Gov. Gavin Newsom enacted major reforms to the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), eliminating environmental reviews for many urban low- and mid-rise housing projects. This change aims to mitigate the barriers that stifled housing construction in California. Newsom emphasized the necessity of these reforms to address housing affordability and construction challenges. The reforms take immediate effect, impacting the development process by removing key leverage points for opposing groups. However, other factors like interest rates and labor availability will still influence housing development outcomes.
The changes waive CEQA for just about any proposed low- or mid-rise development in urban neighborhoods zoned for multifamily housing. No more thousand-page studies of soils, the shadows the buildings may cast and traffic they may bring.
Wiping away these rules shows that no matter how challenging the politics, the state will remove the barriers it has built over decades that have ended up stifling housing construction.
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