Op-Ed: Los Angeles Needs a Countywide Affordable Housing Agency

The Los Angeles Times editorial board is applauding a proposed bill in the state legislature, SB 679, that calls for the creation of a new county agency dedicated to affordable housing. The proposed Los Angeles County Affordable Housing Solutions Agency (LACAHSA) would "provide the countywide vision, foster the cooperation between cities and, perhaps most importantly, secure the funding to ensure that the poorest residents have stable housing."

LACAHSA would be tasked with building and preserving affordable housing and providing renter protections. Most crucially, "the agency would have bonding and taxing authority — although any tax increases would go on the ballot." If the agency is created and a proposal headed for the November 2020 ballot that calls for a new tax on multimillion-dollar property sales passes, "[a]dvocates think LACAHSA could build or preserve 100,000 affordable units over the next decade." The agency could also reduce the cost of building affordable housing units, "which now cost $500,000 per unit or more because developers have to navigate a labyrinthine public financing process."

Advocates for the new agency argue that a coordinated countywide effort would streamline and accelerate the production of affordable housing that is now "carried out on an optional, ad hoc basis." Today, "[f]ewer than 10 of the L.A. County’s 88 cities budget local dollars to produce or preserve affordable housing." Yet "[t]o meet the state’s fair-share housing law, L.A. County is required to plan for 340,000 affordable units by 2030, or about 42,500 affordable units per year. That’s a huge increase over the roughly 3,000 units a year the region has been building. Many smaller cities don’t have the money or expertise to reach the new affordable housing targets on their own." According to the editorial board, a county agency could create the "pressure, accountability and ambition" required for L.A. County to meet its affordable housing goals.