A study from UC Berkeley Terner Center for Housing Innovation found that bureaucratic impediments constitute the main reason San Francisco is the world’s second-most expensive city in which to build a home. According to the study, “the most significant and pointless factor driving up construction costs was the length of time it takes for a project to get through the city permitting and development processes.” Other reasons construction costs are so high is labor is more expensive, low-density zoning increases competition for scare land, and the approval process takes forever. The study found planning permit fees in San Francisco are about $5,000 per home while the national average is $500 to $2000. In most of the country, construction permitting is “by-right” meaning if a project meets local zoning and code regulations the developer gets to build, in San Francisco there is a discretionary individualized review process. Respondents to the Terner study unanimously state the most effective thing the city could do to reduce construction costs was to streamline the permitting process and reduce the fees. Reducing the red tape around housing would help ease the housing affordability crisis and racial segregation, income inequality, and displacement of low- and middle-income families.

$6 Billion Expansion of 710 Freeway Proposed
Los Angeles Metro released a staff report supporting the $6 billion project to widen the 710 freeway from the Port of Los Angeles and Long Beach to downtown. Each year, tens of thousands of truck drivers make the 19-mile drive leading to congestion and pollution. The project would add a lane in each direction as well as changes to 24 major streets that cross the 710, and new interchanges with the 91, 5, and 405 freeways. Transportation and environmental activists say the alternative would not do enough to reduce emissions and would displace people in some of Southern California’s poorest and most polluted areas.

Berkeley Looks to Cryptocurrency to Fund Housing
Facing a shortage of federal funding for affordable housing, the City of Berkeley is exploring funding for affordable housing measures through cryptocurrency. The city is looking into an “initial coin offering” that would exchange a new cryptocurrency backed by municipal bonds for cash that would go toward affordable housing measures. Berkeley Mayor Jesse Arreguin refers it as an “initial community offering.” The city is partnering with UC Berkeley’s Blockchain Lab and municipal finance startup Neighborly. The hope is that backing the coin with tax-exempt municipal bonds would stabilize its value. “It’s not a speculation tool,” Berkeley Council Member Ben Bartlett told CityLab. “It’s like a non-profit, special purpose vehicle, meant to fund social good.”

Coastal Commission Weighs in on Trump Drilling Proposal
The California Coastal Commission signed off on to a letter urging the Trump administration to back away from some of the nation’s most pristine coastlines. The idea of offshore drilling in California is “economically infeasible, legally questionable, and politically a nonstarter” according to the LA Times. In the letter, the commission writes “we were outrages to learn that BOEM (Bureau of Ocean Energy Management) had recklessly threatened the health of California’s coastal environment… by proposing to expand drilling off the coast”. The California State Lands Commission, which has jurisdiction up to three miles offshore, also sent a letter this week condemning the plans saying they would not approve the construction of new pipelines. On Thursday, the Trump administration is holding its only public meeting in Sacramento about its drilling expansion plans.

Alignments for L.A. Light Rail Line Considered
The Los Angeles Metro Board of Directors’ Planning and Programming Committee is considering a new alignment for the proposed West Santa Ana Branch light rail line (WSAB) in its approach to Downtown Los Angeles. The 2015 Technical Refinement Study showed potential alignments for the approximately 20-mile light rail along Alameda Street and Santa Fe Avenue, all of which would have terminated at Union Station. According to the staff report, Metro seems to have settled on a shared right-of-way with the existing Blue Line but has six alternatives it is considering. Only three of the proposed alignments would include Union Station as the terminus. Other alternatives include to the Financial District, Fourth and San Pedro Streets in the Industrial District, and an Arts District route. The WSAB has an estimated budget between $3.5 and $4 billion, with partial funding from Measure R and M. The project includes a Phase 1 between Artesia and Green Line opening in 2032, and Phase 2 into Downtown by 2041. 

California Cities Score on Bloomberg ‘What Works Cities’ List
Bloomberg Philanthropies released its "What Works Cities" list. These cities use data and evidence to improve services, inform local decision-making, and engage residents.Los Angeles was the gold certified winner of 2017 with the award of “best at using data”. Silver certified cities in California include San Diego and San Francisco. All have publicly committed to enhance their use of data and evidence to improve services, inform local decision making and engage residents. By adopting the WWC Standard, they are a part of a national network of local governments committed to using data to improve performance and results that make their residents’ lives better. 

Ten Projects Named for Bay Area Resilience Challenge
The Resilient by Design/Bay Area Challenge announced locations for the resilience design projects to be pursued by 10 international design teams over the next half year. During the design phase, local residents, public officials, engineers, architects, and other experts will come together to create resilient solutions that address the impacts of climate change. The sites are located all around the Bay Area: Oakland, North Richmond, South San Francisco, South Bay, San Rafael, Alameda Creek Watershed, among others. The challenge is cosponsored and hosted by MTC but is a multi-stakeholder collaboration. The 10 design teams were selected from 51 teams made up of over 350 local and global experts.

Quick Hits & Updates
The Santa Ana City Council is considering becoming the first city in Orange County to implement rent control. The city’s housing division manager Judson Brown said city and census data show a 10 percent increase in median rent from 2010 to 2016 with median household income falling 1.5 percent in the same period. A report from USC Lusk Center for Real Estate found that apartments in the Anaheim-Orange-Santa Ana market area had the lowest vacancy rates in the county last year.

A study from the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) foundthat an earthquake similar to the 1906 one that shook San Francisco Bay Area would lead to nearly 69,000 homes collapsing and more than 200,000 people being displaced. The report is intended to raise awareness around the devastation major earthquakes could cause and looks at 16 different scenarios along the many faults in the region using a hazard tool from FEMA. The hope is that cities will enact mandatory retrofit ordinances to reduce the amount of housing loss we would see.

Palo Alto City Council unanimously approved a Housing Work Plan that includes more than a dozen policies aimed at spurring residential construction. The programs include changing the zoning code to provide more incentives for residential development, requiring housing projects to provide below-market-rate units, and relaxing density requirements for housing projects downtown. The goal of the plan is to produce about 300 units per year.

According to a report released by the Los Angeles Homeless Services Authority, the county needs more than 22,000 new supportive housing units and 11,000 short-term rental vouchers to functionally end homelessness. The January 2017 count found LA County has an estimated 58,000 homeless people. Officials plan to use the gap report and homeless count to strategize on the best way to spend money from Measure H, the voter-approved 1/4 –cent sales tax that is expected to generate $355 million annually for ten years.

Long Beach has crafted a plan to complete eight critical infrastructure projects that are key to hosting a successful Olympics. Long Beach is expected to host seven events, including men’s and women’s water polo, sailing, handball, triathlon, open water swimming, and BMX biking. Long Beach City Council directed the city manager to prepare a plan, needs assessment, and timeline for the 8 by 28 initiative. City staff will now come back with a report on where the city stands on the projects, what needs to be done, and how to close the funding gaps.

According to an LA Times analysis, 640 brick buildings in more than a dozen Inland Empire cities have been marked as dangerous but remain unretrofitted despite decades of warnings. In Redlands as many as 74 buildings would not withstand a major earthquake. The more affluent coastal cities have retrofitted thousands of buildings.

San Francisco officials have filed a lawsuit against the state saying the law signed last year by Gov. Jerry Brown allowing ride-hailing companies to have a single business license to drive anywhere in the state is depriving the city of fees that could offset maintenance and traffic costs created by the services. San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera said “Uber and Lyft need to play by the same rules as every other business in San Francisco.” While Uber did not respond, Lyft said the streamlined business licenses allows for predictable costs and reasonable privacy protections.

The City of Los Angeles has identified 119 public lots that it is hoping to transform from asphalt to multistory apartment buildings to house chronically homeless people. Plans are already underway to develop housing on large public lots in Venice and Hollywood, while officials review the rest to determine which could support housing.

Los Angeles City Council is considering two measures aimed at clearing obstacles to getting more people into housing and combatting the homelessness crisis. One measure would allow permanent supportive housing projects to avoid a review process while the second would slash parking requirements and allow homeless housing projects with up to 120 units (and 200 units in downtown) to avoid environmental review. Critics of the proposed measures fear they will concentrate homeless housing into specific neighborhoods.

OCTA released its Orange County Transit Master Plan, which will set the agenda for transit investment for the next twenty years. OC Transit Vision presents multiple strategies for bolstering the system, such as upgrading bus technology, and adding new programs like on-demand service. However most of the investments are seen in making the current system faster, more reliable, and increase ridership. The cost to implement the entire plan is estimated to be $2.6 billion.

A coalition of tenant advocates in Long Beach are collecting signatures to put citywide rent control on the November ballot. The proposed ballot measure would cap yearly rent hikes for most apartments built before 1995 at five percent or lower and establish a citywide Rental Housing Board, which would be funded through fees charged to landlords. The group has until end of July to gather 27,462 signatures.

San Diego City Council and Mayor Kevin Faulconer have proposed temporarily relaxing a rule requiring developers to build groundfloor retail space in new projects and instead convert into live spaces. The goal would be to expand the city’s live-work rules to quickly create more housing- especially for artists, artisans, website developers and other San Diegans who want to live where they work.

The Bay Area has just hit its highest level of residents out-migration in more than a decade. Joint Venture Silicon Valley’s study shows the out-migration says workers are moving to Sacramento, Austin, and Portland for a variety of factors but primarily, the high cost of housing. According to Redfin, the cities with the highest in-flows are Phoenix, Las Vegas, Atlanta, and Nashville.

The Department of Water Resources commissioned Professor David Sunding from UC Berkeley to conduct a cost-benefit analysis of the proposed Water Fix Delta tunnels project. His report concluded that benefits outweigh the costs to ratepayers in every scenario he analyzed under a one-tunnel approach. Last year key San Joaquin Valley agricultural districts announced they couldn’t afford the project, Brown’s administration announced that officials were moving forward on a phased-in approach to the tunnels, starting with building a single pipe under the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta in coming years.

According to a citywide voter survey in San Francisco, nearly three-quarters of voters would support a bond measure of up to $500 million to improve the city’s disintegrating seawall. The measure is heading to the ballot in November. According to the port of San Francisco, the existing seawall rests on unstable bay mud and is vulnerable to lateral spreading and settlement in a major earthquake, which could destroy or seriously damage utilities, light rail, and buildings along the Embarcadero.

Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors moved forward with a plan to establish rent control at mobile home parks in unincorporated areas within the county. The approved motion gives county departments six months to amend the county code and cap annual rent increases.

San Francisco City Attorney Dennis Herrera is accusing Uber of “thumbing its nose at the law”. Herrera seeks company data going back to 2013 for an investigation into whether Uber and Lyft have been obeying state and local laws, which only Lyft has cooperated on. The main issues at question is whether the companies offer incentives encouraging drivers to commute long distances before starting shifts of up to 16 hours, whether double parking is causing traffic troubles, accessibility to people with disabilities, pollution from increase in vehicles, bad road behavior, and algorithms that disfavor certain neighborhoods.

According to California EPA data, areas of Bankers Hill, Barrio Logan, and downtown San Diego have some of the highest concentrations of diesel emissions in San Diego County. The measurements are part of CalEnviroScreen, an interactive tool that analyzes more than a dozen sources of pollution with socioeconomic and public health conditions to identify environmentally-disadvantaged communities and prioritize funding for grants and other programs.