Dear Mayor Ramos and Council Members,

We understand Councilmember Kamei is preparing Mountain View’s input for the Cities Association of Santa Clara County’s Legislative Action Committee. Mountain View YIMBY would like to offer our priorities for the bills the LAC takes up this year.

Our top ask: AB 2252 (Lee) on single-stair reform

This is the biggest cost-reduction item available this session. AB 2252 directs HCD to propose building standards for single-stair multifamily buildings of up to six stories. Single-stair construction is standard in Seattle, New York, and essentially everywhere else in the developed world. California’s prohibition is estimated to add 6 to 13 percent to the cost of a mid-rise apartment with no demonstrated safety benefit. It also forces nearly every mid-rise project into a double-loaded corridor layout, producing the boxy, repetitive buildings residents complain about. Single-stair designs allow units with windows on multiple sides, more varied floor plans, and better-looking buildings overall. AB 835, signed in 2024, already directed the State Fire Marshal to develop standards by 2028, but 2028 is too far away to help any project that needs to pencil today. AB 2252 puts HCD on a faster track using a process the agency is built for. Its first hearing in the Assembly Housing and Community Development Committee is April 22.

Re: Agenda item 5.1

Dear Chair and Members of the Environmental Planning Commission,

Mountain View YIMBY supports Item 5.1 and urges the Commission to recommend the proposed amendments to Council.

The administrative approval process in the draft ordinance is well designed. It eliminates the public hearing requirement for projects qualifying for the AB 130 statutory CEQA exemption, which is the most urgent change: without it, qualifying projects risk being deemed approved because the City cannot act on them within the statutory timelines. At the same time, the process preserves staff’s ability to grant case-by-case flexibility where the Code or a Precise Plan allows exceptions to development standards. That flexibility benefits housing projects and we support retaining it.

Re: Agenda item 6.1

Dear Chair Nunez and Members of the Environmental Planning Commission,

Mountain View YIMBY supports work on the Citywide TDM Ordinance. A standardized framework with a parking exemption pathway for residential projects is a significant step forward from the current ad hoc approach of imposing TDM requirements project-by-project. We appreciate the exemptions for residential trip caps, travel surveys, and driveway counts, and the decision to keep TMA membership optional given the Prop 218 concerns the staff report identifies. We ask the Commission to consider the following comments.

Mountain View City Council approved two significant housing projects in the East Whisman neighborhood at its March 10th meeting, together adding over 650 new homes to an area that has long been dominated by office parks and surface parking lots.

490 East Middlefield Road: 460 Mixed-Use Units (Item 6.2)

The headline item of the evening was a proposal by Development Partners to build a 460-unit mixed-use residential building at the corner of East Middlefield Road and Ellis Street. The project would replace a two-story commercial office building on a 2.86-acre site with a contemporary, seven-story mixed-use development featuring ground-floor retail, a pool, coworking space, and over 34,000 square feet of open space.

Mountain View’s February 10th Council meeting ran nearly to midnight, but the payoff was substantial: Council gave clear direction on the long-awaited R3 zoning update, approved a 2026 legislative platform that includes several housing production reforms we’ve been pushing for, and handled a consent calendar that included the 881 Castro street vacation for the Lot 12 affordable housing project.

R3 Zoning Update (Item 7.1)

This was the main event. The R3 zoning update has been in the works since 2019, and Council finally gave staff direction to complete it this year. The goal: replace the current R3 standards with objective, form-based standards that make multifamily housing feasible and encourage stacked flats over the townhome developments that have dominated recent R3 projects.

Dear Mayor Ramos and Council Members,

Mountain View YIMBY appreciates the opportunity to comment on Mountain View’s Legislative Program. There is a consistent theme that Mountain View advocates for maximum local control, especially on land use and housing. We urge the Council to ensure its positions on these issues are unambiguous and to avoid assisting “bad actor” jurisdictions that abuse their powers to kill housing projects arbitrarily.

Supported Items

We appreciate the inclusion of items on increased funding opportunities and displacement protections, including defending our local rent control ordinance, and the items that generally support increased access to housing, jobs, and services (Items C.8, C.10. C.25). We do appreciate the addition of Item 32, and encourage the City to actively advocate whenever it finds inconsistencies or ambiguities in state law which create uncertainty for both the City and developers.

Dear Mayor Ramos and City Council,

SB 79

Mountain View YIMBY supports harmonizing local development standards with the provisions of SB 79, as much as feasible, to provide clarity for developers and the community. We believe that such standards should incorporate existing work, specifically from the Moffett Boulevard Precise Plan, the Downtown Precise Plan Update, and the R3 Zoning Update, to make best use of staff resources and existing community engagement.

Re: Agenda item 5.1

Dear Chair Gutierrez and Commissioners,

Mountain View YIMBY strongly supports efforts to update the R3 Zoning District. We appreciate Staff’s extensive work to transition toward objective, form-based standards. This update is a critical step in fulfilling the Housing Element’s commitment to ensuring multifamily projects are economically feasible and can achieve their allowed densities. To ensure these new standards successfully encourage diverse housing types—particularly on smaller parcels—we respectfully submit the following recommendations:

In a marathon meeting that stretched into the early hours of Wednesday morning, the Mountain View City Council took significant steps to implement our Housing Element and expand homeownership opportunities. The meeting, which concluded at 12:30 AM, featured a robust public hearing on zoning changes for several sites south of El Camino Real and a study session on a new strategy for low- and middle-income homeownership.

Housing Element Rezonings Approved (Item 6.1)

The Council voted 6-1 (with Councilmember McAlister dissenting) to approve General Plan and Zoning amendments for several sites identified in the city’s Housing Element. The approved rezonings include:

Re: Agenda item 6.1

Mayor Kamei & City Councilmembers,

Mountain View YIMBY writes in support of the general plan and zoning amendments necessary to implement Item 1.1(g) of the Housing Element. The staff memo notes the two major considerations for why these sites were chosen out of the extensive research they conducted: to affirmatively further fair housing by allowing more housing in more affluent neighborhoods, and to encourage developments that are in the realm of feasible. Staff have done their research and outreach over the past three years, creating a clear-cut commitment the City must fulfill now.