The Los Gatos Town Council hit another stumbling block in finalizing its Housing Element.
Council members discussed a series of changes to the document at a town council meeting Tuesday night, with plans to vote on the document’s approval at a later meeting. That approval will pave the way for the state’s department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) to certify the document outlining all housing developments across all income levels to be built in the town for the next eight years.
The council voted 3-2, with councilmembers Rob Moore and Maria Ristow voting no, to add language to the document limiting development of small multi-unit housing in historic areas and near evacuation routes and public transit stops.
Councilmember Rob Moore argued that discussing these changes is unnecessarily slowing the process, and said that the council can still implement restrictions on where housing can be built after the Housing Element has been approved.
“I think we have a Housing Element that is in good condition right now, and we are starting to undermine it,” Moore said. “I have heard loud and clear from our community that they would like to pass a Housing Element, and this is going to hurt that process.”
Councilmember Matthew Hudes argued that it could be more difficult to limit where housing can be built once the Housing Element is approved.
“The purpose of this is to develop some language that we think is reasonable for the town, and then to take that language to HCD and find out if it’s acceptable,” Hudes said at the meeting.
Once the council votes to submit the Housing Element to the HCD, the town will enter a seven-day period of public review, after which the state has up to two months to respond to the town with its evaluation. If the HCD finds the document aligns with state law, the council can adopt the document formally in the early summer, Moore said in an email.
The town council last voted to approve the Housing Element at a special meeting in February 2023 to meet the state’s deadline and avoid the possibility of developers proposing housing projects that are beyond the town’s control, while still maintaining the ability to revise the document to align with the state’s requests.
Town officials have been working since 2021 to draft a Housing Element through the Housing Element Advisory Board, a body whose term they voted to extend in mid-January.
