Gov. Gavin Newsom is signing a bill that would allow for more homes to be built near transit stations, in an effort to address California's high housing costs.
In a statement Friday, the governor said he is signing Senate Bill 79, a measure sponsored by state Sen. Scott Wiener (D-San Francisco).
"For too long, California has poured billions into transit without building the housing density needed for those systems to reach their potential," Newsom said.
The governor said having more homes near transit would provide multiple benefits, including boosting ridership, cutting traffic and pollution, lowering housing costs and expanding access to jobs, schools and services.
Newsom added, "The world looks to California for leadership -- it's time to build modern, connected communities that fulfill California's promise, meeting the needs of today and the next generation."
"In California we talk a lot about where we don't want to build homes, but rarely about where we do — until now. SB 79 unwinds decades of overly restrictive land use policies that have driven housing costs to astronomical levels, forcing millions of people to move far away from jobs and transit, to face massive commutes, or to leave California entirely," Wiener said in a separate statement.
Wiener, who was first elected to the State Senate in 2016, has proposed multiple bills aiming to boost the number of homes near transit, including Senate Bill 827 in 2018 and Senate Bill 50 in 2020. Both attempts failed to gain passage in the legislature.
Senate Bill 79 passed the legislature last month with a 43-19 vote in the Assembly and a 21-8 vote in the State Senate.
According to supporters, SB79 sets standards for allowable housing development within a half mile of train stops and bus rapid transit stops that meet specific criteria. The measure applies only to a handful of counties designated as an "urban transit county" in California, including Alameda, Los Angeles, Orange, Sacramento, San Diego, San Francisco, San Mateo and Santa Clara counties.
For qualifying "Tier 1" stops, which includes stops along BART, Caltrain and LA Metro's B & D lines, housing up to 9 stories can be built adjacent to a transit stop, up to 7 stories will be allowed within a ¼ mile and up to 6 stories will be allowed between a ¼ and ½ mile of a stop.
Qualifying stops in "Tier 2", which include some light rail lines such as Sac RT and San Francisco Muni, some stations on Metrolink and some rapid bus transit lines, housing up to 8 stories would be allowed next to the station, 6 stories within a ¼ mile and 5 stories within ¼ and ½ mile.
In his signing statement, Newsom also pushed back on claims that the bill impacts any efforts to rebuild homes that were damaged in the Palisades and Eaton fires that devastated Southern California in January, saying there are no transit stops that qualify for the measure in the burn scars of either fire and that the measure has additional safeguards for fire-prone areas.
A map provided by the Los Angeles Planning Department showed where the measure could apply in the state's most populous city, showing no transit stops in Pacific Palisades were covered.
The signing of Senate Bill 79 is the latest attempt to tackle the state's housing costs, which remain among the highest in the country. Earlier this year, Newsom signed Assembly Bill 130 and Senate Bill 131, which reforms the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) to speed up the building of housing and infrastructure.
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