Castro Valley Rotarian Jeff Moore is a member of the Alameda County Planning Commission spoke on the impact of Covid and SB9 on housing development in Alameda County. He is also president of Greenwood and Moore, a civil engineering firm in Castro Valley, and a licensed professional engineer. In his six-minute presentation, Jeff discussed the impact that Covid has had in Alameda County and the impact of SB9 has had on housing development. To learn more and watch the presentation, click here.Covid has really affected the development in Alameda County. Essentially, there were no large projects started and only a number of smaller projects. Jeff expects things to pick up now. He mentioned that the county has many rules and regulations covering development. They exist to ensure that things are done correctly; however, these rules and regulations also can also be used to slow projects to a crawl by people who just don’t want the project to be built.
Jeff also discussed SB9, the new law that opens up parcels in zones for single-family homes in residential areas (R1 zone). SB9 allows a homeowner to build additional homes on what had been a single home plot. There are few exceptions to this regulation and cities and counties have little input regulating the projects. The law is meant to deal with the housing crisis in California, but many people are concerned about what might happen next door to them. The law changes many of the existing rules and regulations. The minimum lot size under SB9 is very small. The set back at the rear is as narrow as 4 feet and there are no requirements for additional parking. Many cities and counties are struggling to figure out how to work within the new law. More information will be forthcoming as cities and counties learn to work withing SB9. Watch the presentation here.