Voice of OC (https://voiceofoc.org/tag/affordable-housing/)
Irvine and Newport Beach officials started 2020 by pushing back against new state-mandates to zone for thousands of new homes, as California continues to grapple with a housing shortage.
Laguna Beach and Costa Mesa pushed back last week with resolutions opposing the expansion by the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG), as Irvine and Newport Beach gear up for similar votes Tuesday night.
Santa Ana’s publicly funded residences for artists are part of a trend to integrate them into gentrifying communities. Artists Apartments’ $457,000 cost per unit is typical for subsidized housing.
When it opens in November, the Santa Ana Arts Collective will be the first rent-subsidized complex in Orange County intended specifically for artists.
Hundreds of millions of dollars in state grants could become available next year, and some community leaders want to compete for it to help build 2,700 homes for homeless people.
The lack of affordable housing threatens the quality of life and upward mobility of residents, and puts the county’s economic future at risk, according to a declaration by county supervisors.
Elizabeth Hansburg, who is Director of Orange County’s YIMBY group, People for Housing OC, writes that Orange County political leaders need to understand that there is massive public backing for affordable housing construction of all types.
Residents of the Green Lantern Village in Westminster — many who are senior citizens and Vietnamese refugees — are fighting back against plans by the property owner to close the 130-space mobile home park, which they say would displace more than one hundred families in a county where affordable housing is increasingly scarce.
Homeless people camped along the Santa Ana River slowly are packing up and leaving as a result of county evictions, but most said they are without a place to go and no backup plan.
Officials at CalOptima, Orange County’s health plan for the low income and elderly, are considering plans to use the property surrounding the agency’s headquarters to build a mixed-use development that includes affordable housing and permanent supportive housing for homeless individuals.