A Los Angeles County Superior Court judge has ruled that a landmark law eliminating single-family-home zoning in California is unconstitutional, a decision that could invalidate the law in the state’s largest cities.
Judge Curtis Kin determined that Senate Bill 9 did not restrict housing for low-income residents and therefore could not eliminate state constitutional protections provided to local zoning practices.
“Because the provisions of SB 9 are not appropriately related to and sufficiently narrowly tailored to the clearly stated purpose of that legislation – namely, to ensure access to affordable housing – SB 9 cannot stand could,” The family members wrote in the decision of April 22,
Kines’ decision now applies to five Southern California cities – Redondo Beach, Carson, Torrance, Whittier and Del Mar – that challenged SB 9. which passed in 2021, If their decision is appealed and upheld, it would affect 121 communities known as “charter cities,” including Los Angeles, San Diego and San Francisco, which have more power under state law. There is autonomy.
Redondo Beach City Atty. Michael Webb hailed the decision as a victory for communities fighting against state encroachment on housing laws. State lawmakers have passed SB9 and other “one-size-fits-all” measures in recent years without regard to whether they would affect the ability to provide water, policing, fire and other municipal services. How it will impact, and help those without, guaranteeing new developments. He said, this is needed most.
“SB 9 had all the bad effects of disrupting the community, but none of the positive features of actually ensuring affordable housing,” Webb said.
Spokesperson for Atty. Gen. Rob Bonta, whose office defended the law, said the attorney general is reviewing the decision “and will consider all options in defending SB 9.”
SB 9 is one of the highest-profile laws approved in response to California’s housing affordability problems as Gov. Gavin Newsom and state lawmakers aim to encourage new home construction.
This law affects large parts of the state. Half to three-quarters of developable land across much of the state would be reserved only for single-family homes if not for SB 9, according to UC Berkeley’s Turner Center for Housing Innovation, Under the law, in most cases, property owners across the state can build up to four units on those lots.
So far, SB 9 effect has been mutedespecially compared to A series of state laws first passed in 2016 Its purpose was to increase construction of smaller, secondary units, known as ADUs or casitas, on single-family home parcels.
Bay Area NPR affiliate KQED Recently 16 cities of various sizes across California were surveyed And found that between 2022 and 2023, cities approved 75 lot split applications and 112 applications for new units under SB 9. Over the same period, those cities permitted 8,800 ADUs, the news organization found.
But SB 9 is as much about symbolism as it is about new housing. The lifestyle afforded by owning a suburban single-family home with a backyard and a barbecue has long been mythologized as part of the “California Dream.” Allowing the construction of multiple units on parcels previously reserved only for single-family homes goes beyond that approach. In defense of SB 9, lawmakers argued that all areas of the state need to accept growth and often cited The origins of single-family-home-only zoning as a means of exclusion Black and other non-white residents of the neighborhood.
Legislators argued that individual units in duplexes, triplexes, and fourplexes would be more affordable than just one house on the land, and would reduce pressure for greater housing affordability in general. But, citing the cost of construction, he did not order any units built under SB 9 to be set aside specifically for low-income residents.
the five cities that have been some of the most aggressive in pushing back Against state efforts to promote more housing, argued that the distinction matters.
The family agreed. The stated intent of the legislation calls for increasing access to “affordable housing”, a term that Kin says elsewhere in the text clearly refers to housing restricted to low-income residents. Because SB 9 doesn’t require that type of development, it fails to meet the state Constitution’s high standards for eliminating local control over zoning in charter cities, Kin said.
“To justify SB 9’s interference with municipal concerns of land use and zoning regulations, the legislature cannot rely on the potential, ultimate reduction in prices resulting from increased housing supply to demonstrate that SB 9 would be affordable ( That is, it will increase the supply of (below) market-rate (market-rate) housing,” Kin wrote.
But Chris Elmendorf, a law professor at UC Davis who closely follows state housing law and litigation, criticized Kin’s reading of the law.
Kin’s analysis of the “affordable housing” language in SB 9 means the judge believes lawmakers intended to create restricted housing for low-income residents without actually mandating it in the law, he said. Is.
“The only way that interpretation is correct is if the Legislature is a house full of idiots,” Elmendorf said. “If that was their objective, they would have needed to sell or rent some units at below-market rates.”
Elmendorf said he expected Bonta, who has prioritized enforcing state housing laws while in office, to appeal the decision. State lawmakers also could easily change SB 9 to address next-of-kin decisions, he said.
State Senator Toni Atkins (D-San Diego), who wrote the legislation while she was leader of that chamber, said in a statement that she was considering doing so.
“The goal of SB 9 has always been to increase equity and access in our neighborhoods while increasing our housing supply and production across the state,” Atkins said. He said he believed Kin’s decision was “very disappointing and tragically misguided”.
In defense of the judge, Webb, the Redondo Beach city attorney, said state lawmakers have written numerous other housing laws where their stated intentions match the bill’s language. Lawmakers could amend SB 9 to mandate the production of low-income housing, he said.
“The Legislature can address (the ruling) by putting the wording in the initiative to match the intent, which is that if you are tearing down a single-family home, it will be replaced with affordable housing,” Webb said. “
