From: NAACP Santa Rosa - Sonoma County
To: NAACP SoCo Secretary
Subject: [EXTERNAL] Public comment on South Santa Rosa Specific Plan (SSRSP) Date: Monday, August 17, 2026 7:13:39 PM
Members of the Santa Rosa City Council and Sonoma County Board of Supervisors, After sustained community advocacy for clear equity and anti-displacement measures within the South Santa Rosa Specific Plan (SSRSP), we understand that staff may pursue these programs and policies on a separate track from approval of the Preferred Alternative. We strongly believe now is the time for City and County decision makers to provide clear direction regarding how, where, and with what level of accountability this work will proceed.
Equity and anti-displacement cannot remain a secondary process left solely to staff discretion.
If the SSRSP is to avoid repeating the harms associated with past urban renewal and redevelopment efforts, these protections must be intentional, transparent, actionable, and incorporated into implementation of the Plan.
The Data Calls for Targeted Action
The recently released Santa Rosa–Sonoma County NAACP study, The State of Black Prosperity 2026, and accompanying Black Scorecard identify significant disparities in housing, education, and economic opportunity. These findings have direct relevance to the SSRSP's equity, affordable housing, and anti-displacement strategies.
This is particularly important because two core Plan-area Census Tracts east of Highway 101 have Black populations of approximately 4% and 5%, compared with approximately 2.3% in Sonoma County and 1.8% in Santa Rosa. The Bay Area overall is approximately 6% Black. The concentration of Black residents in the Plan area is therefore significant and warrants deliberate attention to preserving community, housing stability, and opportunity.
The NAACP Branch requests particular attention to Affirmatively Furthering Fair Housing (AFFH) in the development and implementation of SSRSP policies, including meaningful consideration of impacts on the Plan area's Black community and other historically marginalized residents.
AFFH is already incorporated into state law and City and County Housing Elements. The SSRSP itself recognizes AFFH and equitable development as important tools for preventing displacement and ensuring that reinvestment benefits existing residents.
The key word must be meaningful.
Meaningful action goes beyond aspirational language. It requires policies capable of making measurable differences in whether residents can remain in their homes, access affordable housing, build economic stability, and benefit from neighborhood investment.
Community partners—including Legal Aid, NBOP, the NAACP Branch, mobilehome park residents, the Moorland Neighborhood Action Team, and others—have consistently called for equitable development and strong anti-displacement protections to be integral to the SSRSP rather than optional measures implemented after development pressures intensify.
The Displacement Risk Is Already Clear
The City's Affordable Housing and Anti-Displacement Strategy characterizes displacement risk within the Plan Area as high and states that these challenges must be addressed through the SSRSP so existing community members can remain in their homes while new residents have access to housing at appropriate affordability levels.
The Report also notes that the South Santa Rosa Specific Plan Area has one of the lowest Human Development Index scores in Sonoma County, significantly below County and State averages. These findings support targeted interventions rather than a one-size-fits-all development strategy.
We therefore ask City and County decision makers to review the AFFH meaningful actions identified on page 29 of the Affordable Housing and Anti-Displacement Strategy and provide explicit direction to staff regarding which measures should be developed and implemented.
Meaningful implementation will require staff capacity, funding, timelines, measurable outcomes, and accountability. Community organizations and legal partners may also be able to assist with research, model ordinances, and implementation strategies.
Priority Actions for Consideration
We urge decision makers to prioritize bold, enforceable measures, including:
Tenant protections: Just-cause eviction protections, tenant anti-harassment protections, relocation assistance, right-to-return policies, and consideration of rent stabilization.
Preservation of affordable housing: Strengthen mobilehome park closure, conversion, and rent stabilization protections; establish no-net-loss requirements; and protect naturally occurring affordable housing.
Community ownership: Explore and enact Tenant Opportunity to Purchase Act (TOPA) and Community Opportunity to Purchase Act (COPA) policies.
Affordable housing production: Strengthen Plan area inclusionary housing requirements to 25+%, use density bonuses and project streamlining to incentivize deed-restricted affordable housing, and leverage the City's Prohousing Designation to secure additional resources.
Public land and land use: Prioritize appropriate publicly owned land for affordable housing and evaluate rezoning opportunities, including the Todd Creek pipeline area, for a broader range of residential development to serve multiple income categories.
Homeownership opportunities: Explore affordable-by-design ownership models, including for-sale ADUs and other attainable housing opportunities.
Equity accountability: Require an Office of Equity,Racial Equity Analysis for the Plan area, with measurable outcomes and ongoing public reporting.
Economic opportunity: Pair housing development with strategies that create living- wage employment and recruit employers capable of providing good-paying jobs in South Santa Rosa.
RHNA alignment: Ensure that the approximately 6,000 anticipated new housing units contribute meaningfully toward the region's multi-income affordability obligations rather than allowing the Plan area to become disproportionately market-rate housing.
We also encourage serious consideration of additional economic stability strategies, including living-wage policies, universal basic income, and other approaches that address the relationship between housing affordability, wages, and displacement.
Our Request
The South Santa Rosa Specific Plan represents an extraordinary opportunity to demonstrate what equitable development can look like when communities most vulnerable to displacement are considered before—not after—major investment occurs.
From: Adrian Covert
To: CityCouncilListPublic
Subject: [EXTERNAL] Agenda item 4.1, South Santa Rosa Specific Plan Date: Monday, August 17, 2026 11:19:44 PM
Attachments: 08.17 SouthSRSP.pdf
Greetings Mayor Stapp and Councilmembers,
Please see the attached letter from Santa Rosa YIMBY on the proposed S. Santa Rosa Specific Plan preferred alternative.
Best,
Adrian Covert
Local Lead
Santa Rosa YIMBY
August 17, 2026
The Honorable Mark Stapp
Mayor, City of Santa Rosa
100 Santa Rosa Ave
Santa Rosa, CA 95404
Re: Agenda item 4.1, South Santa Rosa Specific Plan
Dear Mayor Stapp and Councilmembers,
On behalf of Santa Rosa YIMBY , an all-volunteer association of over 500 Santa Rosa residents dedicated to building Santa Rosa into an affordable, vibrant, and low-carbon city for all, I write to share our comments on the proposed South Santa Rosa Specific Plan preferred alternative.
Overall, we’re pleased to see the proposed alternative address our top priorities for South Santa Rosa, which include (1) concentrating the highest housing density near downtown, (2) improving east/west transit connectivity, and (3) investing in multi-modal corridor improvements along Santa Rosa Avenue. We ask that this already proposal be improved in at least three ways.
First, the vast acreage of proposed low-density greenfield development near the planning area’s eastern urban-wild land interface would become a fiscal and wildfire liability. Any development here must have sufficient density to generate the revenues needed to offset new road, utility, and vegetation maintenance costs. Low density residential fails to provide adequate to pay for itself, often becoming a fiscal liability subsidized by tax revenues generated in denser urban areas. The city should zone this for denser development and ensure any future development agreement is fiscally self-sustaining.
Second, the proposed alternative’s position on Moorland is contradictory and dishonest. The city cannot meaningfully invest in Moorland, expand opportunity, and prevent displacement while freezing the neighborhood’s housing capacity. Equity without added density is not a strategy, it’s a promise whose the principal means of fulfillment has been removed. In Moorland as in everyplace else, the only way to protect against displacement is to ensure housing remains affordable by keeping the housing supply at pace with demand. The preferred plan should include increased density in Moorland specifically to meet anti-displacement goals.
Lastly, the preferred plan should retain the possibility of a future SMART station. The planning area’s cluster of industry, housing, and retail makes it a strong candidate for a future station to expand car-free alternatives for residents and businesses both locally and across the SMART corridor.
Thank you for your leadership and for considering our views.
Sincerely,
Adrian Covert
Local Lead
Santa Rosa YIMBY