Somewhat unsurprisingly, the Town of Apple Valley has emerged at the forefront on the most recently forming opposition by local jurisdictions to the remedies to the homeless crisis being imposed on high across the state by legislators and bureaucrats in Sacramento.
At the April 14 town council meeting, the council and top town administration gave expression there rejection of Senate Bill 866, a proposal by State Senator Catherine Blakespear (D-Encinitas) which would mandate strict reporting requirements for cities with regard to their homeless populations and efforts to provide permanent housing or sheltering for them, even if those jurisdictions are not receiving funds from the state to overcome the proliferation of those living on their streets.
For years, local government officials have decried Sacramento’s imposition of what what have been labeled as “unfunded mandates,” demands or requirements that counties, cities, towns or smaller agencies undertake action, invest in or initiate programs or meet requirements for which the smaller governmental entities receive no money or assistance in carrying out.
Those orders from the governor or legislature have ranged over a number of topics and touched on myriad issues, in may cases, locals have charged, attempting to micromanage governmental activity and authority in ways that are not in keeping with or are downright antithetical to the values of those living in the communities being ordered about.
An example of this tendency that was met, at least in some venues, with opposiion has been another initiative relating to homelessness, that being the California Department of Housing and Community Development dictating to cities on an individual basis what their share of the burden for housing the entire state’s population – including those who are homeless and have no roof over their heads or a place to stay. This was seen my a substantial number of Californians as Sacramento’s usurpation of land use authority, the decision-making process for which has historically been entrusted to local officials such as county boards of supervisors, city and town councils and planning commissions.
The state, however, commandeered that power by the creation of what is labeled the Regional Housing Needs Assessment Survey, which is then utilized to prevent local governments from limiting, on their own terms or at their own discretion, the type or number of houses or multi-unit housing that is or are to be allowed into their communities. Under the Regional Housing Needs Assessment program, known by its acronym RHNA, the state would set specific numbers of housing types intended for purchase by delineated income levels that were supposed to be accommodated by each jurisdiction within its municipal limits over an eight-year planning period. The income/affordability levels set were acutely low, extremely low, very low, low, moderate and above moderate.
Traditionally, each community in California over the course of its existence and maturation had the ability to let its collective of citizens the autonomy to have their living environment take on the character of their choosing or what was consistent with their economic means, ones that were slightly different or immensely different, depending upon the approach and attitudes of the politicians the people had chosen to run those counties, cities or towns.
Hanging in the balance was the question of density, or how many dwelling units were allowed to be constructed per acre, the height of buildings, the ratio of space occupied by buildings to the space occupied by unpaved ground with grass or plants growing on it, the mix of residential, commercial, industrial development and open space to be permitted in a city, along with whether apartments and condominiums should be allowed to displace single family homes. These decisions historically were left to the people who lived in the places that were to be impacted by the decisions.
Developers, as a consequence of wanting to make a profit, wanted to build as intensely as possible. By building on ever smaller lots, they could put twice or three times or four times or six times or eight times as many houses on an acre as was the case in the generation before and immediately after World War II. Some elected officials – mayors and city council members – saw no problem with accommodating developers. They supported the idea of developers and landowners being able to maximize their profits. Other elected officials, however, looked at the consequences of stuffing more and more people into houses with ever smaller yards, packing them in like sardines into a can, and saw the social harm that fostered, the rapid deterioration of the property that had been developed, the way in which those who lived in apartment or tenements took less pride in renting or in ownership than did those who lived in, if not an estate, then a semi-estate in which they could enjoy some personal space, not be cramped and create an aesthetic about themselves that was good for them psychologically, socially and financially in terms of owning something of value.
The State of California, with its application of RHNA, obliterated that spirit of self determination. There was a housing crisis in which there were not enough homes to go around for those who were capable of affording them and every day the price of those homes were escalating, increasing the number of people who could not afford to buy a home, no matter how much they desired to, the government said. The solution was to build homes, then build more homes and build more homes beyond that and before anyone took time off to rest, build some more homes, government officials said. The laws and regulations that were part of putting the Regional Housing Needs Assessment in place called for each city and the politicians running them to subjugate their own vision for what the aesthetics and character and density of their neighborhoods were to be in the mission to ensure that everyone would have a roof over his or her head. To be clear, Sacramento, through RHNA, was not telling the counties, cities and towns how many houses had to be built within their municipal limits but how many houses they had to allow to be built if landowners and developers applied to build those homes.
Some city officials were outraged at the state’s mandate. It was not, most of those said, that they were against housing homeless or increasing the state’s housing stock such that those who wanted to buy a home would be able to do so or those who did not have enough money to buy one would still be able to find an apartment to rent or lease that was within his or her or his or her family’s affordability range. It was a matter of preserving the character of where they lived, maintaining the standards and quality of the environment in which they were raising their families and exercising control over the atmospheric, aesthetic and social conditions in which they live. Despite recognizing that the state officials were at heart well-intentioned in wanting to redress the housing crisis and the homelessness problem, those city officials, in defiance over being told what to do and how to do it,, rebelled and just said, “No.”
The vast majority of California’s 58 counties and 482 municipalities – in the spirit of “You can’t fight City Hall” – just went along, or made a show of trying. Still, more than two years after the state signaled it meant business, a whopping 523 cities and counties, or just under 93 percent, were not in total compliance with the mandates, although most were not openly contesting what the state was asking of them. Fewer than 60 made a show of gearing up to resist and even fewer, under 40, actually went so far as to inform Sacramento they were going to formally resist or protest having to work toward accommodating the number of homes earmarked for them to theoretically accommodate between October 2021 and October 2029.
In San Bernardino County, 20 of the 24 municipalities docilely adhered to to the state mandate. Four county cities, most vociferously Chino Hills, gave indication that their officials believed the state was making demands that went beyond what was appropriate, not lonely intruding into the arena of land use authority more properly reserved for local authorities but mandating that their cities accommodate a number of homes that would be damaging to their communities.
In the case of Chino Hills, the state’s expectation was that the city welcome 3,720 more dwelling units from October 2021 to October 2029. Almost immediately, Chino Hills stood up to Sacramento, counter-proposing that instead of the 3,720 homes, it allow 1,797 units, a 52 percent reduction.
Three other city councils in San Bernardino County – those in Fontana, Chino and Barstow – were brave enough to challenge the state. Barstow asked the state to cut its 1,516 house-building mandate by 58 percent to 635; Chino wanted a 49 percent cut from 6,961 to 3,564; and Fontana insisted that the 17,477 units it was being asked to accommodate was 30 percent too optimistic, requesting that its mandate be reduced to 10,563.
The state refused to talk turkey with any of those entities, and the California Department of Housing and Community Development did not budge in its demands, conveying that the government does not negotiate with scofflaws, renegades, terrorists or any entity or anybody that does not respect the rule of law. Lest anyone forget, California Government Code §65580, which mandates that local governments in California must plan to meet the existing and projected housing needs of all economic segments of the community, is the law, those city officials were warned.
In January 2022, a still-determined Chino Hills City Council, bolstered by an outpouring of resident sentiment, ventured even further down the path of resisting having to surrender land use authority within that city’s confines by adopting a local housing initiative referred to as “Neighborhood Voices” that asserted local land use and zoning laws trumped any conflicting state laws.
Thereafter, however, developmental interests looking to construct housing subdivisions in Chino Hills, chaffing at the limitations on density, i.e., the number of units per acre to be permitted on property they had purchased or had tied up within the city, made it known that they were considering legal action against the city in which they were prepared to allege the city was denying them the right to develop that land to an intensity they were entitled to under the newfangled state law.
Chino Hills found itself faced with the prospect that it would end up in court fighting not the government but a private entity that had the advantage of being in an adjudicative forum that is, after all, a state entity in which state law is the first principle, in a battle relating to the state usurpation of local authority. Discretion, Chino Hills city officials soon ascertained, would be the better part of valor. They threw in the towel.
Chino, Fontana and Barstow soon learned that each one of them simply did not have the staying power in a showdown with the state.
In so many ways, cities are dependent on the state for pass-through funding, including taxes, subventions and other forms of revenue. Chino, Fontana and Barstow officials were faced with the reality that they could stand on principle and roll the dice and see if they could prove that they could defy the state by trying to retain their land use authority by legal or procedural challenges. Yet, even if one or two or all three managed to win, eac or all three could end up losing, the state let the decision-makers in those cities know. So, what if one or the other City Hall retained its land use autonomy? There would still be plenty of other ways Sacramento could outright deny or withhold funding or drag its feet in providing it, creating financial crises virtually any city was ill-equipped to deal with. Like Chino Hills, Chino, Fontana and Barstow showed the white flag.
One of San Bernardino County’s subjurisdictions, Apple Valley, would have seemed to be naturally inclined to fight Sacramento, and perhaps fight the state capital, with all of its might, with regard to the retention of its land use authority. From shortly after the outset of Apple Valley’s existence as a municipality following its incorporation in 1988, it has had a half-acre minimum lot size requirement on its single family homes. So committed is the city to the concept of preserving a standard of large yards for those who live in its residential neighborhoods that in November 1999, then-town council members Patrick Jacobo, David Holman and Barbara Lux were recalled from office when they outmuscled the two other members of the town council, Mark Shoup and Bob Sagona, in a push to reduce the town’s standards to allow four residential units to the acre. While Apple Valley poiticians and residents had allowed apartment complexes to be constructed in the desert city, they had been very restrictive in terms of where and how many such dwelling units could be built. Having spacious yards for the homes allowed in Apple Valley was part of an effort that distinguished it not just from the other cities in the desert but those located south and below Cajon Pass as well, distinguishing the city from every other place in the county.
Apple Valley residents on the whole are conservative in orientation all the way around. They are social conservatives, financial conservatives and constitutional conservatives. That conservatism boils over into political conservatism, which is something different from blind party loyalty. While the town leans significantly rightward in terms of party affiliation, with 42.7 percent or 20,374 of its 47,717 voters registered as Republicans compared to 13,467 or 28.2 percent who are Democrats, Apple Valley’s leaders and residents accept, remarkably readily, that it is the Democrats who dominate California. And while they believed as strongly or even more strongly than those living in Chino Hills, Chino, Fontana and Barstow that Sacramento politicians should not be meddling with local land use decisions, in 2021, in the immediate aftermath of the setting of the Regional Housing Needs Assessment numbers, Apple Valley residents, collectively, did not feel it their place to challenge the program the state was pursuing, recognizing the state government, by virtue of its control of the political machinery at its command, was in a position to prevail in any match of wills the Town of Apple Valley might have with it.
Remarkably, however, when State Senator Blakespear and her Democratic Party colleagues in Sacramento floated Senate Bill 866, Apple Valley officials perceived that as a bridge too far.
Of relevance is that over the past several years, Apple Valley’s leadership has purposefully refrained from tapping into any sort of specialized or even routine state funding augmentation to pay for homeless assistance programs. The reception and use of such money has strings attached to it that Apple Valley officials have long felt it would be best to steer clear of. Among those strings were requirements that municipalities take a survey and make a strict accounting of the frequency of homelessness within their boundaries and identify as part of their housing element what action the city is contemplating to redress those instances of homelessness. By electing to not received California Homeless Housing, Assistance, and Prevention grant funding, Apple Valley has consistently bypassed the need to conduct those surveys or dwell on how the town was going to redress homelessness issues.
A housing element is a component of a local government’s general plan, which serves as a blueprint for how a city or county will grow and develop. In California, the housing element, as a a legally required part of a city or county’s general plan outlines strategies to meet the housing needs of all community members, ensuring compliance with state housing laws.
Senate Bill 866 declares homelessness to be a matter of statewide concern rather than a municipal affair and, therefore, a need that should be taken seriously and dealt with universally by city governments.
Senate Bill 866 specifically targets cities that aren’t receiving funds from the state to provide services to the homeless, and creates a requirement that they survey and provide information about the homeless within their jurisdiction just as those who are receiving California Homeless Housing, Assistance, and Prevention grant funding even though it is not a recipient of those funds.
Under Senate Bill 866, cities must include specified data on unhoused residents in their housing elements, so to eliminate what Blakespear refers to as “vague or incomplete homelessness assessments in local plans.” The legislation, if passed, would require that cities make a record of the number of unhoused people within its borders, the length of time people remain homeless, their transition into permanent housing, identify those in the city experiencing homelessness for the first time, count the people leaving institutions such as jails, prisons or hospitals who then become homeless and make note of the age, race and ethnicity of those on each particular city’s streets.
The California Constitution requires the state to reimburse local agencies and school districts for certain costs mandated by the state. Statutory provisions establish procedures for making that reimbursement. This bill would provide that no reimbursement is required by this act for a specified reason.
Senate Bill 866 creates for itself an exception, such that the state does not provide funding to cities for implementing it nor reimburse for the additional work it entails. Included in Senate Bill 866 is the requirement for cities or towns to identify any existing programs they provide that serve unhoused members of their community. Furthermore, Senate Bill 866 requires municipalities report to the state how they are defraying the recording and reporting effort the state is not paying for.
While Senate Bill 866’s change of the law requiring the town provide a host of data it has until now not had to produce upset Apple Valley officials and not reimbursing the town for doing so irritated them, requiring that they go to the added expense of explaining how they are paying for carrying out the surveying and recording went them into orbit. City Manager Guy Eisenbrey said the state was layering another “burden” onto the town and requiring that officials divert funding from important ongoing projects and programs to comply with the law.
Senate Bill 866 does nothing to fund or provide housing for those who are homeless, town officials said, while complicating and making more expensive municipal planning efforts.
A letter opposing the bill was sent to the State Senate by the town. It was read during a hearing of the Senate Housing Committee on April 15. The committee deferred a vote on the bill until a future date.
According to Blakespear, the bill is intended to “encourage data-driven homelessness planning in places where it is not occurring and where no homeless assistance programs exist.”
Apple Valley officials have pointed out that under California law county’s cities and towns are already required to adopt a housing element as part of their general plans.
One of the issues driving Blakespear, who is described as both a “liberal” and a “bleeding heart,” is the inhumane treatment of the homeless in many places in California. That treatment is recognized as being particularly harsh in San Bernardino County, where sheriff’s deputies with impunity and the permission of both the sheriff’s department command and the San Bernardino County District Attorney’s office openly participate in physically beating the homeless, in particular males between the ages of 17 and 55, in an effort to induce them to leave the county. Apple Valley is one of 14 cities and incorporated towns in San Bernardino County where the sheriff’s department serves as the contract municipal police department.