In November of last year, to little fanfare, the San Francisco Planning Department presented to the Planning Commission its new Citywide Objective Design Standards. San Francisco, like cities across the state, are grappling with the brave new world of objective standards as required by recent housing legislation out of Sacramento. As the dust settles around the new and improved Housing Element process, the next battleground will be over individual projects, and each jurisdiction’s take on how to implement “objective standards.” The need for objective standards is straightforward: as the state took dramatic action to jumpstart housing production by removing local
On December 10th Mayor Breed and Supervisor Mandelman introduced BOS File No. 241197, an ordinance that would create the Cole Valley Entertainment Zone. Buoyed by the success of the Entertainment Zones that occurred downtown, this is an acknowledgment that there are other parts of San Francisco that have yet to recover from the pandemic-related downturn. As a refresher, entertainment zones enable restaurants and bars in designated areas to sell alcoholic beverages to go for outdoor consumption during events and activations. The establishment of entertainment zones stems from the Mayor’s Roadmap to San Francisco’s Future, which has supported a series of
Readers no doubt are aware of the CEQA Infill Exemption, one of the most common CEQA exemptions used for projects in San Francisco and the Bay Area. In an important opinion published on November 18, the Sixth District Court of Appeal interpreted key terms in the Infill Exemption (CEQA Guidelines Class 32 categorical exemption) to broaden its application, in particular “in-fill development” projects that meet specified criteria, including being “substantially surrounded by urban uses.” In doing so, the Court upheld a lower-population city’s use (King City) of the exemption for a Grocery Outlet project near Highway 101. (Working Families of
Measure L: Additional Business Tax on Transportation Network Companies and Autonomous Vehicle Businesses to Fund Public Transportation – Failed* With preliminary election results showing 56.88% voter approval, it would seem voters passed Measure L, but the Measure has failed due to a provision in Measure M discussed below. Measure L would have placed a permanent additional tax on transportation network companies and autonomous vehicle businesses to support Muni transportation services and fare discount programs, titled the “Ride-Hail Platform Gross Receipts Tax.” The Measure would impose the tax specifically on businesses that provide passenger service for compensation and receive more than
On November 5th of last week, voters took to the polls to cast their ballots in an election with several measures that will affect businesses and City Commissions. With preliminary election results available, below is an overview of some of the key results. Proposition 33: Local Government Residential Rent Control – Failed Prop 33 sought the statewide repeal of the Costa-Hawkins Rental Housing Act of 1995 (“Costa-Hawkins”), which restricts the ability for local jurisdictions to impose rent control. Proponents for the proposition argued that repeal of Costa-Hawkins would allow jurisdictions to expand rent control, while opponents argued it would freeze
Some exciting improvements and developments at the Building Department have been published in the past few weeks including the guidelines for adaptive reuse projects converting downtown commercial offices into multi-family residential buildings and a streamlined ADU review process. See below for the direct updates from San Francisco Department of Building Inspection. Converting Downtown Commercial Offices into Multi-Family Residential Multiple agencies came together to work on final guidelines for commercial to residential adaptive re-use projects and the result is a thoughtful and comprehensive clarification of building code provisions and local equivalency processes that may present developers and design professionals options which
