The Assembly Housing & Community Development Committee heard AB 2252 (Lee) this afternoon on what the chair described as a presentation-only basis. No vote was taken, and AB 2252 is done for this session with no four-story fallback version planned.
We’ve been pushing for single-stair reform for a while. I spoke in support at Council in December. We asked it be included in the 2026 legislative program, and Council adopted it as platform item C.37 in February. Most recently, we asked the City to make AB 2252 a priority at the Cities Association.
What the bill does
AB 2252 directs HCD to develop building standards for single-stair residential buildings up to six stories. It would also authorize local governments to adopt equally or more stringent single-stair standards immediately, ahead of HCD’s work. Current California code requires two stairways in nearly every mid-rise, which forces the double-loaded corridor layouts that produce the boxy, repetitive buildings residents complain about. Single-stair designs are standard in Seattle, New York City, and essentially the entire developed world outside the US.
Lee’s presentation
Alex Lee opened by reminding the committee that he already carried a Fire Marshal study bill (AB 835) in the prior session. That study, delivered to the legislature, recommended single-stair up to four stories. Lee wants six. He cited a recent Minnesota analysis finding that sprinklered single-stair buildings up to eight stories have fire risk equal to or lower than double-stair alternatives. He also pointed to the International Building Code, which has now adopted a four-story single-stair pathway.
From his close:
If California with our large cities can’t do it, I don’t know why Colorado and Montana can do it faster than us. A single stair is not just a matter of cost saving. It is an architectural ability to unlock small lots to be multi-family.
Witnesses in support
Ali Sapirman of the Housing Action Coalition described the bill as a housing production tool, not just a code fix. Double-stair requirements set a floor on building floor plates and rule out a significant share of California’s urban infill parcels. Single-stair designs allow family-sized units with multiple bedrooms, cross-ventilation, and natural light. She addressed the fire-safety question directly:
The leading cause of fire fatalities is not the fire itself, it’s smoke inhalation. And it’s long, double-loaded corridors, not stairwells, where smoke accumulates and kills. Single-stair buildings eliminate that chokepoint entirely.
Anthony Tordillos, San Jose District 3 councilmember representing downtown, testified that San Jose is three years into its RHNA cycle and on track for only 36 percent of its housing target, with half of renters rent-burdened. Local studies find mid-rise projects need 12 to 30 percent in construction cost reductions to pencil; legalizing taller single-stair construction could close that gap by up to 13 percent. Tordillos cited a Pew analysis of twelve years of fire data in New York City and Seattle, where there are more than 4,000 single-stair buildings, finding safety equivalent to two-stair construction. He noted that seven states passed single-stair reform in 2025, and cities including New York, Seattle, and Honolulu have allowed it for years.
Me-too support came from the Bay Area Council, Streets for All, and the City of San Jose.
Opposition
Firefighters showed up in force and in opposition.
Steve Aubert, representing Cal Chiefs and the Fire District Association of California, led off for the opposition. His argument: buildings over 30 feet need aerial access via ladder truck, a single staircase removes critical redundancy, and “we cannot eliminate some of the human behavior that causes that fire to occur in the first place. We can’t engineer our way out of it.”
Brian Rice, president of California Professional Firefighters, cited a 1996 Oregon fire in a three-story single-stair building that killed eight people. He emphasized that ladder trucks are a last-resort egress option, not a primary one, and that California fire departments are severely understaffed. “The only real community in California prepared to deal with density like this is the City and County of San Francisco. The suburbs are completely unprepared.”
Me-too opposition came from Cosumnes Fire District and Sacramento Metro Fire.
Member questions
Assemblymember Lori Wilson pressed on two points: the risk when a new single-stair building sits next to older, highly flammable construction, and why six stories when the Fire Marshal’s study recommended four.
Other members picked up the fire-funding concern. One member, drawing on experience as a former fire captain, said the state is putting “a solution for housing before the services to protect it.” Another mentioned Fresno County partnering with a casino to afford an $800,000 ladder truck.
Lee’s close
Lee agreed that fire departments are overtaxed and underfunded, but argued that is a separate problem from whether current code bans housing types that are routine in Seattle, New York City, and most of the developed world. The Fire Marshal’s own study already concluded single-stair up to four stories is safe, the IBC has adopted that standard, and Minnesota has data going further. Restricting modern mid-rise housing architecture does not solve California’s fire staffing gap.
Our take
Presentation-only with no vote is what happens when an author can’t guarantee the roll call. The firefighter unions showed up organized. The housing coalition didn’t match that energy. Single-stair reform will come back in a future session or through a different vehicle, but not through this bill.
Wilson’s four-vs-six question is still the core substantive stake. Four stories is a meaningful concession: it largely ratifies what Culver City already did locally rather than unlocking statewide production. The economics of single-stair improve substantially in the five-to-six story range, where eliminating the second stairwell’s footprint and core makes previously infeasible narrow-lot projects pencil. A four-story cap would pass more easily but deliver a fraction of the housing. Defending six stories when this fight resumes will be the central task.
This is still the right fight. California desperately needs mid-rise infill housing, and current code makes it nearly impossible on exactly the narrow lots urban neighborhoods have to offer. Rice’s “suburbs are completely unprepared” line deserves a direct response. Mountain View already permits six-story buildings in multiple zones. MVFD operates aerial apparatus. Suburbs across greater Seattle and the NYC metro handle single-stair mid-rise every day. The evidence runs strongly the other way: modern apartment buildings have a fire death rate six times lower than older buildings and single-family homes. Sprinklers, compartmentation, and modern alarm systems all reduce actual fire risk better than a second stairway does. The second stairway itself carries a real cost. Projects that don’t pencil get killed, or they get built as boxy double-loaded corridor buildings.
Mountain View has already committed via platform item C.37. We’d like to see the City carry that commitment forward at the Cities Association and the League of California Cities when single-stair returns in a future vehicle.