Outgoing San Francisco Planning Director John Rahaim announced his departure in September. Rich Hillis will be the next to have the job.
"Mayor London Breed has appointed a longtime ally and former planning commissioner to head the planning department, an agency charged with shaping San Francisco development as the city’s housing crisis persists," reports J.K. Dineen in a paywalled article for the San Francisco Chronicle.
"The appointee, Rich Hillis, is the executive director at Fort Mason Center For Arts and Culture and has held several senior positions at the city’s Office of Economic and Workforce Development. He left the Planning Commission in September after seven years to become a candidate to lead the department," adds Dineen.
Hillis is succeeding John Rahaim, "who was appointed to the position in 2008 by then-mayor Gavin Newsom," according to a separate article by the San Francisco Examiner.
"In her statement, [Mayor] Breed emphasized the need to streamline the planning process to build more homes more quickly in San Francisco, echoing her newly announced ballot measure to streamline the creation of affordable housing in San Francisco, dubbed 'Affordable Homes Now,'" according to the Examiner.
FULL STORY: Meet the planning chief Mayor Breed tapped to shape SF development and build 50,000 homes
Crises and Innovation Converge on San Francisco Planning Director John Rahaim's Watch
The latest installment of the Planners Across America series interviews John Rahaim, planning director for the City and County of San Francisco, about the heightened passions and perpetual controversies of planning in the City by the Bay.
San Francisco Plans for 82,000 New Housing Units
California housing regulators have granted preliminary approval for the city of San Francisco’s housing element as mandated by the state’s Regional Housing Needs Allocation process.
L.A. Planning Department Adjusts to State Housing Laws
Los Angeles Director of Planning Vince Bertoni was recently interviewed the effects of new state planning and housing laws in the state’s most populous city.
Depopulation Patterns Get Weird
A recent ranking of “declining” cities heavily features some of the most expensive cities in the country — including New York City and a half-dozen in the San Francisco Bay Area.
California Exodus: Population Drops Below 39 Million
Never mind the 40 million that demographers predicted the Golden State would reach by 2018. The state's population dipped below 39 million to 38.965 million last July, according to Census data released in March, the lowest since 2015.
Chicago to Turn High-Rise Offices into Housing
Four commercial buildings in the Chicago Loop have been approved for redevelopment into housing in a bid to revitalize the city’s downtown post-pandemic.
EV Infrastructure Booming in Suburbs, Cities Lag Behind
A lack of access to charging infrastructure is holding back EV adoption in many US cities.
Seattle Road Safety Advocates Say Transportation Levy Perpetuates Car-Centric Status Quo
Critics of a proposed $1.3 billion transportation levy say the package isn’t enough to keep up with inflation and rising costs and fails to support a shift away from car-oriented infrastructure.
Appeals Court: California Emissions Standards Upheld
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the California Air Resources Board, the nation's two most powerful environmental regulatory agencies, won an important round in federal court last week. But the emissions standards battle may not be over.
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