Housing Affordability Crisis and Inequities of Land Use Change

Abstract

Problem, research strategy, and findings

Many fast-growing metropolitan regions face a housing affordability crisis that necessitates cities change their land use policies to address this problem. How do cities in metropolitan regions change their land use policies to equitably address the region’s housing needs? We focused on 180 cities in the Southern California region, which has a shortage of housing for all income groups and a severe shortage of affordable housing. We first examined the region-wide distribution of land uses and evaluated whether land use portfolios of cities are associated with their populations’ socioeconomic characteristics using cluster analysis and one-way analysis of variance. Next, we examined land use change by cities and measured the “weakening” (a reduction in cities’ share of residential land use for multifamily housing from 2008 to 2016) and “exclusiveness” (cities’ share of residential land use for single-family housing in 2016) of their land use portfolios. We revealed inequities in the region-wide distribution of multifamily land use, found an association between land use portfolios of cities and their populations’ socioeconomic characteristics, and thus conclude that land use change by cities inequitably addresses the region’s housing needs. We did not, however, examine the effects of land use change on housing production or affordability, which could provide further insights.

Takeaway for practice

Our findings suggest that a) California’s state government should require cities to reform their land use policies to mitigate the region-wide inequities in the distribution of multifamily housing and to equitably address the housing affordability crisis and b) researchers could similarly evaluate land use portfolios of cities in other metropolitan regions to suggest how to equitably address the region’s housing needs.

Keywords:

• housing
• land use equity
• regional planning

ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

We thank Professor Emeritus Tridib Banerjee; Professor Ann Forsyth, editor of this journal; and the three anonymous reviewers for their insightful comments. We owe a special note of thanks to the regional planners at SCAG for sharing land use data with us and for responding to our queries.

RESEARCH SUPPORT

This work was supported by the John Randolph and Dora Haynes Foundation (Faculty Fellowship).

SUPPLEMENTAL MATERIAL

Supplemental data for this article can be accessed on the publisher’s website.

Notes

1 Local governments consider several factors, including tax revenues, in making land use decisions. Cities in California receive tax revenue primarily from property tax and sales tax. Proposition 13 has reduced property tax revenues and e-commerce has reduced the appeal of retail stores; however, the theme of fiscalization of land use has endured. Some states have fiscal arrangements that are different from those of California. For instance, cities in Ohio and Pennsylvania are allowed to impose income tax.

2 We have excluded seven cities from Imperial County, also in the SCAG region, because it is a rural county.

3 Higher-density housing is not the same as overcrowded housing.

4 Recent housing permit data reveal that housing production in most cities in California are not on track to meet their low-income housing goals (State of California Department of Housing and Community Development, 2020).

5 Cities in the SCAG region are required to indicate in their housing element the sites where their RHNA housing allocations for various income groups could be accommodated for each planning period. The fifth-cycle RHNA allocations by SCAG cover the planning period from October 2013 to October 2021. SCAG changed the sixth-cycle RHNA distribution method, which covers the planning period from October 2021 to October 2029, to address the ongoing housing affordability crisis.

6 There is a strong correlation between cities’ populations and their RHNA allocations.

7 These 37 cities include two cities that have mostly industrial land use and one city that has considerable multifamily residential land use.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Ajay Garde

AJAY GARDE ([email protected]) is an associate professor in the Department of Urban Planning and Public Policy at the University of California, Irvine.

Qi Song

QI SONG ([email protected]) is a PhD student in the Department of Urban Planning and Public Policy at the University of California, Irvine.