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Plans for a major retail center redevelopment in West San Jose are on track for final approval. At a Wednesday San Jose Planning Commission meeting, members approved the 10.76 acre mixed-use development known as El Paseo de Saratoga in a 9-1-1 vote. The project will demolish existing commercial buildings to pave the way for four high-rise...
Rent burden growing worse in Santa Clara County
The rent burden grew heavier in Santa Clara County during the second year of the COVID-19 pandemic, and there’s no sign it will get any lighter this year. Rents in Santa Clara County increased 6.3% between the end of 2020 and end of 2021, according to a recent report from California Housing Partnership, which provides housing...
South Bay land trust saves residents from displacement
For more than a year after Tafhari Siyani Benjamin Franklin moved into a fourplex on Reed Street in San Jose, the Navy veteran’s clothes were still in bins and bags. He’d watched as developments sprung up nearby and worried the property—home to formerly unhoused veterans—would be sold next. If that happened, he’d be unable to...
San Jose is not jumping aboard the SB 9 lawsuit train
One San Jose official hoped to join Southern California cities in suing the state over recent housing legislation, but her efforts didn’t go far. On Wednesday, Councilmember and mayoral candidate Dev Davis asked some of her City Council colleagues to support a recent lawsuit against Senate Bill 9, which allows homeowners of single-family lots to divide...
San Jose wants hundreds of short-term homes, only 76 in the pipeline
San Jose has a lofty goal to triple its number of temporary homes by the end of this year, but progress is slow as the city has only broken ground on one development so far. Last September, Mayor Sam Liccardo and several city councilmembers introduced a plan called “Compassionate San Jose—Bold Housing Solutions” with the...
San Jose school district wants to subsidize teacher housing
San Jose residents may be asked to support subsidized housing for Alum Rock Union School District teachers on the November ballot. The East San Jose school district is exploring whether creating below-market housing for its workers is possible. If officials find it is, the district will look to voters to fund the roughly $27 million...
UPDATE: Santa Clara County buys land for more affordable housing
Santa Clara County is acquiring more land to build hundreds of affordable homes for disadvantaged residents. On Tuesday, the Board of Supervisors voted unanimously to purchase four properties in San Jose, Santa Clara and Morgan Hill, which will cost the county more than $17 million and provide 324 apartments. “I really want to just acknowledge...
VTA bets big on housing in Santa Clara County
Transit comes first at VTA, but the San Jose agency sees a big future in residential real estate. Earlier this month, VTA announced several significant updates about housing projects being built on agency-owned land, also known as transit-oriented developments (TODs). On March 9, California invested $29 million to build a 569-unit housing project near Tamien...
Silicon Valley residents say state ‘death tax’ should go
An anti-tax movement is working in Silicon Valley and elsewhere in California to gut a law that taxes transfers of inherited property. An estimated 8,000 volunteers for the nonprofit Howard Jarvis Taxpayers Association have been collecting signatures across California to put a measure on the November ballot to repeal part of Prop. 19. Approved in...
Silicon Valley, state renters struggling to get relief
Barriers to COVID-related rent relief have placed thousands of renters in Santa Clara County and throughout California in desperate circumstances as they struggle to avoid eviction. A new survey documents common problems facing tenants in Santa Clara County and 26 other counties in California, using data provided by 58 organizations and partners that help tenants...