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(SANTA BARBARA, Calif.) – The County Board of Supervisors met on Tuesday, April 30, 2024, in Santa Maria and Friday, May 3, 2024, in Santa Barbara to review and select sites to accommodate affordable housing throughout the county. On Friday, the Board voted to rezone ten sites in the North County and 17 sites on the South Coast that can accommodate affordable housing units for lower-, moderate-, and upper moderate- income households countywide. The Board also selected nine County-owned sites to provide needed housing units, all in the South County. This is the final step in the Housing Element Update process and ensures the County remains in compliance with State Housing Law.
The selection of sites is the end of a long process that began in 2021 when the State Department of Housing and Community Development (State HCD) through its Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA, pronounced REE-nah) process mandated how many housing units the County had to accommodate as part of the current Housing Element Update cycle. For this cycle, State HCD required that Santa Barbara County identify sites to accommodate 5,664 new housing units in unincorporated portions of Santa Barbara County between 2023 and 2031. This is an 8-fold increase from the last cycle. The RHNA was further broken down to require 4,142 units in the South Coast region and 1,522 units in the North County region. This breakdown attempts to address the current jobs-housing imbalance. The State further mandates the number of units the County accommodate at lower-, moderate-, and above moderate affordability.