The Democrats’ civil war over housing reaches its peak after San Francisco is forced to allow more construction

The San Francisco Board of Supervisors does not support simplifying housing permits, but California Governor Gavin Newsom and Mayor London Breed do. (Steve Proehl/Getty Images)

Housing policy Democrats scored a victory in San Francisco on Friday after state authorities said the city had failed to meet its 2023 housing approval goals, leading to a bill opposed by some Democrats to speed up approvals for new construction, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.

The slow pace of approving new projects in San Francisco led to SB 423, a California law that allows many new homes to forgo extensive environmental reviews and proceed with construction without the approval of city planning bureaucrats.

California Governor Gavin Newsom and San Francisco Mayor London Breed, both Democrats, support simplifying building permits. But the all-Democratic San Francisco Board of Supervisors, which will lose its power to control some construction projects, is more hostile to the law signed by Newsom, SB 423.

“Ultimately, removing the risks in the permitting process and eliminating the political gauntlet of approving housing will have a positive impact on housing construction in the city,” Corey Smith, executive director of the Housing Action Coalition, told the Chronicle.

Smith stressed that developers have so far been reluctant to invest in San Francisco due to the complicated approval process for new housing in the city.

California had required San Francisco to approve 82,000 new housing units between 2023 and 2031. However, according to the Chronicle, the city only approved 3,039 units in the past 18 months.

San Francisco’s historic reluctance to build new housing and the high pay of its tech workers created a market where demand far exceeded supply, leading to high real estate prices, according to the Chronicle.

The high cost of living in California has been a major reason for the exodus of residents from the Golden State. In a 2023 survey by the Public Policy Institute of California, 45% of Californians said they were seriously considering moving elsewhere due to high housing costs.

Newsom, a supporter of SB 423, sought to address his state’s housing shortage by promising in 2017 to build 3.5 million new homes by 2035. However, between Newsom taking office in 2019 and early 2024, California has only increased its net housing supply by about 600,000 units.

Aaron Peskin, president of the San Francisco Board of Supervisors and a Democrat running for mayor, opposes many of the new housing projects that SB 423 seeks to speed up. He urged the city attorney to sue California over the law in January, the Chronicle reported. Peskin has clashed with Breed, the current mayor, over her desire to allow higher housing densities in some parts of the city.

About three-quarters of current housing projects in San Francisco are eligible for the simplified approval process, the Chronicle reported.

“There’s a lot of PTSD in the construction industry about what it actually takes to build in San Francisco,” Smith said, according to the Chronicle. “It’s not going to suddenly take off, but as the economy picks up and the rules become better known, it will be a game changer.”

Neither Peskin nor the offices of the California governor and the mayor of San Francisco immediately responded to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.

Originally published by Daily Caller News Foundation