Statement: Pro-Housing Coalition Denounces City of Los Angeles' Illegal Delay of Affordable Housing Project. YIMBY Law Considers Legal Action
/Contact: Jae Garner
The Inner City Law Center, Abundant Housing LA, Urban Environmentalists, YIMBY Action, and YIMBY Law denounce the City of Los Angeles’ decision to delay the application and review process for 360 affordable homes at 8217 N Winnetka Ave in Canoga Park today. The coalition aims to ensure these homes and similar projects are approved and streamlined as outlined in the original form of the Mayor’s Executive Directive 1 (ED1).
"We're disappointed in the outcome of today's hearing, but we find ourselves grateful again to Councilmember Nithya Raman for her consistency on housing and standing up for this affordable housing as she did when it was in her Council District last month," said Cynthia Clemons, Field Organizer for Abundant Housing LA.
“Quickly increasing the availability of affordable housing is essential to ending LA’s homelessness and housing crisis. ED1 does just that. But stopping 1,500 affordable homes—proposed without any public subsidies— is irresponsible when every public subsidy for affordable housing is oversubscribed,” said Mahdi Manji, Director of Public Policy at Inner City Law Center. “LA needs innovative ways to build affordable housing. Rejecting these projects is equivalent to rejecting nearly $750,000,000 dollars of public subsidies. We just can’t do that when our families need these affordable homes.”
“It’s the height of hypocrisy that our supposedly climate-conscious leaders have just declined to support affordable infill housing that is within walking distance to a school, groceries, and everything else residents would need to lead a low driving, low carbon lifestyle,” said Joanna Gubman, Executive Director of Urban Environmentalists and Environmental Director at YIMBY Action.
“The city has now said no to affordable housing worth over $750,000,000 that would have helped hundreds of people live in stable, affordable homes without the city having to spend a dime,” said Laura Foote, Executive Director of YIMBY Action. “The idea that the city would say no to low-cost housing at a time when Los Angeles is in dire need of affordable housing is absurd and offensive to the voters who put these leaders in office to address the housing crisis.”
ED1 created a path to streamline the Winnetka project as well as similar projects representing over 1,500 total affordable homes. Instead, the city is illegally forcing them to go through the same laborious and expensive process that has killed countless affordable housing projects in the past.
If these homes are not approved, not only will Los Angeles go without hundreds of much-needed affordable homes, this decision will also stymie similar efforts to build affordable housing in the future by creating unnecessary barriers and ambiguity in the application and review process.
“YIMBY Law is considering legal action, including a lawsuit at this point,” said Sonja Trauss, Executive Director at YIMBY Law. “We’ve spoken with them about the legal and moral implications of going back on their own policy. The city still broke the law, and now they have to be held accountable. Affordable housing can’t wait, especially in Los Angeles.”