Dear Friends --

One of the major causes of California’s housing shortage and affordability crisis is NIMBY abuse of the California Environmental Quality Act to block homes where we need them most – in already-developed areas of our cities. It's time for that to change.

CEQA is a critical tool for protecting the environment and public health. Much of the progress we've made in conserving pristine habitats and cleaning up our air and water is thanks to CEQA. But loopholes in the law allow NIMBYs to use it to block projects that are environmentally beneficial – particularly multifamily infill housing.

According to climate scientists, building more infill housing near jobs, schools, and amenities is the number one thing most California cities can do to reduce climate pollution. But the misuse of CEQA is blocking these types of homes in our cities – and is leading to more sprawl developments that increase pollution and congestion.

That doesn't make sense. We must update CEQA to help solve our housing shortage and tackle the climate crisis.

That's why California YIMBY is standing with Assemblymember Buffy Wicks to sponsor AB 609. It will create a streamlined permitting process for multi-family housing in existing, developed urban areas by exempting these projects from the California Environmental Quality Act.

Will you add your name in support of AB 609? Show legislators that Californians want to make it easier to build new homes in our cities!

For decades, scientific research has shown that housing built in existing urban areas results in dramatically lower environmental impacts than homes built in "greenfield," or undeveloped, areas.

The reason is simple: urban areas already have the infrastructure to accommodate housing growth, and new homes built in these areas result in lower "external" impacts – such as transport pollution, building materials consumption, new highway construction, energy use, and habitat destruction.

That's why the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has repeatedly recommended building infill housing as one of the most effective strategies to reduce climate pollution. Other places, like Washington State, have already passed laws to exempt infill housing from their versions of CEQA.

Yet California lags behind, even as the climate crisis grows worse, even as housing prices continue to rise.

We're going to change that. AB 609 exempts environmentally friendly housing projects from CEQA, provided they are in infill locations and not on environmentally sensitive or hazardous sites.

These projects must still comply with local general plans, zoning ordinances, and objective standards—meaning these project types have already undergone CEQA review. To qualify, projects must meet minimum density thresholds (15 units per acre in urban areas, 10 in suburban areas, and 5 in rural areas) and be no larger than 20 acres.

It should not be possible to use environmental legislation to block environmentally-friendly projects. Yet NIMBYs continue to abuse CEQA in order to block housing they don't like. Fixing CEQA is essential to being able to build the infill housing California urgently needs.

This is a major bill – and as you might guess, we expect all-out opposition from the same forces who always work to kill housing and climate action. Will you help build the movement to fix CEQA?

Sign the petition to the legislature and show your support for AB 609 today!

Thank you so much for stepping up in this urgent moment.

Matthew

Matthew Lewis
Communications Director
California YIMBY