LA County Seeks to Pause State Laws That Could Slow Recovery

Los Angeles County wants the state to temporarily suspend housing laws in unincorporated areas such as Altadena, so residents can quickly rebuild their homes. Housing advocates say not so fast.

County Supervisors Kathryn Barger and Lindsey Horvath introduced a motion to request that Gov. Gavin Newsom temporarily exempt the county from housing laws intended to fast-track the development of affordable housing, the Los Angeles Times reported.

The supervisors, who represent districts burned by this month’s wildfires, also put forward a motion with 41 steps needed for department heads to hasten the recovery process.

They want Sacramento to issue a five-year waiver in unincorporated L.A. County for parts of Senate Bill 330, aimed at preserving affordable housing, and the Density Bonus Law, which encourages developers to build new units.

Amy Bodek, head of the L.A. County Planning Department, said she believed the state laws could hamper recovery by incentivizing density at the expense of residents looking to rebuild their homes.

“In order to provide the community the ability to return and not face immediate displacement, we understand the need to pause some of these policies,” Bodek said at the Board of Supervisors meeting.

“We are not anti-housing. To say that we are anti-housing is someone that has not been paying attention.”

Bodek said it was unclear whether the governor would agree to the county’s waiver request, but she hoped it would be a starting point for conversations with the state.

Affordable housing advocates contend that the county‘s waiver proposal would slash too many restrictions, bypassing laws aimed at solving the region’s affordable housing crisis, according to the Times.

“This is just totally going in the wrong direction,” said Nolan Gray, senior director of legislation and research for California YIMBY, a prohousing group based in Sacramento. He said the relevant laws have spurred the construction of thousands of affordable homes across the state.

“There’s so much in here that has nothing to do with helping people rebuild.”

Chris Elmendorf, a law professor at UC Davis who studies California housing law, said the county was too broad in seeking a waiver in undefined “fire impacted communities.”

“If the goal is to get people back to their communities as fast as possible, shouldn’t the goal be to build as much housing in those communities as fast as possible?” he asked.

Barger, who represents Altadena, said the accusation that the county was uninterested in ramping up housing “could not be further from the truth.”

The remarks came as part of a larger discussion over how the county should prepare for an influx of new buildings in areas reduced to rubble.

Bodek said the Planning Department, which is responsible for permitting in unincorporated L.A. County, is expecting as many as 8,000 permit applications from homeowners wanting to rebuild after the Eaton Fire and 600 from the Palisades Fire.

— Dana Bartholomew