For the first time, leaders across the entire community told the City of Sonoma they want and need more homes in the City that more people can afford.

Our advocacy with the united voice of the Sonoma Valley Collaborative Council and community members has been effective and inspiring. We are proud to announce that the Housing Element adopted by Sonoma’s City Council on January 31 is by far the most pro-housing plan ever in the City of Sonoma! 

This Housing Element will govern how affordable homes are preserved and built in the City for the next 8 years. 

Thank you to the many people–especially Sonoma Valley Collaborative’s members and community members who shared your housing stories–for uniting in support of Sonoma Valley Collaborative’s set of housing goals! 

Sonoma Valley Collaborative advocated for 23 housing affordability policies, in many cases writing proposed language that the City adopted word-for-word in the Housing Element. All of these policies align with the consensus our members came to over several months at the outset of our work on housing affordability in Sonoma Valley: to work together across boundaries to increase, improve, and preserve housing that is affordable for people who live or work in the Valley, within already developed areas, to create diverse, safe, complete neighborhoods.

The 25+ community leaders on the Sonoma Valley Collaborative Council made this commitment understanding that housing is the most pressing cross-sector issue in Sonoma Valley. They met monthly to create a housing platform that everyone could support. Then, Sonoma Valley Collaborative staff crafted policies and organized the advocacy that helped get them adopted. Of the 23 policy requests we made—designed to preserve existing affordable housing, protect tenants, protect open space from sprawl, and make the City of Sonoma more affordable—18 are now part of the City of Sonoma’s Housing Element. 

These pro-housing commitments in the City’s Housing Element might not be there without Sonoma Valley Collaborative’s advocacy:

• Making Sonoma appeal to nonprofit housing developers like MidPen and Burbank who can build attractive, all-affordable projects like Alta Madrone and the cottages next to Vintage House

  • A promise to consider, during the upcoming General Plan update, increasing building heights and reducing setbacks along Sonoma’s main roads (W Napa and Broadway). The current limit is two stories!

  • More coordination with nonprofit housing developers, with specific outcomes like funding proposals and project development plans 

• When affordable units are required as part of an otherwise market-rate development, now those units will be affordable in perpetuity.

• Protections for renters against arbitrary evictions and sudden rent hikes

• A registry of subsidized and low-cost homes and apartments to make sure they remain affordable

• Faster deadlines for many of the promised programs

• Acknowledgement that Sonoma’s housing history includes racial exclusion. This matters because housing law requires redressing discriminatory practices.

• A program for putting housing on underutilized commercial parcels like shopping centers.

• A feasibility study for a tax or other disincentive on empty homes

• All new construction will have doorways that wheelchairs can get through.

• A commitment to seek the state’s Prohousing Designation, which would unlock state and federal funding for more and better homes

Some policies could bring more affordable housing to the City but still do not appear in the Housing Element. All of these policies are fair game for incorporating into the City’s next General Plan:

• Reducing parking requirements. One parking space can add $20,000 to a project’s cost. The City gives precious land to cars that should be used for walkways, homes, trees, or transit.

• We’ll have to wait longer to see W. Napa St. and Broadway allow the taller, tighter mixed-use buildings that grace so many European towns.

• 65% of the City is still zoned for single-family homes. Luckily, state law allows these lots to have one attached Accessory Dwelling Unit (ADU, or granny unit) and one detached ADU. But small “plexes” of 5 or 12 units are still disallowed in most of the City. Allowing small plexes could allow more families and working people to Sonoma’s neighborhoods and spur more creative, compact housing designs.