Op-ed: Inclusionary for who? The quiet re-redlining of San Jose’s housing policy

San Jose is preparing to pull a slick move with its housing policy, and if you’re Black, brown or low‑income, you’re not supposed to notice until you’re already gone.

The city is revising its inclusionary housing ordinance, branding the changes as “modernization” and “workforce housing.” But beneath the language, it’s the same old story: Open the doors wider to higher‑income, mostly white and affluent Asian households, and quietly close them on Black, Latino and low-income Asian families.

The original policy tied private development to the public good. When developers built new market‑rate housing, they had to include affordable homes, some as low as 30% or 50% of the area median income (AMI) or pay fees that helped finance deeply affordable homes elsewhere. It wasn’t perfect, but it at least tried to ensure that new development included racial diversity and people at the bottom of the income ladder.

The new plan flips this logic. It shifts the focus to a “workforce” band of roughly 70% to 110% of AMI, solidly middle income and close to what the private market already serves. Even worse, the option that allowed developers to meet their full requirement by setting aside 10% of homes at 30% AMI, a narrow but crucial path for extremely low‑income households, has been erased. In its place, developers get easier paths, thinner obligations and fewer fees, while those in deepest need are shut out.

Once you look at who actually lives at different income levels in San Jose, the racial impact is obvious. Black and Latino households are more likely to live below 50% AMI, devoting a crushing share of income to rent and living one emergency away from losing housing. White and many Asian households tend to cluster at or above 100% AMI. Vietnamese, Pacific Islander and some Southeast Asian communities face deep poverty and instability, but overall, the higher up the AMI ladder you go, the more it tilts toward white and higher‑income Asian residents.

By redefining “affordable” as 70% to 110% AMI, the city is drawing a line above where many Black and Latino families actually live and much closer to where higher‑income white and Asian households sit. Families under 50% AMI, disproportionately Black and brown, simply will not qualify for many of these new “affordable” homes. Meanwhile, households in the 70% to 110% band are already better served by the private market and may not find a small subsidy worth annual recertification hassles. A program that was initially sold as a tool for those at the bottom is being reshaped to serve those in the middle.

Even the supposed “compromise” of raising the affordable floor from 30% to 65% AMI would wipe out the few homes reachable for households at 0% to 30% AMI, stripping away options for thousands of Black extremely low‑income renter households in the San Jose metro. For Black households between 30% and 50% of AMI, shifting the focus up means being squeezed from both directions: too poor for “workforce” homes, no longer prioritized for truly affordable ones. That means more overcrowded, substandard housing, chronic rent burden and heightened risk of displacement or homelessness.

The quiet removal of the 30% AMI option tells the truth. Those limited affordable homes were often the only way an elder on Social Security, a low‑wage worker or someone stabilizing after homelessness could live in an amenity‑rich building near transit, jobs and schools. With that pathway gone and nothing like it replacing it, there is no real mechanism left for extremely low‑income residents to be included in those projects. For Black residents, roughly 2% to 3% of the population, but about 19% to 20% of the unhoused, this is not a minor adjustment; it is the door slamming shut.

All of this moves forward despite the city’s own Racial and Social Equity framework and Ordinance No. 31076, which states:

“Whereas in implementing Section 608 of the City Charter, the City Council intends to adopt and maintain an Equity Values and Standards Policy, which establishes a framework for advancing racial and social equity, and which shall apply equity standards to the conduct of members of the City Council, City Boards, Commissions, decision-making bodies, and City employees.”

Advancing these housing changes without a serious analysis of their impact on Black, brown and low‑income Asian communities ignores that commitment and hollows “equity” out into a slogan.

If San Jose is serious about equity, it cannot keep writing rules that look race‑neutral on paper but function like a new kind of redlining in practice. Policy must account for who it harms, not just who it helps. Equity is a practice of fairness, and fairness demands that those most impacted are considered, engaged and given a real chance to remain in the city they call home.

Sean Allen is president of the NAACP San Jose/Silicon Valley. Richard Konda is executive director of the Asian Law Alliance. Raul A. Colunga is co-chair of La Raza Roundtable. Chuck Cantrell is host of the “Dying to Stay Here” video and podcast series and a columnist for San José Spotlight.