Adaptive reuse projects. (Gabriel D)

Current Text: Amended: 3/30/2023

Status: 10/11/2023-Approved by the Governor. Chaptered by Secretary of State – Chapter 746, Statutes of 2023.

Summary: The Planning and Zoning Law requires each county and city to adopt a comprehensive, long-term general plan for the physical development of the county or city, and specified land outside its boundaries, that includes, among other specified mandatory elements, a housing element. That law requires the Department of Housing and Community Development to determine whether the housing element is in substantial compliance with specified provisions of that law. Existing law, for award cycles commenced after July 1, 2021, awards a city, county, or city and county, that has adopted a housing element determined by the department to be in substantial compliance with specified provisions of the Planning and Zoning Law and that has been designated by the department as prohousing based upon their adoption of prohousing local policies, as specified, additional points in the scoring of program applications for housing and infrastructure programs pursuant to guidelines adopted by the department, as provided. Existing law defines “prohousing local policies” as policies that facilitate the planning, approval, or construction of housing, including, but not limited to, local financial incentives for housing, reduced parking requirements for sites that are zoned for residential development, and the adoption of zoning allowing for use by right for residential and mixed-use development.

This bill would add the facilitation of the conversion or redevelopment of commercial properties into housing, as specified, including the adoption of adaptive reuse, as defined, ordinances or other mechanisms that reduce barriers for these conversions, to the list of specified prohousing local policies. This bill would require the Department of Housing and Community Development, in consultation with the State Fire Marshal, to research and develop revisions and clarifications to the California Building Standards Code, as specified, pertaining to the requirements for adaptive reuse development projects, and authorizes the department to propose these revisions and clarifications to the California Building Standards Commission.

The bill would require the commission to consider for adoption the revisions and clarifications proposed by the Department of Housing and Community Development.