As the far-reaching impacts of the COVID-19 crisis continue to reverberate nationwide, California lawmakers are attempting to reorient the state's housing policies in an effort to continue making progress in addressing the housing crisis gripping the region.
Lawmakers have introduced a slew of bills in recent weeks aimed at furthering housing production goals, Cal Matters reports. Until now, the state has focused on a two-pronged approach of reducing zoning and regulatory hurdles for new housing developments while also infusing nonprofit housing developers and state agencies with vigorous financing to build new units. With the increasingly dire financial situation being left in the wake of the COVID-19 crisis, however, plans have had to change in order to keep up and state authorities will now likely lean on private businesses to produce and fund much needed housing.
One of the many proposed plans comes in the form of State Bill 1385, an effort that would allow residential development on existing commercial sites.
Known as the Neighborhood Homes Act, SB-1385 "would deem a housing development project, as defined, an authorized use on a neighborhood lot that is zoned for office or retail commercial use under a local agency’s zoning code or general plan."
The plan, according to Cal Matters, could bring new life to the state's struggling mall and commercial properties, many of which are now facing even more dire futures amid the current retail collapse and coming era of socially distanced re-opening that is set to get underway soon.
The proposal comes as private entities around the state, including a significant number of technology companies, pursue projects aimed at converting former malls into creative office spaces, facilities that will likely no longer be in such high demand as many of those same companies opt for permanent work-from-home setups for their employees in the aftermath of the pandemic.
4 Comments
Sin lugar a dudas, es una opción viable para reutilizar a futuro estas estructuras que, paulatinamente –incluso antes del COVID, se estaban vaciando. No solo por el embate del comercio electrónico, sino por la falta de visión de los propios desarrolladores.
"Undoubtedly, it is a viable option to reuse in the future these structures that, gradually - even before COVID - were being emptied. Not only because of the onslaught of electronic commerce, but because of the lack of vision of the developers themselves." -Translation courtesy Google Translate
THANK U GOOGLE!
I'm impressed. That's actually a pretty good translation. A little too direct in the syntax, but I wouldn't expect much different.
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