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SB 79 - A week ago, on April 22, the state Senate Housing Committee heard pros and cons of SB 79. It is San Francisco Senator Scott Weiner’s latest aggressive effort to up-zone housing in California. It’s an offspring of his original SB 50 that died in the Senate in 2020.
The same fate nearly befell SB 79 in its first committee test. L.A. state Senator María Elena Durazo did not vote. The bill barely garnered the needed six “yes” votes, the narrowest majority, to make it out of the 11-member panel. Now a new showdown awaits on April 30 in the Senate Local Government Committee chaired by Senator Durazo.
Sen. Weiner’s bill has drawn criticism for promising more profits to developers by enabling multi-story apartments and condos near transit lines. It also makes many analysts, including progressives, ask how exactly it would get more working-class residents housed when there is no provision for affordable units anywhere in its text.
SB 79 would re-zone large swaths of cities and suburbs throughout California to higher scales of development. It would also take away community input and environmental review. The raw deal for local say-so doesn’t end there.
Weiner’s bill uses enhanced transit routes, including train and bus lines, as the trigger for the up-zoning. It up-zones around transit stops and allows displacement of existing residents by demolishing established homes within ¼ to ½ mile from transit lines to build apartments and condos with heights from 55 to 75 feet. That means five- and seven-story buildings in low-rise neighborhoods, including those where single-family homes predominate, without any checks or balances at the community level.
SB 79 also pulls a bait and switch on advocates for improved transit. Some would not have pushed for and won more dedicated bus lines or rail service just to have that progress exploited as a reason to tear up the cohesion of middle-class communities and lose their voice on local development.
Higher buildings with higher rents or condo price tags can prove disastrous. Cost increases unleashed on low- to moderate-income homeowners and tenants by up-zoning can displace thousands of working-class and retiree households. These may be the residents most in need of public transportation.
Plus SB 79 fails to mandate parking minimums for new development at a time when street parking is increasing the risk of car break-ins.
Worst of all, there is no requirement in SB 79 that any new units be affordable. Most would be market-rate. The wishful thinking that market-rate and luxury development trickles down is a cruel fantasy. Yet too many lawmakers persist in voting for housing bills that ignore affordability.
At the April 22 hearing, pro-development activists clashed with the committee’s chair, state Senator Aisha Wahab, a progressive Democrat from Hayward. She opposed SB 79, citing the lack of affordable units and calling the proposal a “non-starter for me at the very beginning.
“The types of development that are going up with zero parking and all these giveaways to developers have also not translated to housing that has dignity that people want to stay in and raise their families in,” said Sen. Wahab.
“Because there is such a need right now,” she added, “developers are seizing the moment and experimenting with options that are truly a sweetheart deal for them. There are no guardrails for regular Californians.”
Onlookers watched if Sen. Durazo, a longtime labor activist and union organizer, might line up behind Sen. Wahab. Senator Durazo’s District 26 in Northeast Los Angeles consists primarily of renters who may suffer further cost increases and displacement if SB 79 is approved. But Sen. Durazo did not vote either way on the bill.
She did, however, make some critical remarks. “My concern is that there would be more market rate at the expense of affordable housing,” Sen. Durazo said during the hearing. “And the bill bypasses CEQA (California Environmental Quality Act),” she added.
“[SB 79] permits transit agencies to build commercial-only developments, and it does not have the affordability standards baked in. It leaves a door open to luxury development without guarantees for low- and moderate-income residents. And it exempts transit from the Surplus Lands Act, cutting off opportunities to prioritize affordable housing on public land,” Durazo explained.
The state Building and Construction Trades, an influential voice for Sen. Durazo, spoke up against the bill at the April 22 hearing. They were listed as opponents of the bill in the official analysis published by committee staff.
East Area Progressive Democrats, the largest Democratic club in L.A. County and in California, is working to highlight core Democratic values and make heard the voice of grassroots Democrats on SB 79, including by Sen. Durazo. “Paying lip service to housing affordability while actually forsaking it worsens displacement of low-income tenants,” says EAPD President Hans Johnson. "The bill does nothing to strengthen their voice against greed, density and eviction in this housing crisis, or put homeownership in any better reach.
“We are impatient for sensible housing production," Johnson adds. "But SB 79 is no catalyst; instead it portends confusion and inequality. EAPD strongly opposes SB 79, and we urge Sen. Durazo and other Committee members to vote NO.”
EAPD counts hundreds of members in the 26th state Senate district, from La Brea to Figueroa St. and from Los Feliz to East L.A. Constituents of Senator Durazo will be watching her committee and her vote very carefully.
(Mary A Fischer is a journalist who covers housing, politics and criminal justice.)
