Assembly Standing Committee on Business and Professions

All right.

Good morning, everyone. Welcome to today. To today's joint convening of the Assembly Committee on Business and Professions and the Assembly Committee on Housing and Community Development. This morning, we will be discussing the governor's 2025 reorganization plan, which proposes to split the business consumer services and housing agency and the two new state agencies.

Today's discussion will consist of two panels, one for each new agency proposed to be created, which will each feature a presentation from agency and department leadership, followed by an opportunity for questions or comments from committee members.

Then, following each of the two panels, we will take public comment from other stakeholders here in the room, limited to no more than two minutes of testimony per organization.

As chair of the BNP Committee, I'm looking forward to today's discussion and to hearing how the governor's reorganization plan will ensure our licensing entities have the resources they need to protect the public while the state continues to focus on addressing our urgent housing and homelessness crisis.

Before we begin with today's sunset review agenda, I'd like to offer my colleagues any chance for opening remarks. I know my colleagues will have lots of thoughts later on in the hearing, but any opening remarks? Chair Rubio, Chair of the Governmental Organization Committee, please.

Thank you, Mr. Chair. First, I want to thank the Assemblymember, Assemblymember Berman and Haney, for hosting this important informational hearing. I look forward to learning more about the government, the governor's reorganization plan, particularly how it would enable a more focused leadership enhanced program. When I was looking through what this department does, I was floored.

No wonder we need to have this meeting. It's just really huge task that you have in front of you. And I'm looking forward to making sure that we do what's best for the department so that we can facilitate progress both in many areas, especially in housing. So thank you for allowing me to be here.

I'm really eager to have a deeper understanding of the key components of the GRP and the reasons behind the implementation. And hopefully we can establish some measurable benefits and goals for the committee. So thank you, Mr. Chair. I appreciate the opportunity to be here.

Thank you, Assemblymember Rubio. Mr. Haney's gonna take the bulk of this hearing, so we'll get started with our first portion of today's hearing, which is focused on the governor's proposed Business and Consumer Services Agency. And so on the agenda for this discussion, we have Tomiquia Moss, Secretary of the Business, Consumer Services and Housing Agency.

Kimberly Kirchmeyer, Director of the Department of Consumer Affairs. Nicole Elliott, Director of the Department of Cannabis Control. Frank Robles, Chief Deputy Director of the Department of Alcohol, the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control, and K. And KC Mohseni, Commissioner of the Department of Financial Protection and Innovation. Thank you all for joining us this morning.

So Secretary Moss will let you kick us off.

All right. There it is. Good morning, Chair. Thank you, members of the committee for inviting us to speak today on the governor's reorganization plan. My name is Tomiquia Moss. I'm the Secretary of our Business, Consumer Services and Housing Agency.

And you know, it feels like such an important time to come before you today as Californians are facing great growing uncertainty and really wanting to demonstrate the state's ability to rise to that moment, to meet the moment of uncertainty with strategies like this. So thank you so much for having us today.

This proposal emerges from that commitment and lays the groundwork for lasting and meaningful change. The reorganization is our opportunity to align state government in ways that meets the urgency of today's challenges and sustains our progress for the long term. For this portion of the hearing, I am joined by four of my amazing department leaders.

Director Kim Kirchmeyer from the Department of Consumer Affairs. Director Nicole Elliott, Department of Cannabis Control. Commissioner KC Mohseni from the Department of Financial Protection and Innovation, and Chief Deputy Frank Robles from the Department of Alcoholic Beverage and Control. I'll pass the mic to them. Thank you.

Well, good morning and thank you, Secretary, and thank you, chairs and members, for having me here today. My name is Kimberly Kirchmeyer. I'm actually Director of the Department of Consumer Affairs. The department is in full support of the reorganization proposal.

This proposal will allow a stronger focus on consumer protection issues, which will help the department continue to advance important changes and achievements made by the department, including expanding public participation opportunities, using hybrid formats during meetings, releasing the enlightened license report that the DCA did, identifying licensing best practices to reduce application processing timelines and support workforce entry and expanding online services for applications, renewals and complaints, which has enhanced user experience and saved costs.

The department believes that this doesn't dedicated consumer protection agency will ensure that consumer protection issues impacting Californians receive the attention they deserve through a focused business and consumer services agency. I look forward to discussing this more and I am happy to answer any of your questions. Thank you.

Thank you.

Good morning and thank you for the opportunity to join you all here today. I'm Nicole Elliott, Director of the Department of Cannabis Control. Since 2021, the department has prioritized consumer protections while focusing on streamlining the licensing and regulatory framework and enforcing against illicit operations.

This work has resulted in numerous regulatory packages, thousands of licensing actions and substantial enforcement outcomes, all to build a safer and more sustainable cannabis market that benefits all Californians by creating two distinct agencies, one focused on business and consumer services and one on housing and homelessness.

This proposal before you will mean that consumer protection and business regulation is no longer entangled with hugely important but competing priorities, resulting in stronger consumer protections, more streamlined oversight, and greater agility in addressing market complexities with the swiftness legal cannabis requires.

As California continues its long term efforts to transition our cannabis market, success requires this type of focused capacity and deliberative action. Thank you and I look forward to answering your questions today.

Thank you. Good morning and thank you for the opportunity to speak with you today. I'm KC Mohseni, Commissioner for the Department of Financial Protection and Innovation. DFPI regulates a wide variety of financial services and professionals working to protect consumers and in the marketplace through effective supervision and regulation.

As a department that recently went through our own transformation, I am excited to envision the department as part of the new Business and Consumer Services Agency. I believe that this proposal will provide the dedicated leadership and focus that necessary to push forward our shared mission of consumer protection and effective regulation to even greater heights.

Thank you and I look forward to answering your questions.

Thank you very much.

Good morning and thank you. I am Frank Robles, Chief Deputy Director of the Department of Alcoholic Beverage Control. We are in our 70th year since being established in the state constitution. This department protects Californians by providing equitable service and public safety through licensing, education and enforcement.

One of our core values as embedded in our strategic plan and mission statement is innovation. We embrace emerging change for continuous improvement. We see this proposal as an opportunity to do just that, providing necessary change to better enable our ability to improve and serve the public. Thank you and I look forward to answering any questions.

Thank you.

All right, so I'd like to maybe start by how we got here and then I'll move into more detail about the plan and how the plan will uplift our important work in our regulatory and consumer protection space.

First slide. Since BCSH was started and created in 2012, the state has made significant improvements in our work, passed many laws that you heard from my colleagues, and has changed and expanded the impact of BCSH across California.

Not only have our responsibilities related to coordinating and implementing homelessness and housing policy grown exponentially, but we also provide oversight to an expanding 4 million professionals and businesses licensees across the state of California. Even when this agency was created in 2012, there was a concern that the disparate function and policy focus could impact the agency's effectiveness.

And while I am incredibly proud to have represented this agency for the last year and a half, I do believe that this organization, this agency has outgrown its structure. And that's why we're coming before you today. This proposal will reorganize BCSH into two agencies.

The California Housing and Homelessness Agency, dedicated to addressing our full spectrum of California's housing and homeless needs. The Business Consumer Services Agency, which will be dedicated to providing effective and efficient business and professional regulation and consumer protection. Now, although we propose to create two new entities, we have worked incredibly well together.

We know how to collaborate, we know how to align. We know how to work in partnership. And that work will continue. But what the opportunity to separate these agencies provides is it allows us to become much more specialized and focused in our leadership and delivery of services and programs across both agencies.

The Business Consumer Services Agency will contain our departments that regulate some of California's most essential and visible industries, furthering public safety, consumer trust, and economic stability through education, licensing, and enforcement.

Establishing a dedicated Business Consumer Services Agency will give these departments the focused leadership and support that they need to quickly adapt to the industry's changes, strengthen our oversight over time, and protect Californians. Both our industries and people deserve nothing less. Now, this change will provide the space necessary for BCSA to work within its departments.

These are some of the goals that we think this reorganization provides. Enhanced licensing and enforcement functions. It will improve and modernize technology and efficiency in our regulatory functions. And it'll strengthen our oversight for all of our work. Our goal is to continue to.

To provide the incredible work that our departments do today, but with a labor or not a labor, but a laser focus on higher efficiency and outcomes as. As a specialized agency. These efforts will support economic growth through our regulated industries and ensure that Californians can trust the professionals and businesses that we license.

The proposal will see the Business Consumer Services Agency come online next July, providing us ample time to perform the necessary administrative work and give the new agency the foundation it needs through change management and the goal of setting up all of our employees for success.

I truly believe that this proposal will give our consumer protections and business regulations departments the dedication and focus that they deserve. Not only to uplift the important work that we do every day. It's not sexy work, but it's critical work. But it will help them achieve and stay focused on their mission and their goals.

We are happy to answer any questions that you have, chair and committee members. Thank you.

Thank you, Secretary Moss. With that, I will make sure that I follow my agenda and open up to colleagues for any questions or comments that they have. None. Yes. Assemblymember Rubio.

Thank you so much for that. And I know we had a conversation last week, Secretary Moss, I really appreciate it, but. And through that conversation, I was just listening to all of the work that you all are responsible for. I was just overwhelmed with the conversation.

I can't imagine that the amount of work that you have to do on a daily basis to make sure everything is coordinated. First of all, I appreciate all of you and the departments for handling this. I had really no idea until we had this conversation and looking at the paperwork today.

I think it was needed a long time ago, not just today. Thank you for the proposal again. I look forward to working with you to figure out how we can best support you as the legislature.

Again, the other thing that was interesting to me is I had questions and I'll ask those questions here, but how do you coordinate with the legislature? Because we all love. I think there's what, 3,000 bills this year, and I imagine that a third of them were probably housing bills. And I don't feel like there is any coordination.

So I commend you for taking all of our bills and trying to implement them. But I think this will streamline some of that work. I think the message for you today and for all of us, and all of us, I mean, my colleagues here, but I think the whole entire legislature is.

We do have to be very mindful as to, you know, the, the bills that we propose and pass because ultimately you're all responsible for taking care of them. So again, thank you.

And just a quick correction for the record. I know that one Scott Wiener housing bill feels like a thousand housing bills, but it's. It's. It's a little less. But it feels like that sometimes. Love you, Scott. Any additional questions or comments from colleagues? Just a quick question. Thank you everybody for being here this morning.

And I appreciate the governor's intent to create agencies more specifically focused on the mission of their departments.

And Secretary Moss, as you alluded to and as Chair Rubio alluded to as well, during the prior reorg that created BCSH, the legislature raised concerns that the work of the agency would be a little too expansive, a little too diverse, and this appears to have become the case.

My one question that we had a chance to briefly talk about yesterday is mainly logistical because historically the agency has been funded through a pro rata assessment on its departments. And since most of the licensing entities we oversee are funded through fees charged to licensees.

There is a little bit of concern that those fees will need to be increased to support the infrastructure costs of a new agency and would love to hear how you all intend to address that.

Thank you for the question. Chair yes, we do not we recognize how onerous these fees are for our licensees and want to make sure that we are not burdening our licensees with our intent to provide them with more efficiency and effectiveness.

And so we do not anticipate any of our departments raising fees as a result of of this reorganization. And in fact, I think we have been so intentional around the reorganization of keeping our pro rata not only at a steady state, but even finding ways to reduce that burden.

And so we are incredibly focused on making sure that we're not adding any additional burden to our licensees. And in fact, this, this is a resource for them in the end.

Very much appreciate that focus and I know that'll come to a relief to the to the hundreds of thousands of folks who are licensed and are dealing more and more every day with just affordability issues at large.

And so anything we can do to help lower the cost of living in California, working in California, that's all the better. I know we had some new colleagues join, wanted to see if anybody. Assembly Member Quirk-Silva.

Good morning and I apologize for not hearing the opening remarks. We have heard this in my Budget Committee and we had some pretty specific questions on the timeline. I see a chart here on the timeline I know that you presented to the Little Hoover Commission.

So what I'd like you to do is share what their thoughts are and is this timeline going to match up with our budget? Because that's been the concern since January. So if you could speak to that.

Absolutely. Good morning. Good to see you. Yes. So with the May revision coming out tomorrow, the reorganization will be a part of the re the May revise. And so it'll give the legislature and the Little Hoover Commission time to opine on the fiscal impacts of the reorganization.

And just to say we had two days of hearings with the Little Hoover Commission where all of our departments and staff were ready and willing to participate in those conversations.

And you know, I think that they, like you, asked the right questions, very interested in the cost of the reorganization, very interested in why do it now, what is the sort of gain and wisdom around that. And I think we had a very robust discussion.

We had a lot of folks who were able to, throughout the testimony, throughout the two days were really able to give a more broad perspective outside of the administration, external stakeholders around how we have listened and incorporated a lot of stakeholder feedback in the design of this reorganization and how this is the first step.

This is not the panacea. There are no silver bullets for improving our housing finance system, for the expanded work that our consumer protections departments do.

But this is our, the state's effort to do what we can with the tools in our toolbox to make it easier for Californians to get into homes faster and cheaper and for our consumers to feel like we are stewarding their protections through the services and programs that we deliver.

So I think that they were very productive conversations in terms of the timeline. They are debating even today around the reorganization plan. And we'll be providing a recommendation to you all within the next 20 days. And then you all, of course will have 60 days to review the reorganization plan.

A follow up. And I appreciate that and I know you're working on that. But we have repeated that even if this report comes out in 20 days, it's not matching up to our budget which needs to be completed by June 15th. So even if they have the 60 days which going to be past that budget.

So it means that when the governor drops tomorrow with this reorg, it really has not given us the ideal time, but we'll let that go because it appears that this is just going to move forward the way it started. And to be honest, I respect all of you, but I'm not happy about it.

This should have been done earlier so that we were on the right timeline.

That being said, and I asked these questions before, which is when this reorg occurs, are we going to be housing the HCD people in the HCD building and the consumer affairs people in another building because as you know, we also have a return to work which again, again, and this is to Mr.

Governor, is not ideal because we do not have enough stations or placements for them. We don't have enough parking. So how are we going to be assured that if we are splitting this, these organizations that they're actually going to be housed?

Because I'm assuming that if you want to house people together for collaboration and all of those things, that they're going to be in the same place?

No, it's a, it's a great question. And we do not anticipate any additional space needs through this reorganization. We've been really thoughtful about building out the May Lee Complex where HCD is housed. DCA and our other departments are in their current locations.

And so as I said, we've been incredibly thoughtful about the sort of competing priorities that this administration has to get this reorganization done, but also for our return to office executive order. And so we do not anticipate any additional costs around office space. We.

But housing people will be with housing people or HCD. They won't be over in that building and over in that building, they will be housed together, if you want to say it that way.

Well, certainly the design of the reorganization for the Housing and Homelessness Agency is that all of our programs and, and, and efforts will be coordinated under the agency. Our HCD and CALHFA today are in different buildings. So we're not likely to move those folks because of our space constraints.

But the, the, the intent of this structural reorganization is to better align our work along the full housing and homelessness continuum. The Interagency Council on Homelessness folks are now housed at the May Lee Plaza with Department of Real Estate and HCD. So those folks are already consolidated.

But again, I think as much as it's about where people are physically located, it is also about the leadership and vision of integrating their work. And that really is what this reorganization speaks to.

Sorry, one last. Because the issue is when we're asking thousands of state employees to return to work. And some of them voice, which I know is not this issue, but there's an intersection here, which is they're voicing that if I'm going to return to work just to do a zoom for the building next door.

I thought that part of this reorganization was to house housing people together. And if that it sounds like they're not all going to be together, why that's a big deal to me is because then you're still going to be doing zooms and you're still going to have to make room meetings and conference rooms.

So it seems to me a lot of effort, and I'm still, you know, I'm trying to see the vision. I really am. But if part of the idea is, is to split these organizations to have this very focused housing model and you're still not together by the end of this, it's hard for me to understand that.

Go ahead.

No, please.

No, by all means.

I guess I would just say to that. Assemblymember, we are really thoughtful about our space constraints. We have had them prior, we have them now. And we want to make sure we're not adding any additional fiscal impacts for this reorganization by relocating staff that currently have office space.

And we want to make sure that every single employee within our departments understands the mission and vision of this reorganization, the intent of aligning and integrating our programs, our work streams, our leadership, our ability to streamline all of the work that you all have been doing over these last many years.

Those are the shared outcomes that no matter where an employee is situated, those are the mandates of their job.

And so that is what I look forward to stewarding that leadership and expectation that no matter if you're on a zoom call or if you're in person next to one another, we expect the coordination, alignment and outcomes of a united and integrated department and agency. And that is the spirit of this reorganization.

Thank you very much. Any additional questions or comments from colleagues? I have one last question. How does the BCSH legal unit intend to ensure that regulations are reviewed and processed promptly to avoid delays in implementation?

It's a great question. Assemblymember. We. Our legal affairs across all of the BCSH departments are intact.

We have an internal system that has our legal departments working together with agency legal counsel to make sure that we are bringing regulatory packages, reviewing those in a timely fashion, ensuring that they have the public comment and all the other statutory requirements that are required.

We see no disruption in that current practice and look forward to making sure that that infrastructure is. Is a part of the reorganization as well.

Great, thank you very much. With that, I want to thank the witnesses on our first panel for being here this morning. We'll now be hearing from any members of the public who wish to speak in regards to the proposed Business and Consumer Services Agency. As a reminder, each witness will have no more than two minutes.

Any witnesses of the public who would like to come and speak to this first agenda item, please.

Dennis Loper. On behalf of the California Beer and Beverage Distributors Association, we support the reorg. Thank you.

Thank you.

Chris Walker. On behalf of the California Craft Brewers Association, we support the reorganization. Thank you.

Appreciate it.

Tim Schmelzer representing Wine Institute, also in support of the reorg. Thank you.

David Krieger here on behalf of United Wholesale Mortgage. We also support this reorganization. Thank you so much.

Appreciate it. Thank you. Any additional, please come on up.

Good morning. Nora Kostra with EAH Housing and the Sacramento Housing Alliance in support of the reorg. Thank you.

Thank you. With that, we're going to turn it over to the main event. I'll turn it over to my co chair, Assemblymember Matt Haney, who will be leading the second panel on today's agenda.

Thank you so much. Mr. Chair and Members, welcome to the second half of this hearing where we're going to be focusing on the new proposed housing and homelessness agency. We'll again have Secretary Moss and she'll be joined by a set of other folks and then we'll have a couple panels to follow. As we heard, the role of the state in enforcing housing policy has increased significantly over the past few years.

My colleague Ms. Rubio noted the many, many hundreds of bills that have been introduced on housing this year and that has been the case now for a number of years, which has enhanced the role of housing, the Housing Accountability Unit, and also in various ways increased the funding and the support and the responsibility that you all have in housing.

Separating housing and homelessness from consumer services can allow for a more focused approach to each of these important issues. We know that the crux of the reorganization proposal for housing comes down to the creation of a new unit, a Housing and Finance Committee, that is supposed to streamline our state funding programs which are now housed in four different entities.

This proposal also mirrors legislation prioritized by the Assembly and AB 519 offered by Assemblywoman Schiavo that requires all of the housing entities to form a working group to figure out how to create a consolidated application for all state housing funding and a coordinated review of applications.

We have heard in our Housing Committee and in the Assembly for years now that the complexity of applying for state funds can create challenges to be able to deliver on the critical affordable housing that our communities need. According to the Turner Center, on average, affordable housing developments need 3.5 sources of funding and some need 11 sources.

And each new funding source can add over $20,000 to the cost of each affordable unit. Anything that we can do to make it quicker and cheaper and more streamlined to build affordable housing is most welcome, as well as to ensure that our existing housing laws are effectively implemented and enforced.

I look forward to hearing from Secretary Moss and I I know that my colleagues who are here on from the Housing Committee and other committees are as well. And so I will turn it back over to you, Secretary Moss.

Thank you, Chair, and thank you again for the opportunity to present this part of our plan to you.

For those of you who are just joining us, Tomiquia Moss, Secretary of BCSH and prior to this job, I spent about two decades of my career working in the Bay Area to address our affordability and housing crisis across the state.

You know, too many of our neighbors do not have a safe and affordable place to call home, which has really inspired me to come and work with this Administration and with all of you to figure out how could we improve the state's role in addressing this crisis.

So I first want to say I believe that our housing crisis is solvable and it requires more though than short term fixes.

And we, and what we're proposing is really some structural changes that can last and gives us an opportunity to build on all of the incredible work that you all have done over the last many years, as well as this Administration.

We know that centralizing housing and homelessness functions improves administrative efficiency, accelerates the construction and preservation of affordable housing, and it maximizes our limited state investments. This proposal builds on a structure that will accelerate our progress toward our California housing goals through simplifying our compliance procedures and using limited state resources much more efficiently.

I am now joined by another set of amazing leaders. Gustavo Velasquez, our Director of the, Director of the Department of Housing and Community Development, Rebecca Franklin, our Chief Deputy at the California Housing Finance Agency, and I would love for them to offer a few remarks. Gustavo.

This one. Okay, thank you. Secretary. Good morning, everyone. Thank you for allowing me to speak with you today. I'm Gustavo Velasquez, Director of the Department of Housing and Community Development.

Under my leadership at HCD for the past five years, the Department has provided funding for about 60,000 new affordable homes, help local governments plan to accommodate 2.5 million new homes and enforce California's robust housing laws, thank you to all of you, to create more housing opportunities.

I am immensely proud of the work that my colleagues at HCD have accomplished and believe that creating this new agency, the California Housing and Homelessness Agency, will provide the right structure to our momentum and our progress towards housing and homelessness.

Creating this agency will provide dedicated leadership and focus on housing and homelessness at the Cabinet level, which will reinforce this administration's work across the entire housing continuum from homelessness to homeownership. Collectively, these changes strengthen HCD's ability to be nimble to focus its work on delivering improved outcomes for Californians.

For example, on data collection and reporting, which is necessary to make the best decision making and allow the state to give housing and homelessness the ongoing attention that these critical issue areas deserved. Thank you and I look forward to this discussion.

Good morning. My name. Good morning Assembly Members and thank you. My name is Rebecca Franklin. I am the Chief Deputy Director at the California Housing Finance Agency, also known as CalHFA.

Since 1975 we have brought people home supporting the needs to low and moderate income renters and home buyers by providing financing and programs with a focus on equity. We invest in diverse communities with financing programs that help Californians have a place to call home.

Creating a structure that is intentionally built to facilitate this work through focused leadership, streamline and transparent decision making and effective use of state dollars is why we are here today. I believe this proposal will help CalHFA work towards achieving its vision seeing all Californians living in homes they can't afford.

I'm very excited to discuss this proposal with you today and I'm looking forward to answering all of your questions. Thank you.

Thank you. The California Housing and Homelessness Agency will provide a clear focus and leadership as you've heard, elevating our ability to drive focus to meeting our California housing and homelessness needs.

It will provide focus for the entire housing policy spectrum from implementing efforts to end and prevent homelessness as we've outlined in our Action three year Action Plan to advancing civil rights protections for all Californians.

The new agency will provide clear direction and guidance to ensure that all of its departments are working together across all of state government to meet our needs. The agency will be made up of the departments that play a central role in addressing California, California's housing and homelessness crisis.

The Department of Housing and Community Development, the Civil Rights Department, California Housing and Finance Agency and a proposed Housing Development and Finance Committee, Chair mentioned, designed to help the state aligned affordable housing resources. We believe that this structure will strengthen our entire housing ecosystem making targeted deliberate changes while minimizing disruption to to our staff and our stakeholders.

The Housing Development and Finance Committee is an integral piece to this proposal. It's really where I think the innovation comes from. It empowers us to promote transparency, coordination and the alignment of our state affordable housing resources. We know that longer timelines means higher costs and less housing.

To build affordable housing, a developer and you know the chair also mentioned this must combine multiple sources of funding to secure enough just to commence construction. When funding sources require separate processes with different timelines, it extends the work and the time that the developer must spend before they're even able to start construction.

While some studies vary, we know it's tens of thousands of dollars that are applied to each of these projects anytime that it takes a developer more time to create that capital stack. And although that feels administrative, that is significant in our ability to reach our 2.5 million home goal across the State of California.

By creating this Committee and aligning the agency's multif family housing affordable housing programs within will streamline the management and oversight of the housing funding across the state, decreasing award timelines, making it faster and less expensive to build affordable housing in our state.

Just to provide a few specifics about the Committee's role. Oversight. It will oversee the development of a single funding award process and streamline compliance management for all of our affordable housing programs. We will pursue more and greater program alignment and funding opportunities across all of state government as well as provide oversight for our affordable housing funding programs.

And it will also increase our transparency and predictability through a public decision making process and decision Something we heard over and over from our stakeholders Talk a little bit about the timeline. The proposal will be implemented over a phased and multi-year timeline.

Our goal, as I said earlier, is to complete the necessary changes as quickly as possible while acknowledging the need for careful and deliberate implementation.

In year one, we will prepare for the two agencies and the Housing Development and Finance Committee to become operational and that Committee will have an Executive Committee that will begin development of its recommendations for greater program alignment.

By July of 2026, BCSH will officially be replaced by our two newly focused agencies and the Housing and Finance Committee will become operational. In the second half of 2026 and beyond. There will be a phased transfer of staff and programs upon appropriation to the Housing Development and Finance Committee.

Over the last several years we have heard from many of our stakeholders, we've all read the reports, we've reviewed the analyses asking us for the change that we are recommending in this proposal today.

It provides each agency with the space to develop deep stakeholder relationships, improved opportunity for focused collaboration and it'll allow us for a faster response for any emerging issues that continually develop in our space. We can meet today's challenges with more focused increased effectiveness and most importantly, we can do that together with all of you.

Thank you so much and I look forward to answering any questions that you might have Chair.

Thank you so much for the presentation and also your responsiveness. I know that this comes as a result of as you've laid out a lot of feedback and input that's been given both from folks who rely on your services and access to funding and also from the Legislature and, and that this is really designed to respond to those set, set of, set, that set of feedback to be able to make all of this work better and more effectively to be able to accomplish your goals.

So I greatly appreciate that. Let me open it up to the Committee first and then if there are any questions then we are, we are also going to hear from a set of developer practitioners and so we'll hear from them as well. But I want to open it up to colleagues if there are any questions, questions or comments. Yes.

Excellent. Thank you Chair. So wonderful to see you all in a different space in a different forum. So these are my peeps from CalHFA. Question on the reorganization. I'm looking at the chart that has the Housing and Homeless Agency and then the five entities below it. CalHFA uniquely statutorily was separated outside of the state.

It has its own independent budget, rightfully so, so that people like ourselves, the legislators can't touch that money and it operates as an own entity bank. How would this work now that we are creating a new umbrella and legally, you know, for all the appropriate financial reasons, we were a tool away from the state.

Curious of the thoughts behind that and how this would all work.

Thank you for the question and good seeing you again. So we've been CalHFA has been working very closely with agency, the BCSH team, our legal teams have been collaborative throughout this process to ensure that CalHFA staff, statutorily financial separation from the general budget, et cetera, will remain intact. Our separate credit rating would not be affected.

Really what we're talking about with this proposal is looking at combining the issuance of the subsidies. So CalHFA's permanent lending practices, our single-family programs, the fact that we're governed by a board would all remain intact. There would be no change at that time.

Great. That makes a lot of sense and makes me feel better because I think that, you know, when we do get things right in the State of California, I think when Jerry Brown created that that was one good thing for affordable housing financing.

And the streamlining, it makes all the sense because as we see these applications that were not being burdensome for developers as they there's one Portal11 application process bringing out the teasing out the tax credits and all the multi financing having a central portal. That all makes sense. So thank you. I appreciate for the clarification.

Yes. Ms. Quirk-Silva.

First, I want to say, you know, I'm a housing person. Some of you have seen me here for almost 10 years. It's been the space I've been working in. The timing of this, as I've said now repeatedly from the budget committees to now is just very difficult because of the budget we're in.

Tomorrow we will get a budget dropped that is going to have vast cuts that are not going to only include housing cuts, but across the board from health care to universities. So that's one of the reasons I'm having a really hard time with this.

But the other thing is I've been listening to the remarks and I'm hearing words like a faster response, targeted delivered changes, centralize, accelerate, predictability, transparency, clear focus.

And again, I'm not the kind of person to do a gotcha, but when I look at this handout, which would be the umbrella agency and we have how California Interagency Council on Homelessness. I'm assuming those are already their mandates to streamline.

Because I've been here 10 years, I also have about knowledge of the bills that have come through the housing Committee. And I remember particularly a Tom Daly Bill that was exactly to streamline the application process for housing.

So to kind of set the stage like we haven't already had this mandate to do this is what is bothering me about this, because all of these words that have been used have already been mandated for sure over the last five years at least because of the frustration.

And now when we top that with the governor's press from yesterday about shutting down campgrounds, which none of us are happy that there's campground - or not campgrounds that would even actually be better - but encampments across the state and now it's like, all right, cities, go ahead and start enforcing.

Well, if we would have had that six years ago, we wouldn't be in the place we are now. So I'm hoping you can understand why this is such a big deal. This is my last term and I'm just hoping. I fully believe this is going to move forward. Again, we don't always get what we want on the timelines we want.

But I want to feel better leaving this position in one year that we really are going to do, in fact, central, centralize, accelerate, have transparency because we have been setting the stage for this for now a decade. And again, this is with all respect because I know this is the most critical hard issue to solve.

I know all of you have invested your life's work in this. And so this is not a commentary on you personally. I know you're doing everything you can. And by the way, I believe the Governor has as well. It's just these are elusive problems. And so I really hope in my lifetime we do see results.

May I? Thank you, Assemblymember. Of course we know you are a housing champion. You've always been. And of course we don't want you to feel like you leave this legislative body and there is no progress behind.

There is a ton of progress, in large part due to the enormous amount of great pro housing legislation pass passed by both the Assembly and the Senate and signed into law by the Governor.

Let me just talk about some facts in terms of progress and then I will comment on one part that I think we have not made as much progress and is reflected in this reorganization proposal on progress in general. Construction for housing is up every single year since 2018.

Permitting and entitlements of housing across almost every single jurisdiction in the State of California is much faster today than it was in the past. Again, because of all that pro housing legislation that the Governor has signed into law. Many of those your own bills.

In terms of addressing the biggest need, which is units for people experiencing homelessness and units for low and moderate income persons, we are seeing numbers that we haven't seen in many, many years. We have seen progress on accessory dwelling units in ways that we haven't seen before.

When I came into this position, the State of California was permitting about 5,000 accessory dwelling units. We are close to 28,000 per year now. Surplus land, both state and local. We've been able to create a pipeline of 32,000 new homes because of the surplus land act and the exercise program of the Governor.

The Housing Accountability Unit has been able to unlock more than 8,000 units because of actions holding locals accountable to produce their fair share of housing. The progress is tremendous.

But this reorganization proposal addresses one aspect of our progress that we haven't fully met yet, and that is how the State of California finances affordable housing. We have the most fragmented system in the country. We have multiple entities that because each and every one of us finances in different ways and for different progress programs.

Affordable housing, it takes so much time and time in housing development is money. There are studies. Well, first of all, we know that in order to complete the project, affordable housing project, a multifamily rental affordable housing program, it takes many layers of funding, right? 7, 8, 9 layers of funding.

The State of California could be two or three of those funding sources. We have numbers of how much more money it cost to developers to access each and every one of those layers and how longer it takes for a project to be developed.

The creation of this Housing Finance and Development Committee is about continuing to integrate the way in which we can all at once provide developers with the financing they need to cost time and to cut money that it takes to develop these projects. And I would just end by saying that progress has been made.

I mean we've, we've already consolidated AB 434, consolidated six programs into one. We have underway right now AB 519 which is also furthering a one-stop shop for financing. Assemblymember, your legislation, I think AB 2006 also furthers how we monitor how we hold compliance by integrating our compliance functions across all these entities.

But we need the infrastructure to make this work done faster and that is what the Housing Finance and Development Committee does. So there is programs being made by the infrastructure isn't quite there yet. And that's what this reform is about.

Thank you. I really do appreciate that response. Thank you.

And Assemblymember, I just wanted to speak to your specific question about our Interagency Council on Homelessness because I think this is another area where we've seen tremendous progress over the years. California was the very first state to begin to collect data from, from all of its continuums of care.

All 44 continuums of care now provide state quarterly data for us to be able to track outcomes of how many people are exiting the streets, how many people are receiving services across the State of California. And in our last, in 2024, California housed 60,000 people, 60,000 people exited homelessness.

And we know that because we now have our data system that is able to track that data and hold our communities accountable for continuing to make gains to that end.

We also have had incredible legislation over the last five years that strengthens ICH's statutory authority to collect data across all of the departments and agencies that spend resources on housing and homelessness to understand how are those resources being used, how are those programs actually delivering on outcomes.

So I say that just to say, you know, you all have created a foundation of work that is growing and it's our responsibility to create the infrastructure to take that to the next level.

Ms. Caloza.

Thank you. Chair Haney, thank you to both of our chairs for convening this really important hearing today and thank you to Secretary Moss for your presentation.

I think one of the things that I haven't heard yet, and apologies if you mentioned this in your opening, is in the creation of this new, you know, these two new agencies. Can you explain and share a little bit more about any cost savings that we may be having? What are the costs or cost savings by these new agencies.

Thank you so much for the question. As I said, the full cost analysis will be revealed in the May revised tomorrow. But in the design and contemplation of the reorganization, we've been really discriminate about making sure that this is as cost-neutral as possible.

Looking at shared costs across the agency. For the consumer protection side of the portfolio, we do not anticipate any increased fees for licensees with the establishment of the new agency.

And I think on the, on the housing and homelessness side, we too are looking at how do we support our existing infrastructure to keep our costs in check and make sure that this is not onerous, particularly in this budget climate. To, to you all, to the taxpayers, but also to making sure that with all of the competing priorities that you all will contemplate as a part of the budget, we've been really strategic about keeping our costs contained.

So shared costs where we can, you know, tight projections in terms of staffing. And so much of that detail will be revealed tomorrow in the Governor's revise.

Thanks for resharing that. And I echo, you know, some of the concerns that Assemblymember Quirk-Silva shared about really what the tough budget year is. And I look forward to reading what those details look like.

And making sure that the consolidation of some of these departments into specifically the Housing and Homelessness Agency actually result in efficiencies and hopefully, you know, implementation of these programs that actually result in more people getting off the streets.

As you know, there's a number of bills that we've voted on, especially in the Housing Committee, that are redirecting some of these programs to be managed by the Housing Department instead of the Interagency Homelessness Council for some of these reasons that are described. And so would these be impacted if those bills pass? Would they be impacted by this reorg?

No. I mean, HCD oversees our HAPP Administration and our Encampment Resolution Fund, so those homelessness programs will continue to be administered by HCD.

I mean, I think the intent of the reorganization is that we are harmonizing the work that each of our departments do so that we're working as one coordinated entity responsible for meeting our housing and homelessness goals. And so, you know, it is really challenging to, to reduce siloing in a bureaucracy as big as the State of California.

But I think that what we're trying to do here is be particularly focused on what are each of our departments and their functions' goals with respect to meeting our housing and homelessness goals and working backward. That takes leadership, that takes focus, that takes being willing to reimagine different roles and responsibilities if that's necessary.

And all of that is part of what this infrastructure creates, is for us to do our due diligence to make sure that we are organized in the best way possible to deliver on our goals.

Not just do the sort of responsibility of our individual jobs, but that we are collectively looking at the full housing spectrum and seeing how we can take the assets that we're responsible for and meet the moment.

Thank you for sharing that. The area that I represent is District 52. It's Northeast LA, East LA and South Glendale. I think one of the things that I find disconnected when I go back home to my district is what I also read about in the paper and what I see on the streets.

Right now, many of my constituents are asking about what's happening with LAHSA and all the scandals, the alleged misuse of dollars. LAHSA as an organization, as you know, receives state funding. And there's also lots of things happening within LA County, including a community creation of a new homelessness department.

Can you speak to how this reorg is going to impact what's happening in LA? What's happening in LA County? I know you talked about greater accountability and oversight.

What should we expect to see from this reorg specifically as it relates to LAHSA and what's happening in LA County where we have the highest number of unhoused in the entire state?

Well, what's exciting is this reorganization proposes to make ICH its own independent entity within the Housing and Homelessness Agency. And what that will do is it will allow our staff to be able to provide much deeper technical assistance, much more support of our local jurisdictions around their collective goals and what the state is expecting of them.

We just announced our three year action plan to end and prevent and end homelessness across the state for the very first time. Assemblymember, there are metrics within that plan that, that the local jurisdictions have to meet in order to reduce unsheltered homelessness.

We've had performance metrics in the past that guided how those resources and programs needed to be established. But this one is actually saying, "You know what? We need to work together to actually reduce the number of our brothers and sisters who are on the street."

And we have worked so closely with the City and County of Los Angeles to figure out how to support not just the stewardship of the resources, but to actually deliver on visible outcomes that the folks in that community expect.

So I, speaking specifically to LAHSA, we will continue to work with all of our city and county partners in Los Angeles to make sure that not only are there sort of goals with their programmatic responsibilities to our funding is intact, but we're also going to be tracking their ability.

And we get that data from Los Angeles on a quarterly basis. How are they actually doing toward meeting the metrics that are now within that action plan? So those are some specific ways we'll be working with LAHSA and the county and the city.

And of course, as a part of the wildfire recovery, I've been spending a lot of time in Los Angeles under the governor's direction, working really closely with the county, with Lassa, with the city, to figure out how do we build back in a way that is more resilient and provides, you know, the housing that was lost, but also creates the opportunity for us to meet our broader housing goals in LA. And so that work will also continue in tandem with the work of this reorganization.

I appreciate everything that you're saying and you know, the work that your team is doing.

You know, I won't continue to belabor this point and want to give time to my colleagues to ask their questions, but I would really like to see the state take a much more aggressive stance in really weighing in and giving guidance to what's happening in LA County. Because what's happening at Lassa is unacceptable.

What we're reading in the news and the fact that we're hearing it from the news first is unacceptable. And really we owe it, because those are taxpayer dollars, so that we ensure that we're getting outcomes for the billions of dollars that we have spent.

And it's really hard to go home and to advocate for all these things that we're doing when we're not seeing those outcomes. And so I look forward to working with you and your team more closely so that we can get the data, the oversight, the accountability that we need.

And you have my commitment that, you know, this is my number one issue in the Legislature, which is homelessness. And so I will be following up with you and your team. And thank you for your presentation.

I look forward to it.

Thank you, Assemblymember Valencia.

Thank you, Mr. Chair and co Chair, for hosting today's informational hearing. And Secretary Moss, great seeing you again and I appreciate the information thus far. In one of your earlier statements, you mentioned that there would be no fee increases, is that correct?

For our licensees. For the Business Consumer Services Agency, we do not anticipate any additional fee increases for our licensees as a result of the reorganization.

Wonderful. I really do appreciate that efficiency point. If there will be no increase.

Increases in fees to our stakeholders across the state. That sounds like good government to me. And ensuring that we're making bureauxy work for everyone. And that will also then be reflected in the May revise that will be posted, correct?

Yes. All of those details will be revealed in the May revise. Yes.

Appreciate the the confidentiality and can't disclose that just yet but just wanted to reaffirm that that will be reflected in the May revised. So I do appreciate that. Thank you.

All right. I had a few questions and then I want to go to our developer panel and then we may have a few more questions when we come back. So I absolutely fully support this sort of reorganization and consolidation.

I think it's gives the type of focus and also the clarity and the streamlining of where you go one stop shop in some ways.

And so part of I have sort of two questions that relate to different issues but are both asking about how you're going to deal with aspects that are not included in this new proposed agency.

I know that a lot of what we are attempting to do here is to have one instead of having to go multiple places when it comes to housing finance that you have more of one stop for that. I think there's a big aspect of this that's potentially missing and understandably because it connects to another constitutional office.

But the the low income housing tax credits as I understand are not included in this new Housing Development and Finance agency. And so this is a potential still secondary step that folks might have to take. How are you envisioning aligning that work with the work of the Treasurer's office?

Or is there some other set of steps that might be taken to ensure that there's as much cohesion and central one stop shop aspect to this agency in light of the fact that there is some funding that's not included.

Thank you for the question. And yes it is not tax credits and bonds are not included in this proposal as you described because it sits under another constitutional officer. And I will say the partnership between the Treasurer's office and the Administration, particularly with HCD has been incredible.

We have been working with them not only on how to improve our existing programs through 519. I know the Treasurer's office is at the table during that Gustavo sits on SIDLAC and TCAC.

So we have been really thoughtful about as they have done a lot of work to streamline their processes and making that last in resources available and accessible to our development community.

We want to make sure that we are looking at what's working around their processes and working in partnership to make sure that as we talk about that continuum from those experiencing homelessness to home ownership, how do we integrate and work together to look at all of the funding sources across state government?

We also have resources in our affordable housing sustainability community pot we have our partners at HHS who steward a lot of our social safety net resources around homelessness.

So this container, this infrastructure and this structural change allows for those conversations to continue and to look at different program opportunities over time that can better align all of those resources across state government. So we are not starting from scratch there assemblymember.

And we look forward to continuing our work with the Treasurer's office and frankly all of the other departments, Cal Trans or Cal STA, all of the other places where our homelessness and housing resources live so that again we're putting all of our assets forward so that we can deliver on those outcomes that we all expect.

Gustavo, I don't know if you wanted to add to that.

Well, just to emphasize what the Secretary is saying. Yes, we get a lot the same question about private activity bonds and tax credits not being in this reorganization proposal. But there is just, let's just be frank. There is a lot of coordination that needs to happen just within the authority of the Governor.

I mean we people may think that only HCD HALHFA provides what the developers call the soft funding, the grants and loans in the capital stack. But there are a whole host of other entities out there under the Governor's authority, Strategic Growth Council, other peer departments of HCD. So that coordination needs to continue within the Governor's office.

And again just something the Secretary mentioned is coordination with the treasurer and the controller is deep. We've aligned criteria of funding between HCD college FA bonds and tax credits, whether it's on providing more points for homeless units or the intersection between climate and housing and financing in higher resource neighborhood.

All of that criteria that is so important for the predictability, the consistency for developers that has been aligned as much as we can. So work is happening and it will continue happening under this real proposal.

Thank you for that. And I know it's even just having that greater cohesion and coordination amongst the opportunities that exist under the Governor and Executive branch is a huge step forward.

And then understanding that there's also of course other pieces that still require coordination, but maybe when you have the 1 very large aspect of it better consolidated, you can do that more effectively.

And Secretary Moss, you did touch on this as well that there was a similar set of kind of question I had as it related to the programs that will continue to be housed in other areas. In terms of our homelessness response, and I know this from my experience in San Francisco and others have this experience as well.

There was a creation of a Department of Homelessness for the City of County of San Francisco. But there were huge aspects of the homelessness response that were not included in that. Including the actual. Most of what was actually helping people who were currently on the street and getting them off of the street were still housed elsewhere.

And of course all the public health.

So some of that actually created some level of confusion because if you call something the homelessness agency, but so much of the response to homeless is still in other departments that can end up having the opposite effect where you go somewhere believing you're going to get the set of answers or funding or accountability, but actually it's housed elsewhere.

So I'm sure that that aspect of this is. Is under consideration as well. But we are of course when we.

We are now putting homelessness in the name and as well, and we're sort of putting the flag up there that a lot of those responses or at least how to engage with the broader state response should be able to be accessed there as well.

I couldn't agree more. I mean, I think that's part of why standing up ICH is as an independent entity within the agency reorganization is critical.

All of the entities that touch housing and homelessness are Members of that council and now have this action plan that we are collectively implementing as well as the enhanced statutory requirements that will help us really think about efficiency and alignment amongst all of our programs across that council.

So I am a co-chair of the Interagency Council on Homelessness with Secretary Kim Johnson from Human Services. And we both are incredibly committed to working with all of the Members of the council to make sure that we are not just talking about it, but being about it.

We really have to do a much better job of doing, not just standing next to each other and talking about what we do to address the issues of homelessness, but actually integrating those, those responses into one singular response. And so I'm looking forward to that piece of the reorg as well.

Thank you. And I think Ms. Kalosa Assembly Member Colossa also touched on this as it relates to homelessness. That as as much as the.

The real meat of this and the focus of it is on the Housing Development and Finance Committee and this sort of separation in some ways we are also now creating an agency that has the name homelessness in it.

It's not something that currently exists in the current title, you know, that you have and that the current Department has and so, really hoping for that level of focus and accountability and clarity in terms of responsibility within our state government as well that comes with that.

One last question that I'm going to ask and before we go on to our next panel. Will the Housing and Homelessness Agency include an asset management Department that makes a single inspection of all state funded affordable housing for compliance monitoring?

Thank you.

And again, I just have to thank again here Assembly Member Berman for AB 2006 because we are already working on this coordination of how after homes are built and have different layers of estate subsidy, how these different entities go about ensuring that these regulatory agreements, these contracts between the state and these sponsors, these providers or housing, how they abide to all the compliance and regulatory requirements.

And what AB 2006 does is it ensures that we are working together to streamline the compliance review and monitoring across all of these entities that have funding in often the same unit and so we are already working on that.

I think what this reorganization proposal does is takes us a step further in ensuring that again, the infrastructure is there so that compliance monitoring and asset management coordination deepens.

So short answer yes, we were moving in that same direction, but again, AB 2006 has been a sort of the spark that was really helpful to start moving in that direction.

I like that Bill, but I didn't know it was that helpful. So I appreciate hearing that. Glad to help get things started.

There you go. Glad some things we do are helpful to you all here. All right. Well, I'm going to move on to our next panel and there may be additional questions for you all as well.

We've invited two housing developers with experience in applying for state housing programs to be able to offer their perspective on this new creation of a housing Development and Finance Committee.

We have Margaret Miller, President of Development and Chief Real Estate Officer, the John Stewart Company and Jeffrey Morgan, President and CEO of the Community Housing Improvement Systems and Planning Association. Welcome.

Good morning, Mr. Chair and Committee Members. My name is Margaret Miller. I am President of Development and Chief Real Estate Officer at The John Stewart Company. John Stewart Company was founded in 1978 to develop, own and operate affordable housing throughout California. We are the state's largest manager of affordable housing with 35,000 units under management.

We have also developed and currently own approximately 5,000 units of affordable housing throughout California. I have over 20 years of affordable housing development experience and have utilized nearly every source of affordable housing funding available to projects in California.

I also sit on the Board of Directors of the California Housing Consortium, which advocates for the production and preservation of housing that is affordable to low and moderate people. I am in support of the reorganization plan.

I have firsthand experience developing housing here in California and I'm here to attest that the systems and processes we currently have in place to deploy and administer the state's affordable housing funds are inefficient, opaque, and costly.

To help you understand my perspective, I would like to share an example of a project named Cornerstone Village which was recently undertaken by the John Stewart Company. In 2021, we entered into a purchase and sale agreement with the church in Elk Grove to acquire land to develop affordable housing.

We planned an inclusive multifamily rental community consisting of 84 new units of affordable housing for working families, adults with disabilities, and formerly homeless. We designed and entitled the project while we work to secure the $54 million of funding necessary to take the project forward.

In 2021, we successfully secured five and a half $1.0 million from the City of Elk Grove. We built on this success and in March 2022 we secured $2.1 million from the State of California Department of Developmental Services. That same month we applied to HCD for $7 million in home funding.

In July 2022, we were awarded project based vouchers from the Sacramento Housing and Redevelopment Agency, which meant we had the operating subsidies necessary to support our units for the formerly homeless.

Continuing to build on the momentum, in April 2023, which I should note was a full year after submitting our application, we heard from HCD that the project was awarded $7 million in HOME funds. With funding commitments of nearly $15 million in hand, we needed to secure the final $9 million to fill the funding gap.

Once we had that final commitment, we would be well positioned to secure the tax exempt bonds and low income housing tax credit allocation we needed to take the project forward.

We applied for both HED MHP funding and and Cal HFA MIP, each time contorting the project within the parameters we had already committed to with our other funding sources so the project could be as competitive as possible for awards.

And I'm sorry to say that, long story short, because there was a lot of time, money and effort involved, we were ultimately unsuccessful in securing the $9 million we needed to take the project forward. In 2024, despite having made considerable progress on the project, time ran out on us.

We could no longer extend the funding awards we had secured and the Church was no longer willing to keep the site tied up under contract without a more definitive schedule regarding when the project would go forward.

The reality is that $15 million in public funds from four different agencies sat idle while we attempted to get the final $9 million we needed to proceed. I would like to say that this story is atypical, but unfortunately it's not.

Most affordable housing developers have a similar story to share and we all need to work together to figure out how we can do better. Enterprise Community Partners recently released a study stating There are nearly 45,000 units of housing ready to proceed that need funding.

There are many projects, like Cornerstone Village that but for being able to secure the necessary funding, are ready to proceed. The system in which we currently operate is too slow and and too fragmented. The result is extended project durations driven by the multitude of financing sources that currently require duplicative and sequential processes by various agencies.

All of which creates uncertainty and adds cost. The reality is that despite extraordinary efforts, many projects simply won't ever make it through the labyrinth we have found ourselves in. And the net impact is fewer new housing units. We have an opportunity before us to rethink how the state deploys and administers these resources.

I believe that having a cabinet level secretary focused on housing and homelessness is crucial to the future success of producing as many affordable units as possible. Cabinet level leadership will be able to effectively align priorities and will be able to better coordinate and create improved efficiency in the funding programs.

Thank you for this opportunity to share my perspectives today. I'm of course happy to answer any questions.

Hi, good morning everyone. My name is Jeffrey Morgan. I'm the President of Chispa. That's what all those names stand for, that means spark in Spanish. We've been serving mostly farm workers, but a large population on the central coast of California in Santa Cruz, Monterey, and San Benito county for 45 years. Currently we serve 5,000 residents.

We've built about 1,000 units of single family homes, including self help housing.

You know, when I first joined about a year and a half ago, I remember going to one of my very first panel discussions in Hartnell College and a young man who had a family was excited because, you know, we're the one of the fastest growing counties, but we're also one of the most unaffordable counties if you look at rent compared to income.

And he was looking expectantly to say, do you know when will you have your next bit of housing? We really want to house our family. We want to make our roots here.

And it made me think back to about 25 years of experience that I've had both in this region and in the Bay Area, which is also one of the most unaffordable regions in the country. And I thought about the biggest enemies to development to the kinds of work that we do. And it's really uncertainty.

And probably the granddaddy of that uncertainty is time. Time is one of the greatest enemies for getting a project done. And a lot of the work that you've done, thanks to your leadership, has created a raft of legislation that's helped expedite the entitlement process. That's been a big help.

You know, the Turner studies were talking about saving four months of time if we don't have this duplicative financing process. But I would actually submit that there are outside factors that make that timeline grow even more. Think about what's happened over the last few years. There's COVID 19, which caused tremendous cost increases and delays and inefficiencies.

You think about the Great Recession. And so I've seen developments that took years, some of them over a decade. And meanwhile, people are waiting. One of the things I was able to do is I worked with a nonprofit that did senior housing, Christian Church Home, CCH up in Oakland. We actually worked outside of the state.

And I had a chance to see what a one stop shop looks like. So I was in Denver at the Colorado Housing Finance Agency and they said what you can bring to your presentation is two form boards and one double sided handout.

And in front of me were representatives from their allocating Committee for Tax Credits, the housing finance agencies and all the soft debt lenders. And I had 30 minutes and that's a little nerve wracking when you know all of your financing is going to be done at once.

But the nice thing about it was, is all of the funding was also committed at once. It was deployed at the same time.

So right now I think, you know, I think about the hundreds of millions of dollars of funding that have been tied up waiting in the state as a result of having this bifurcated process that we have. You know, originally when I was applying for financing 20 something years ago, the average development cost was about $250,000 a unit.

Now in many cases it's four or five times that amount. And you think about time, you know, over the last few years when I was budgeting for development, I would budget about a 10% construction cost increase every year, every year. And that was going on for over a decade. And during COVID it was even worse.

And so when I think about timing and financing, this is the big thing that I think Under Secretary Moss's leadership, Director Velasquez, the Cal HFA, this is what they're trying to fix.

So if we're building say 15,000 units a year in the State of California, which is a fraction of what we need, but for example, we had a 10% cost increase, but we were able to do all those funding commitments at once. What if we saved a year on that process?

And in doing so, instead of building 15,000 units, maybe we saved enough money to build 16,500 units. So I think about the different families that are being housed. So you think about it from an economic perspective about being efficient.

And you know, I was very blessed that both Gustavo and Tamika, Secretary Moss, Director Velazquez came to our Alfred Diaz Infante apartments. We had 66 units of multifamily housing in the old four door. It took years to finally get built in a two week time period we had 1800 applications for that housing.

So beyond just the financial impact, I think about the human impact. They heard the story of Daisy Gonzalez Rivera. She's in her second year of aerospace engineering as a master's degree student at Stanford University. On a full ride, her family picks fresas. They're strawberry pickers.

They've been in the fields for about 20 years and they were living in a one bedroom trailer and they were about four months from losing their home.

As a result of PGE and others working with us, we were able to shave four months off that schedule and they were able to avoid the terrible option of deciding whether or not they were going to have to live in a car. A family of seven.

Just the day before that, I had handed keys to a family of eight that had been living in a garage. These are hard working families. They contributed. A lot of them are feeding us all over America.

So I go about that to say, you know, my parents, my mom and dad live in affordable housing up in Northern California in Sonoma county and they were around during the Coffey park fire. She said to me, you know Jeff, I think about this the same way you look at fires.

All the agencies start to come together when there's an emergency. This is an emergency. We have fires in LA County. There are resources being amassed. This is a time for all of us to do it. Because I think about the other 1700 residents.

We didn't house that community and all the thousands more we can house if we do this more efficiently. Thank you.

Thank you so much. I appreciate it. I'm opening it up now to my colleagues. If there are any questions or comments not seeing. I will ask a couple. So I think you addressed sort of what are the issues and challenges that are causing the most delays?

Is there anything that you think is missing from this proposal that we could do in addition to this? I know that you've reviewed what we have here, or it could be even something that you wish, you know, may be challenging or expensive or.

But what are some of the things that you think we could do in addition to what is on the table here?

Well, I would just say, I don't know if you, if you sprung this on the secretary, but I love your idea of a unified single inspection. That's fantastic. So if there's. We have a lot of different inspections during the course of operations, you know, I think that it's going to be difficult.

One of the big things is we're facing uncertainty, especially with what's going on in the White House and in Washington right now. So we know that we're facing different kinds of resources.

I think putting everything together where the agencies talk to each other and recognize their own conflicts within the funding sources and resolve those in a proactive way, in an intelligent way is probably the best thing we can do to just move faster.

Let's get it all done at once so that we know if we remove that uncertainty and we underwrite it like we can build it tomorrow, then maybe we really can.

Yeah. I would just second in terms of the compliance side, there's, you know, both an efficiency, like if we can get all the compliance kind of better coordinated, there's a cost right. Because each agency charges a fee for their compliance, which inhibits our ability to leverage more debt on the project and have more money in operations.

But I would also just express, as you know, again, the manager of 35,000 units across the state, our staff at these sites, and the amount of time that they're dealing with compliance in all the different regulatory agencies really has an impact on the effectiveness of doing their job and ultimately serving the residents, which is what it's all about.

It's become increasingly difficult to find staff that can navigate the complexities of each of the agency's requirements and the amount of time that they spend preparing for these inspections and interacting around the reporting and exorbitant. So huge advocate for also figuring out how to make that more efficient and coordinating that all within the agency.

Thank you for everybody. Definitely have some excellent points on the progress we made. So I appreciate that. On the regulations, one of our colleagues has Select Committee on Permitting, which I have been part of and I know this year particularly we have a permitting reform package.

So if you could speak to if you've been following some of those pieces of legislation that are moving, but on the other hand, speak about the Federal Government and their potential impacts, including tariffs where we know building requires lumber and the impacts where we know many times developers are getting lumber or it's brought down from Canada.

So what we see on the horizon there, but also the Section 8 impacts where we already have individuals housed and now those vouchers may not come down. It has not happened yet. But those are the potential. So tariffs, section 8 and permitting, whoever wants to address those.

So I know that we've been. What's happening right now is when we work with contractors and get bids, nobody wants to quote us out more than a few days. And the reason is they have absolutely no idea when the next tariff is coming.

So we kind of take on that risk if we're going to actually put something together to get our funding applications and in place. So, you know, we've already seen cost increases on lumber and metals that around 5 or 10%, but it's going to go much. We're anticipating a lot more.

You know, a lot of stuff got back down. One of the things is that we probably have of our 1500 units in the Central coast, about 20% are voucher holders. And the proposals right now are to, as I understand it, block grant the vouchers to the states, reduce the amount by something like 40%.

And then they're going to say you have to quote, unquote, be able bodied, whatever that means. You know, a lot of our folks are working, they need those vouchers to keep their housing. So I think it's a threat. I think that some of the work that's being done by the state is helpful in trend.

And I think that the underwriting is just going to have to take into account the fact that some of it isn't reliable. I think one of the most disturbing things that we've seen is the threats to seniors around cuts to Medicaid. Absolutely terrifying. Originally, I think The President started $880 billion and then everyone went.

Even the Members of Congress that were on that party shrunk away from it. Those are major threats to quality of life, especially on people that are just on a single income trying to survive and just stay alive. The other, the other piece is rural development.

We're going to be more dependent on things like Joe Serna tax credit programs because they're proposing basically gutting the Rural Development program or in the skinny budget.

Now it's still, they're going to take some more time, but we want to see more rural housing that's built at maybe slightly higher incomes for single family homes to create financial Independence, wealth creation and also just multifamily housing. So it's a big issue and frankly there's going to be have to be.

I'm on the board of the California Coalition for Rural Housing and we're really looking to collaborate with the state to continue to serve those who frankly serve us all over the state. Hope that answers your question.

I would just assemble a Member on permitting to say the time for entitlements and permitting has over the years has come down. There are jurisdictions that we're tracking that have cut almost in half the time they are taking to entitle and permit projects. So we're watching that very enthusiastically.

We want to see that really across every single jurisdictions, not just in some particular jurisdictions. You mentioned the streamlining package. We, of course we, we can get ahead of the Governor in terms of commenting on legislation being proposed right now. But we can say that, you know there are some great provisions.

The more help we get, the more legislative authority we get. We get to also on the accountability side to hold jurisdictions accountable to permit faster. That's, that's very helpful for the amount of housing in the pipeline that we unlock.

Given our due to the accountability monitoring that we provide and then on the federal budget we are cautiously watching that we haven't seen any major impact so far.

Basically HCV two important sources is disaster recovery funding in the form of community development block grant for disaster recovery that has not been affected so far and also block grants that go to non entitlement jurisdictions. So far we haven't seen, we haven't been affected yet. But we know the proposal running through Congress is complex, is difficult.

So we're going to be continue to be watching that.

I had a couple questions which probably is more for Secretary. So as, as I understand it, the goal here will, will be to have a single application for affordable housing funding that would be created and that would include all of the available types of funding. Is that, is that part of the, of the vision?

I know that there's the consolidation within the Committee. Would that mean there would be one application?

I think that that's a possibility that the Housing Development Finance Committee will work on. As Gustavo talked about earlier, we already have several of our programs under one application process. But creating this funding Committee would allow us to do more of that and really look at, have we really nailed it with our supernofa?

Like, what other programs should we be contemplating as a part of that singular application and Administration of award timelines? All of those things will be the responsibility of that Executive Committee of the Housing Finance Development Committee that will, will set the terms for how all of our multifamily affordable housing programs integrate.

Great. And I'd imagine this question would also relate to that, which is that whether they would be required to enter and to multiple agreements with the state or one, if there's different types of program funding.

But this Committee overall would, would be tasked with making this as simplified and straightforward and fast and predictable as possible and sort of having that authority to bring it all together. And that could mean a single consolidated application as well as contract and other aspects of some of the challenges that we've heard.

Absolutely.

Great. A couple other quick things. You know, one of the things, and there's a colleague who's not here, and I told him I would ask this question. You can imagine the colleague this is coming from.

But one of the things that the Legislature has been interested in is the role of the state in developing housing directly and public construction and, or in some, some cases called social housing. Is this at all within the, the, the purview of this agency or Committee, as you see it, or, or, or could it be.

And how do you think about potentially the state's role in sort of directly building housing?

Well, I think, you know, what's. Like I said, we're not starting from scratch. So we already have efforts to study how social housing could be integrated, implemented into our housing continuum. And so that work is underway. I know that Members of my team have started to organize stakeholders around that process.

You know, I have said, and I've said this to my, to the entire agency when I started. All of our housing needs are critical. We have to prioritize often those who are most vulnerable, who are on our streets and need support.

And we also need to be providing housing for our farm workers, for our teachers, for our first responders, for families who want to buy their first home. What I think this reorganization is trying to get at is an opportunity to do all of those housing goals right.

We have limited resources often, so we are constantly having to prioritize, but there should not be any losers and winners. We need housing at all levels of income, and we need resources and strategies that deliver on, you know, publicly funded housing.

We, we rely on our housing authorities to provide vouchers for stable housing and operating supports for our development community to operate those buildings. And so it is an ecosystem. And I think what we're, what we're aiming toward is how do we create an ecosystem where if the market can. Can build the housing, let's get it done.

And if we need subsidies, great, let's steward those subsidies in the best way possible to deliver as many units as possible. And if there's something in the middle that doesn't need as much subsidy but developer can, you know, get that housing built, let's do that too.

So this is a, in my mind, shifting from that scarcity mentality that we've all had to operate in within this space to how do we think more abundantly about the resources that we do have and, and figure out how to use policy levers, density bonuses, all the, you know, there's a lot of ways for us to leverage the resources that you all put into housing every single year.

And I think that this reorganization creates the opportunity for us to strengthen and expand all of those tools and levers.

I appreciate that. And it's a very bold vision. It's a vision that I think we all share. It's also one that's going to require a lot of resources.

And I know that, that we have a concern here in, in the Legislature that to fulfill that vision, we're going to need a lot more funds, we're going to need more revenue, we're going to need a bond. We're going to need to be creative about how we get additional funds for affordable housing.

It's something that we hear particularly from our cities and counties who now we've placed significant mandates and responsibilities on this, that for them to meet those. Our ability to provide resources is going to be essential. Is there, and this will be my last question. Is there a vision for how we.

We are going to fund this bold vision and the, you know, the extensive expenses and time that's going to be required to create a Department that's able to not only streamline and consolidate, but actually meet these needs that we laid out and not have a situation where we do have such winners and losers and so many people who are in need, who are not able to,

to access housing or, or access funding that's needed to provide that housing is a part of this agency going to be looking at how to be more creative and more aggressive about accessing funds and the resources that are needed to be able to provide for the, the, the.

The goals that we have and the needs that we have on affordable housing.

I think at the core, this Reorganization is focused on doing the very best with the state resources that we have. We currently have $750 billion of ASIC funding that was just released in February. We have $2 billion of Homekey plus funding. Prop 1 resources are out. Thousands of units are out, ready to start being built.

And we want to make sure that we, we are not only producing a nofa, but we're actually streamlining and making more efficient the processes that will help those resources and units be built faster.

So I can speak to the uncertainty of what's ahead, certainly in this budget climate is unknown, but I most certainly know that the resources that we have at our disposal right now, in the next few years, we want to make sure that we're doing our part to get those resources maximized.

And so you all have been incredible housing champions and making sure that housing and homelessness is prioritized. This Administration has invested the most resources around this issue than any Governor that I've ever seen. And more is always on the table.

But I think first we have to demonstrate to Californians that we're doing the best, very best we can with the resources we have right now. And there are billions and billions of dollars that are currently being deployed toward these goals. And this infrastructure is, is going to help those, those resources get to their maximum impact.

So, yes, and let's do good with what we got. We got a lot right now.

We agree with you there, too. Thank you. Thank you. All right, I'm now going to open it up for public comment. If folks want to come up, I think we give no more than two minutes. If you've got some thoughts you want to share, come on up.

Good morning, chairs and Committee Members. My name is Natalie Spivak. I'm with Housing California, a statewide nonprofit advocacy organization focused on affordable housing production, homelessness, and protecting renters. First, I want to express our strong support for the proposed creation of the California Housing and Homelessness Agency.

We believe that an agency singularly focused on housing and homelessness will enable more effective and efficient delivery of state funding resources and programs. In particular, we strongly support creating a single application and award process for affordable housing, or one stop shop, which research shows is critical for reducing the time and cost of building.

We also strongly support the proposals to streamline compliance and asset management requirements and to hold public meetings to make funding decisions and hear project appeals, which is a process that works well at TCAC and SIDLAC. But as discussed, the current CHHA proposal for a one stop shop leaves out tax credits and bonds at TCAC and SIDLAC.

That serve as the common denominator for all affordable housing funded by the state. If projects that receive funding at CHHA aren't competitive for funding at TCAC and SIDLAC, the system will remain fragmented.

While it's encouraging that the current reorganization proposal urges coordination between CHHA and TCHAC and SIDLAC, giving TCAC and SIDLAC formal representation on the Housing Development and Finance Committee would better ensure that funding awards are coordinated.

On the homelessness side, we strongly support the proposed coordination between CHHA and and the Health and Human Services Agency to better deploy homelessness services.

CHHA should also create greater alignment between the various non housing agencies that provide homelessness programs such as the Office of Emergency Services, the Board of State and Community Corrections and the Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation. Program integration and effectiveness would be even greater if these homelessness programs were formally included in CHHA.

This new agency is a promising step towards strengthening California's leadership on housing and homelessness. However, it can't be a substitute for state investments in affordable housing and homelessness at scale. Governance improvements and funding must be complementary to maximize impact. We look forward to continued engagement with the Administration to make CHHA a success. Thank you.

Good morning. Mark Stivers with the California Housing Partnership. We are in support of the Governor's reorganization planning. We mostly appreciate that we were going to have a cabinet level secretary who can be focused on the most pressing issue facing Californians, namely affordable housing and homelessness.

And we're hoping that cabinet secretary can be allowed to be more proactive in addressing the issues. We appreciate what this Governor has already done, but we would like to make sure that they have the time and authority to be focused on this exclusively.

We also appreciate having the Finance Committee, which is moving more transparent, will allow appeals and regulation decisions to be made in public, with public comment and with a little bit more understanding for the community of how those decisions are made. So we do appreciate the Committee as well.

We do think that we hope this is also a first step towards getting us to the true One Stop shop that a lot of us have talked about. We just put out a new report that each state agency that a developer needs to go to adds another almost $17,000 per unit.

So when you're talking if it's a three state agencies, that's $50,000 per unit, we can save hundreds of millions of dollars if we can get to the true one stop shop.

And so as we look forward, you know, we need to really be focused on getting more resources for wool housing and reducing the cost and if we can get to that true one stop shop, that will really help with the ladder. We see this as a necessary first step in getting there. So thank you.

Hi, good morning. Marina Espinosa here with the California Housing Consortium. CHC is supportive of the concept of creating a new housing and homelessness agency with the caveat that a new agency alone is not going to automatically solve the issues that exist with the state's housing programs.

The implementation phase of this plan will be critical to its success and we strongly urge the Legislature to work with the Administration to secure the resources needed for this effort.

Funding will be needed for the housing programs captured by the proposal and and resources will also be needed to promote the culture shift necessary to make this effort a success, including funding to invest in staff development. Thank you for the opportunity to comment.

Good morning Chair Committee Members. My name is Doug Shoemaker. I'm here representing the Turner center at UC Berkeley. Turner center does not take a position on this Bill. But I was hired to go out and do some outreach as an affiliate of the Turner center to understand what people were really looking for from the states.

I just want to give you some of the highlights from that. You've heard some of them already from Marina and Mark. They're very consistent. A cabinet level secretary focused on housing and homelessness. The transparency that Mark referenced is a really critical aspect of this.

I think an underappreciated aspect of the Committee will be the sort of open government aspect of this. I think people get somewhat frustrated by not understanding how decisions are made. Maybe somewhat is a little understatement. The seamless award process that people sometimes refer to as a one stop shop.

I think it's critical to understand where cost occurs in affordable housing. For I guess much of my affordable housing career of 30 years I was affordable housing developer at Mercy Housing and other places. And before that I was the Director of the mayor's office in San Francisco where we had a quasi one stop shop.

And I'll just say the two most expensive times in the process are pre construction when you're looking at the delays that Jeff described in terms of construction cost increases. But the second most expensive and probably actually more expensive is when you're stuck and you can't close your project with all of your construction financing out.

And that is the closing process that people refer to over and over again. And I say of all the comments we heard from 60 plus individuals and five associations fixing the closing process particularly to HCD but across these agencies was in many ways the number one request.

And it corresponds to what Marina described earlier, which is an intense need to get a more business oriented approach. This is in the words of stakeholders to the closing process, the need for speed to make sure that that closing takes three months, six months, not 12 and not 18 when interest rates are chewing up state resources.

And I think that that speaks to what Jeff talks about. I'll also say as a former developer, I can't tell you how surprised I was a number of years ago to hear from General contractors.

They were actually building additional cost into their General contracts with Mercy Housing and other developers at the time because of the uncertainty they saw specifically from HCD. And I think that is an incredible factor. It's not included in, I think anybody's cost forecast here.

But when you see market participants start to behave in a way with the expectation that they are going to have this level of delay, there are hidden costs throughout this process. And I think that another critical reason for doing this. So we've talked about cost swings to projects on the front end on the closing process.

I think Margaret referred to the importance of sort of addressing the cost of the asset management piece. And I'll just say on a, on a last note, I think, you know, there's a lot of difference of opinion about where this should go after, you know, Chair Haney, you asked like what could be next.

I think the one thing we heard over and over again though in our focus groups was the desired for more coordinated and aligned a shared governance framework that would really make this happen.

So however that unfolds and whatever the Legislature and the governor's office role in that might be, I think there's a real hunger for making sure that however these agencies relate to each other, that there's a shared governance framework that enables them to better align the processes, particularly on the front end where they do a lot of their work of awarding funds.

And Jeff, you know, referenced the experience in Colorado and I think that's what many of the folks that we met in focus groups are looking for. So thank you.

Good morning chairs and Members. My name is Elise Borth. I'm here on behalf of Enterprise Community Partners and All Home and I'm here to express support for the administration's proposal to create the California Housing and Homelessness Agency. Enterprise conducted focus groups across the state that included finance and development partners and the message is clear.

The status quo is not working. The current approach of assembling funding from a mix of state departments and agencies is duplicative, inefficient and costly. We need a system where all the financing, including tax credits and bonds, are packaged together and the application process is streamlined.

The governor's reorganization proposal is a step in the right direction and we're hopeful that it will lead to meaningful progress towards an expedited one stop shop for affordable housing developers looking for public funding options. However, a reorganization without meaningful investment is not enough for this effort to work.

State funding needs to be allocated to MHP, the low income housing tax Credits and HHAP. We look forward to working in collaboration with the Legislature and the Administration to ensure that this reorganization achieves the intended outcomes. Thank you.

Good morning Committee Members and panel. Secretary Moss and Director Velazquez, this is the hard work and I want to thank you so much for doing it. My name is Jenna Abbott. I'm the Executive Director for the California Council for Affordable Housing. We are a trade Association represented by members who produce affordable housing at scale.

We estimate that our members currently in some way, shape or form, hold, manage or are building over $200,000 or 200,000 units of affordable housing in the state. We are encouraged and inspired by what we're hearing about this reorganization. We think that this is a very good step in the right direction.

I'd echo a lot of what my colleagues have already said. I won't do that. I know we have a two minute time limit, so I'm just going to say ditto. There's a lot of good going on here. We do want to express some concern. However, we are worried a little bit about how.

How it's all going to shake out. The devil in these things is in the details. And one of the things that our members have told us consistently is that they very much appreciate the way that TCAC and SIDLAC operate and I would just encourage this panel, this committee, to really look at that.

They're a good model for how things work well and we want to make sure that that continues. It's very important for a developer, as I'm sure the two of you at the table can tell, or can say it's very important to have that stability and to understand how the process works.

So good job, keep going and let's make sure that we get it right and then we get it right over and over again as we need to tweak the process. Thank you for the time.

Good morning.

Kim Lewis representing the California Coalition for Youth and we are speaking in support of the reorganization plan because we do believe it's long overdue and the strategic focus of allowing them to focus on housing and homelessness will allow our young people who are experiencing homelessness to be able to be focused on as appropriately as they needed.

We a couple years ago sponsored SB 918 with Senator Wiener and Assemblymember Blanca Rubio to really give our young people who are experiencing homelessness on the home a home within state agencies because nobody was really responsible for addressing their needs.

The council is tasked with this work and elevating that and we believe the additional next more traditional state like department structure will allow them to be able to uplift and work towards solutions for ending homelessness for our young people.

Other states like Washington, Oregon, Colorado, New York, Maryland, Massachusetts and Kentucky all have dedicated state offices for addressing youth homelessness and looking at these programs. California should be on that list.

And so we really look forward to moving seeing this plan move forward and we hope that it can achieve the vision that we would like for our young people so they don't grow up and end up homeless on the streets, end up in prisons or likely dead. Thank you.

Good morning Mr. Chair. Raymond Contreras with Lighthouse Public Affairs on behalf of Spur, the San Francisco Bay Area Planning and Urban Research Association. In January 2024, Spur published a report entitled Structured for Success Reforming Housing Governance in California and in the Bay Area.

The report was designed to address governance challenges related to housing in both Bay Area and California as a whole. One of those key findings in the report that currently in California's governmental institutions are not set up to deliver the housing California needs.

The report points out that a broad agency dilutes the amount of time the secretary can devote to housing and recommends the creation of a standalone state housing agency that is solely focused on housing.

The report further recommends that that the housing agency be reorganized to carry out a series of functions, first, including a regulatory function focused on housing element compliance, secondly, the affordable rental housing function, and lastly a robust policy function that has the necessary data and tools to advance housing policy in the state.

They describe how the agency should be able to analyze and describe how various policies proposed by other state agencies, agencies impact the state's housing production goals. The most relevant, relevant recommendation to today's conversation is to create a one stop shop for affordable housing financing.

For those reasons, we are confident that the reorganization is the first step in the state need further advance housing policy solutions goals throughout the State of California.

Hi, Nora Kostra with EAH Housing. We are a nonprofit affordable housing developer across two states. Here in California we've developed over 9,000 units. We currently have over 3,000 in the pipeline waiting to get funded. I wanted to really appreciate Jeff and Margaret's comments today.

Margaret had mentioned that it's not atypical that a lot of us are waiting for funding and projects don't move forward and we are in that same boat for sure.

So I wanted to reiterate that point and also Jeff's point about a lot of the funding that we were relying on from other agencies not coming through, including for rural housing.

I also want to note that those units that we are waiting for in the pipeline, most of them will not be using the two sources that are currently available which are Home Key and AHSC.

And so we would like to reiterate that we do need other funding sources budgeted for in the next couple of years because a lot of us will not be using those two sources we do have. So thank you.

Good morning Mr. Chair. Galen Dobbins from the California Coalition for Rural Housing. First, I'd like to align the majority of my comments with our fellow housing organizations such as Housing California, CHC Partnership and Enterprise. I'd also like to elevate the comments on farm worker housing and rural development from Secretary Moss and Mr. Morgan.

CCRH is appreciative of the proposed Housing Development Finance Committee, especially that it will provide more transparency and public input in funding decisions, regulations and program guidelines which ultimately will help us build trust and demonstrate our commitment to the public and create more affordable homes.

We hope that as this conversation continues we can find ways to better align across programs specifically to make best use of federal housing program resources when they're available, when they're delivered to the state, such as disaster related rebuilding programs that serve our tribal communities and resources for California's non entitlement communities. Thank you very much.

Chair. Members. Alex Torres with Brownstein here today on behalf of the Bay Area Council representing over 340 employer members in the nine county Bay Area. I want to thank the panelists and the members in attendance for a good discussion today.

You know, it's been a major concern of the business community, the lack of housing, the need to expedite housing affordability at all affordability levels. So we continue to watch this proposal.

We are very supportive of it would just encourage and I think, you know, the panelists on the dais today are a good example of the administration, the legislature pulling in developers and folks who have experience on the ground to make sure the details are done correctly. Look forward to being a resource, however we can to bring to.

To better the experience of our developer members or any members of the business community that can assist in getting this right. Thank you so much.

Hello. Hello. My name is Dennis Green Jr. I do not have a organization but I, I need to because I need to be able to write some of these Amtrak fees off to come all the way up here. But I am, I want to personally thank those.

Even if I don't know you directly, if I talk to you indirectly. I am one of those that has got off of homelessness after a two to three year off and on as of last year through one of a pro, through a program, a voucher. So thank you. If you.

You help those like myself that are not able to go to work, that also serves the community, that even rides the bikes to schools to see what's going on at the. Around the community that unfortunately we go through things that some people don't understand that causes us to go homeless.

We, some of those homeless people actually work before. Some of those homeless people actually even went to school. Shout out Sacramento State. A school I went to in 2003 from out of Richmond, California. And I say that to also know that I went homeless. So I'm a face of people like. You went homeless? Yeah, I went homeless.

I slept in my car. I didn't sleep in under a bridge or anything like that, but I slept in my car for two plus years and also was trying to go to school through that. I tell you say this. If I would have had stable housing, I'd have finished school.

I probably would have been back at Sac State going with my children. I have 33 kids, two of them in college. I went home is why they was getting ready to go to high school out of here in Sacramento and also still attending school board meetings, city board meetings. This is my first state meeting.

I'm glad I won't get arrested at this one. Thank you. But you know, I now know the processes. I go to these things and I also learn the process. I also was of course a part of trying to get the tiny homes because I knew now I got.

I must say this, I also represent formerly incarcerated so those challenges take accountability. But also you, you see that those type of people, now we know those type of people can also get back on their feet and also get back in the community and also create positive.

It's important we say positive, to give back to their, their community, whether it's unincorporated or not. And that's the things I, I looked forward to do. And I.

If you help me, I know my time is running up and I'm kind of just freestyling, but I just wanted to also just say with the new things that are taking place, we're, we're. If you're paying attention, like I have been paying attention for the past 6, 7 years and went through the things and everybody going.

And I don't know. And also I gotta, I gotta shout out these people because I hear some problems going on. Shout out everybody in Solano County that helped me somehow in some way get off the streets.

And I don't know the things, but I will name the shelters I went to, the programs that I went to, and even the one that I'm going through now, which is funded through HUD. And even though, you know, I will say the resources I got, once I got in there is.

I'm sorry, I have to ask you to wrap up.

Okay, I'm gonna wrap it up.

I'm gonna say the resources I got is limited, but if we work together and let people with the different differences get the opportunities to work, stay healthy, medical and all that, and housing, whether it's a tiny home, that's what I was willing to sleep in, and that's what I participated in a lot of the meetings and things like that.

So. But now I'm in the studio and I'm doing very well. I wouldn't say I'm doing well, but I'm doing well.

Thank you for being here. We really appreciate it. Thank you.

Good morning, Mr. Chair. Members, Steven Stenzler with Brown Scene on behalf of the Housing Action Coalition. We're a member driven organization that represents developers, land use attorneys, architects in the Bay Area focused on building housing at all income levels.

And the Housing Action Coalition has worked diligently over the last several years to reduce barriers to development at both the state and local level. And one of the things that we find is that misalignment on priorities among state agencies and departments is one of the biggest killers for development, causing delays and cost increases.

And we've been making progress on that at the state level. We just would encourage everyone as we're working on the details of this proposal to keep that in mind, we think that having a cabinet level position overseeing housing and keeping the focus on it will be really important to driving that alignment and goals.

And we're really excited and support the proposal. Looking forward to seeing it develop.

Hi, my name. My name is Kerry West. I'm with Thompson Public Affairs representing the Bridge Housing Corporation, the Christian Church Homes Midpen East Bay Asian Local Development Corporation, the Housing Leadership Council of San Mateo County, Lisk Bay Area, the California Association of Local Housing Finance Agencies, the Sacramento Housing alliance and the nonprofit Housing Association of Northern California.

The nonprofit Housing Association of Northern California representing nonprofit affordable housing developers over the nine counties of the San Francisco Bay Area. This agency will propose. I'm sorry. This proposal will make such a meaningful difference for our practitioners that develop thousands of affordable units each year.

We are grateful to the secretary and the governor for their work on this issue. It's a step in the right direction and we look forward to engaging further especially as budget, funding and regulatory details emerge. Thank you all so much.

Wonderful. I'll close public comment and want to thank everyone who is here and especially those who are engaged in this process as practitioners, as developers, as providers. I know that this proposal comes as a result of a lot of feedback, input and also partnership.

And that will also be true for the next steps of this and as it is implemented.

I know was wonderful to hear all of the strong support for this proposal and I can say here, as on behalf of my colleagues who, who were here and, and as the Chair of the Housing Committee, that the, the feeling is also shared by the legislature. We're excited about this proposal.

I'm excited to see where it goes and what it can do to solve some of the challenges that we've heard. But most importantly to make sure that housing is there for folks who need it. That we confront our affordable housing crisis and homelessness crisis with the scale and the urgency that it requires.

And so I want to thank you, Secretary Moss, Deputy Director Franklin, Director Velasquez for your leadership and you'll continue to have our partnership as this moves forward. And Ms. Miller and Mr.

Morgan, thank you so much for being here and your work and look forward to to continuing to partner with all of us here to get this work done. I don't know if there's anything you want to say in close. I'll give you that opportunity.

You said it all. I just want to express our gratitude. You know, this is not just an exercise for many of us. We have dedicated our careers and our passion and commitment to seeing this through. You have our partnership as well. So I appreciate the time and, and. All of the, the, the comment and.

Community that comes in the spirit of this reorganization. That's how we're going to do it together. Thank you.

Thank you so much. And thank you again to you. And I should also say thank you to the governor as well, for his continued prioritization of our challenges around homelessness and housing and the willingness to, to make a change here.

I know this has been a process and takes time and, but it's going to make a difference, not only for us who are here, but for many, many years to come, for everyone who will be benefit from a much more effective process and structure to be able to deliver on our goals and, and meet the demands.

So with that, thanks again, everyone, for your time and this meeting's adjourned.