In 1948, the Santa Barbara News-Press ran a headline decrying Santa Barbara’s “severe housing shortage.” Housing has been a hot topic here ever since.
When I arrived in Santa Barbara in the mid-1970s, the city’s zoning allowed housing for a population of about 170,000 residents. In spite of that generous zoning, rents were relatively high, and the Community Action Commission published a pamphlet, “The (Santa Barbara) Housing Problem,” that reported, “39% of households were spending more than 35% of their income for rent.”
In 1976, the City Council commissioned a study titled “The Effects of Urban Growth,” written by UCSB faculty members and others. The report emphasized the negative impacts of job and housing growth and led that council to “down-zone” housing in the city to provide for a population of about 85,000 residents. Most residents agreed that this change would keep us within the carrying capacity of the region and protect our comfortable “non-L.A.” quality of life.