and
- Electric utilities and regulators could develop new rate designs to incentivize charging while optimizing grid efficiency.
These and other solutions are discussed in the report, which will hopefully help stakeholders in both jurisdictions achieve an electric future for transportation. Bonne route!
On this morning’s 10am edition of Your Call’s Media Roundtable, I’ll interview Emmy-winning correspondent and 25-year producer for PBS’ Frontline Martin Smith about his new PBS documentary “The Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia.”
The film coincides with the one-year anniversary of the brutal murder of the Washington Post’s Jamal Khashoggi at the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul, Turkey. It examines the rise of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman to power, as well as his ties to the murder, handling of dissent, and relationship with the Trump administration. You can watch the two-hour documentary on PBS.
I’ll also discuss this Tuesday’s D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals decision which reaffirmed the Trump administration’s repeal of Obama-era net neutrality rules. These rules were meant to ensure we can all access content and applications on the web regardless of the source. Joining me will be April Glaser, a Slate technology writer and co-hosts the podcast “If Then” who will help unpack the ruling and how it will affect the internet going forward.
You can stream it live at 10am today or listen to 91.7 FM in the San Francisco Bay Area. Call 866-798-TALK with questions or comments!
In response to the state’s severe housing shortage, California legislators have been quietly strengthening its housing mandate process for local governments. I’ll discuss the new policies and what the future will bring on a webinar today at noon with outgoing California Department of Housing and Community Development director Ben Metcalf.
Metcalf’s agency takes the lead in assigning housing goals to each region of the state. Those regional entities in turn assign housing allocation numbers to local governments in the jurisdiction, which must plan for this new housing in four-year cycles.
Until recently, the process was easily gamed by local governments, with no penalties for non-compliance. But legislators have now added significant enforcement powers.
As examples of this beefed-up process, the state now requires streamlined local approval for housing projects in jurisdictions that are not producing enough housing according to these mandates. The state has also been linking transportation funding to local compliance. And perhaps most prominently, Governor Newsom is suing local governments like Huntington Beach for its inaction.
To learn more, you can register this morning for the noon-1pm webinar, which is co-sponsored by the California Lawyers Association and the Council of Infill Builders. MCLE credit is available for attorneys, and registration is free for members of the Council of Infill Builders. Hope you can join!
