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The city of San Juan Bautista received welcome news on Feb. 26 from the California Department of Housing and Community Development: its 6th Cycle Housing Element, as adopted by the San Juan Bautista City Council on Jan. 20, was reviewed and accepted.
City Planner Arielle Goodspeed told BenitoLink that “this certification represents a significant milestone for the city. With certification secured, the city will now focus on implementation of the Housing Element programs and annual progress reporting requirements.”
Acceptance of the Housing Element places the city in compliance with state law, which requires documentation of how a jurisdiction will address housing needs for various income levels during a given planning period.
As part of the element, the state also requires the city to demonstrate that there is enough property to accommodate the Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA), the number of housing units which must be planned for over the 2023-2031 cycle, as set by the San Benito County Council of Governments.
The RHNA imposed for this cycle is at least 88 housing units. The Housing Element itself does not authorize or approve any projects, but serves as a framework for filling the state’s requirements.
According to the notice sent to the city, several federal, state and regional funding programs consider Housing Element compliance as being required for eligibility.
Programs listed as examples include:
- Sustainable Communities grant
- Strategic Growth Council and HCD’s Affordable Housing and Sustainable Communities program
- HCD’s Prohousing Designation Program
- HCD’s Prohousing Incentive Program
- HCD’s Permanent Local Housing Allocation program
“With a compliant housing element,” the notice reads, “the city now meets housing element requirements for these and other funding sources.”
Beyond opening up grant opportunities, compliance also exempts the city from what’s known as the builder’s remedy, which allows developers to bypass local zoning and general plan requirements for projects with significant affordable housing, and prevents any penalties from being levied for non-compliance.
The city was also notified that it must “continue the timely and effective implementation” of several other programs, including:
- Child Care Facilities Program
- Housing Grants Program
- Inclusionary Housing Ordinance Review and Enhancement
- Single-Room Occupancy Program
- Low Barrier Navigation Centers
- Density Bonus Compliance
- Employee/Farmworker Housing Program
- Emergency Shelter Zoning Update
- ADU Program Expansion
- General Plan and Zoning Consistency Amendments
- Fair Housing Definition of Family
- Group Homes Zoning Update
- Middle Housing Types
- Transparency in Land Use Controls and Development Standards
- Zoning Code Amendment for Special Housing Needs
- Other Zoning Code Amendments
- Reasonable Accommodations
- Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing
- Support Transit Facilities and Transit-Oriented Development
- Place-Based Neighborhood Revitalization
- Owner-Occupied and Multi-Family Housing Rehabilitation Program
- Affordable Housing Program
- Promote Variety of Housing Options
- Development of Extremely Low-Income Housing
San Juan did not submit a “timely” housing element for the Fifth Cycle (2015–2023), resulting in a compliance failure which led city officials to be summoned to meet with Governor Gavin Newsom in February 2019 to resolve the matter.
The process for drafting the Sixth Cycle Housing Element began with a series of public workshops starting in June 2023, followed by public input at subsequent Planning Commission and City Council hearings.
“The city recognizes the importance of inclusive, transparent community engagement,” Goodspeed said, “and it conducted targeted outreach throughout the process. These efforts were designed to comply with the affirmative furtherance of fair housing requirements.”
The first draft of the Sixth Cycle Housing Element was submitted to the state in September 2023. A second and third draft were submitted in 2024, and two more drafts were submitted in 2025. The city received a notice of substantial compliance from the state regarding the fifth and final draft on Dec. 31, 2025.
Currently, 488 of the state’s 539 jurisdictions required to file housing elements are in compliance, including San Benito County, whose plan was accepted on Feb. 3. As of March 3, 50 are still pending acceptance and out of compliance, including the city of Hollister, whose Housing Element was reviewed by the state on Feb. 13.
A copy of San Juan Bautista’s Housing Element is in the agenda packet for the Jan. 20 City Council meeting.
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San Juan Bautista passes housing element
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