Mayor Darrell Steinberg used his third State of the City address on Friday to introduce his concept of a housing and transportation measure for the 2024 ballot, called the ‘Climate, Clean Transportation and Affordable Housing Measure’. The half cent sales tax would generate about $8-9 billion over the 40 years, and the transportation aspects would be administered by Sacramento Transportation Authority (SacTA) which administers the current Measure A. More detail is available on the Mayor’s Community Engagement website https://engagesac.org/blog-civic-engagement/2023/8/25/a-new-vision-to-fund-affordable-housing-and-transportation.

One-third would go to a countywide housing trust fund, to provide affordable housing, permanent supportive housing, and other types. One-quarter of the one-third would be devoted to keeping people in their housing so they don’t become homeless to begin with.

Another one-third would go for public transportation. Specifically, initiate bus rapid transit routes, increase bus frequencies on all routes, buy new fleet, and create express buses across the region.

The other one-third would be for safe streets and active transportation. Implement vision zero, build sidewalks and protected bike lanes, multipurpose trails, car and bike share, and repair roads, all with an equity lens.

All of these investments would help the city and county reach the agreed-upon greenhouse gas (GHG) reduction target of 19% for the region.

Steinberg acknowledged that there will be opposition from the old guard, who want to keep doing the same things that don’t work and have never worked for most citizens of the city and county.

He pointed out that transit cannot be effective unless we achieve a density of housing and destinations that allows transit to work.

The mayor said that he would prefer a countywide measure, but would go for a city measure if the other partners (county and the four cities) are not interested. He emphasized several times that climate change compels us to change directions and invest more wisely.

Panel

A panel was composed of Elk Grove Mayor Bobbie Singh-Allen, Steve Cohn of SMART (Sacramento Metro Advocates for Rail and Transit), Cathy Creswell, Chair of Sacramento Housing Alliance, Luke Wood, President of Sacramento State, and Gabby Trejo of Sacramento Area Congregations Together (SacACT).

I won’t detail the panel questions and answers, except to say that there was a recognition among all that housing and transportation are inextricably linked. If you watch the video of the session, note that the first ten minutes is dead air space, and the quality of the video is poor. But still worth watching.

As I say, “You can’t have affordable housing without effective transit, and you can’t have effective transit without a density of housing and services”.