Santa Clara’s housing plans still don’t meet the state’s, but the city hopes its most recent draft will be the final effort.
On Tuesday, the Santa Clara City Council voted unanimously to rezone more than 27 acres along El Camino Real for mixed-use redevelopment, opening up the possibility of more housing in the area. The city also approved its final housing element 6-0, with Councilman Raj Chahal absent.
The state Department of Housing and Community Development issued conditional approval of the housing plans on April 11, pending rezoning.
The 27 acres along El Camino Real come from 17 sites, mostly near intersections with the Lawrence and San Tomás highways. Mayor Lisa Gillmor said she heard from residents who were concerned about the loss of commercial space. But Reena Brilliot, Santa Clara’s interim community development director, clarified that the rezoning is separate from the city’s specific plans to develop El Camino, so it will not affect future business opportunities.
The city is working on updating its development plans for the El Camino area, with the goal of finalizing the draft by this summer.
Brilliot said during his presentation to councilors that the state’s conditional approval gives him confidence that the city’s housing element will be certified. Santa Clara is one of six cities in the county with a housing element that has not yet been certified.
“They’ve given us the go-ahead, all the go-ahead they can give at this point,” Brilliot said.
Santa Clara needs to account for 11,632 new homes by 2031, with 6,506 below market rate, or below 120% of the area median income. In 2023, the area median income for a family of four in Santa Clara County was $181,300. The city would have to facilitate the construction of 1,454 homes, 813 of them below market rate, each year through 2031 to reach that goal.
The Housing Action Coalition filed a letter opposing the city’s plans, alleging that Santa Clara has exaggerated how many sites it could redevelop. Brilliot said the plan is to demonstrate that the city has the capacity to build enough housing to meet state requirements, and acknowledged that the city’s inventory of sites is not a complete list.
“We can’t promise that any of these sites are going to be developed,” Gillmor said. “We can do our best to see which ones are likely to develop.”
Brilliot’s presentation included the city’s housing site inventory, which showed that Santa Clara already has 12,209 homes approved for development, although only 2,008 will be affordable. Overall, the city has planned about 19,233 homes across all housing types, including accessory dwelling units.
He added that increasing the city’s volume of affordable housing will require more work, and emphasized that building housing for very low and low-income levels requires partnerships with other organizations.
“I don’t want these numbers to look like a failure,” Brilliot said. “It’s very hard work at those very low and low income levels of affordability.”
Contact B. Sakura Cannestra at [email protected] or @SakuCannestra on X, formerly known as Twitter.
