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Housing Element

Planning for 11,135+ New Homes

By January 31, 2023, the City of Mountain View must identify sites and policies for at least 11,135 new homes to be built between 2023 and 2031. The city does not have to build these homes directly, but it must make them feasible. These sites and policies will form the Housing Element, which the City Council approves and the state certifies. Failure to create a compliant Housing Element disqualifies the city from state grants and can even go as far as suspend local land use power.

The Mountain View YIMBY Housing Element Working Group meets monthly during this process to identify sites and policies to enable those homes. This process is complicated, even for the most adept housing advocates. That’s why we’re committing to breaking down the content and making it more accessible for all. Join us at contact@mvyimby.com

Housing Element Upcoming Schedule

  • Initial Site Inventory and Policies Study Sessions
    • Environmental Planning Commission: Wednesday, February 16, 7-8pm
    • City Council: Tuesday, March 8, 5-6pm
  • Public Review Draft Housing Element Study Sessions
  • HCD Review Period (Maximum 90 Days)
  • Housing Element [Second Draft December 2022]
  • HCD Submission

YIMBY’s Requests for the Housing Element

Programs

  • Use data-driven approaches for designing city programs targeted at meeting our housing needs allocation such that their efficacy can be objectively measured.
  • Commit to specific recommendations from the Development Review Study (Matrix)
  • Addition of the Displacement Response Strategy

Production

  • Drastically upzone within a half mile of our two Caltrain stations. No unit density limits.
  • Upzone within a half mile of our highest opportunity schools.
  • Policies to address production south of ECR
  • Increase Base FAR and height limit (allowed without Council review) in Precise Plans

Constraints

  • Streamline new home approval by eliminating discretionary reviews for housing.
  • Address Constraints found during the R3 Update (refer to Opticos presentation)
  • Remove Parking Minimums from (pick some combination of these asks):

Mountain View Housing Elementg Needs Allocation

In a process called the Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA), the state’s Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) assigns minimum quotas to various regions based on projected growth, a targeted vacancy rate, existing overcrowding, expected demolitions, and historical cost-burdens. Our region, under the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG), then assigned the quota to individual cities and counties based on projected growth, resource richness, proximity to jobs, and economic segregation. From this plan, Mountain View is assigned:

  • Very Low Income (<50% of Area Median Income): 2,773
  • Low Income (50-80% of AMI): 1,597
  • Moderate Income (80-120% of AMI): 1,885
  • Above Moderate Income (>120% of AMI): 4,880

Area Median Income is specified at the county level by HCD annually. For 2021, Santa Clara County’s AMI for a 4-person household is $151,300, compared to $141,600 the year before.