Senate Bill 79 Could Be a Housing Showdown for Long Beach vs. State Government

A Senate bill in Sacramento could be a showdown for classic housing development issues that have shaped Long Beach – along with California and regions around the country – since the 1980s.

Senate Bill 79, introduced in January by Sen. Scott Wiener, a San Francisco Democrat, cleared through the state Senate’s Housing Committee in Sacramento on Tuesday, April 22 by a 6-2 vote. If passed and signed into law, the state would have more say over approval of these projects than municipalities have, and it would require cities to allow for the building of taller apartment and condo buildings near mass transit. That would include bus-rapid-transit stops and rail stations, potentially supporting the concept of a growing number of people moving into cities and needing more access to public transit.

Senate Housing Committee Chair Aisha Wahab, a Democrat representing the East Bay Area, expressed opposition to the bill in its present form, voicing concerns about developers being given too much power without meeting other state mandates including making sure that adding more affordable housing is part of the legislation.

Weiner was pleased to see SB 79 move forward, but also expressed frustration that another one of his bills, SB 677, has been defeated in the Senate. That bill aimed to make a “number of changes to strengthen existing housing streamlining laws, SB 423 and SB 9,” Weiner’s office said in a statement. SB 677 died on a narrow vote, and Wiener was granted reconsideration, meaning that he could bring the bill up again for another vote in the committee.

“Until our leaders are willing and able to vote for and support big changes – and demonstrate that Democrats can, in fact, govern – we’re going to remain stuck in a cycle where more and more people are pushed out of our state,” said Laura Foote, executive director of YIMBY Action in reference to the bill passing through the committee approval, but also to the fact that SB 677 stalled out.

YIMBY Action, a national group that started years ago in San Francisco, says that it’s made up of architects, city planners and homebuilders. Their philosophy, along with other pro-YIMBY advocates, seems to be that more is better. The more housing that’s allowed to be built in cities would mean that market forces should balance out rental rates, making housing more affordable for low-income and middle-income residents. Other groups and legislators, such as Wahab, argue that governing agencies must have directives to provide more quality affordable housing in cities, or it won’t happen.

Some Democrats on the committee were absent or didn’t vote, according to States Newsroom. The bill will have the typical process of working through committees, going through the Assembly, and being signed into law by the governor, likely in an amended form.

SB 79 will be referred back to the standing committee, Senate Local Government Committee, of which Wiener is a member, according to Cal Matters.

So far, 73 cities in the state are in opposition to the bill, according to a summary document on SB 79 from the Senate Committee on Housing. That includes Lakewood, Los Alamitos, Paramount, Garden Grove, Huntington Beach, Newport Beach, Orange, Manhattan Beach, Torrance and Fullerton.

Long Beach and Statewide Groups Voice Concerns

Corliss Lee, President of Eastside Voice, a neighborhood association for the 4th & 5th districts in Long Beach, had sent a letter to Wahab in mid-April opposing SB 79 as it was amended on March 5, 2025. Lee referred to what’s been called the “Crackerbox Era” in Long Beach, when the city allowed a great deal of up-zoning that would soon bring unintended consequences – traffic, parking problems, crime and garbage buildup – starting in the late 1980s.

Lee presented five arguments in opposition to SB 79: the up-zoning method does not increase housing supply or affordability; it raises land values and makes housing more expensive; bus transit is an unstable basis for building on 50-plus-year-old structures; the clash between gentrification and displacement, with transit riders being mostly lower-income families who can’t afford to live in these structures; and that it’s a “major usurping of the authority of local jurisdictions.”

Lee also expressed concern that the methodology explaining California’s growth in recent years, that’s being used as the basis of other housing bills that have been adopted in California, has been incorrect. Numbers produced by the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) in 2017 have been repeatedly challenged. In 2024, a bill passed but AB 2485, the bill to adjust the Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA) process, died in the Appropriations Committee when that methodology was challenged, Lee wrote.

Livable California, a statewide non-profit organization committed to the development of affordable housing and fair treatment of cities, in late March, sent a letter to Wahab opposing SB 79 as it was amended on March 5, 2025. The letter was signed by Rick Hall, president of the organization on behalf of its board of directors.

“This is yet another major statewide up-zoning bill. Up-zoning has not, despite eight years of passing similar bills, been successful in significantly increasing housing supply or housing affordability. Instead, this bill is another major give-away to market-rate developers. It gives them the choice of properties for market-rate profits without requiring any affordability,” Hall’s letter states.

One of the core problems that SB 79 would bring is that it means these projects would be approved “ministerially.” That would mean major cities could lose land use control over much of their land, according to Livable California. Mapping used in this proposed legislation shows a wide radius being used around transit stops, which means cities would lose control of whole neighborhoods and communities. It would also have increased associated infrastructure costs that the cities, and not the state, would need to pay for.

Exemptions should have been included in the bill, the organization says. Land use for light industrial and commercial use that are essential for a city’s economic development and job growth should be accounted for; along with factoring in historic sites and single-family neighborhoods, two other factors that are very important to residents, business owners and city officials, in Long Beach and across the state.

Anyone who was living in Long Beach during the 1970s and 1980s – or who has heard stories told about these times – knows that the city was going through some of the historic shifts seen across the country. It could be referred to as “urban blight” or “urban decay” and it was often described as being dictated by abandoned buildings, vacant lots, a decline in property values, rising crime and a lack of commitment by the city to upgrade the condition of streets, parks and other public venues. Many residents were leaving these cities to move away for jobs and what they hoped would be a better quality of life.

Local stories would include what happened to the historic Long Beach Pike, that finally had its lease ended in 1979; the failed Long Beach Plaza downtown shopping mall that opened in 1982 and closed in 1999; and closure of the Long Beach Naval Station and Naval Shipyard in the 1990s. Revitalization of Pine St. in the 1980s started a restoration of the downtown similar to what was happening in Bixby Knolls and Belmont Shore – and in cities across the U.S. during that time-period.

Those building developments, along with commitment to a certain amount of historic preservation and improving the quality and safety of public spaces, continues in Long Beach – along with nearby cities well known by residents such as Carson, Torrance, Los Angeles, Anaheim, Santa Ana, Huntington Beach, San Diego, San Jose, San Francisco and Las Vegas.

But while some residents look forward to attending concerts at the upcoming Long Beach Amphitheater and seeing continuing city improvements, others express deep concerns about overdevelopment, crowding, traffic, lack of parking and having their charming, accessible neighborhoods overrun by too many new residents and their visitors. City and state housing, transportation and economic development policies must factor in all these issues and concerns.

This bill in Sacramento presents an opportunity for City of Long Beach planners to map out the potential impact of SB 79, which could provide vital information for the City Council to take a position on it.

Jon LeSage is a resident of Long Beach and a veteran business media reporter and editor. You can reach him at jtlesage1@yahoo.com.