Race or Ethnicity Number of Loans
Originated
Percentage High-Cost
White, Not Hispanic 62431 1.80%
Black, Not Hispanic 1689 3.37%
Asian, Not Hispanic 73926 1.23%
Hispanic/Latino 14275 4.79%
The statistics for subprime loans may not seem like cause for concern, since each percentage is so low. However, the low percentages are due to the extremely costly market in Santa Clara County.
The differences between racial/ethnic groups is striking, even at these levels. The Hispanic/Latino subprime rate, 4.79%, is nearly four times the rate of Asian subprime loans, 1.23.
Location of Accessible Housing
Although it is not possible to precisely map the location of accessible housing in the city, it tends to exist where there are concentrations of new, multifamily housing and where there are concentrations of publicly supported housing. The American Community Survey does not facilitate the disaggregation of housing units by the number of units in a structure and the year a structure is built together, but it does allow a look at those two data points separately. As the maps below reflect, these two data poin ts tell a sometimes converging, though nuanced tale. New construction seems to be concentrated in the northernmost part of San José , with a bit in central San José and some more to the southeast. There is also new construction concentrated in Morgan Hill, and near Stanford’s campus. Units in structure from 20 units to 49 units (multifamily, but on the smaller side) tend to be located on the western side, which is more heavily White and Asian American or Pacific Islander. Units in structure 50 units or more align with the northernmost area of San José that has seen recent construction, and are also sprinkled along the central thoroughfare of El Camino Real, although to a lesser extent. As the publicly supported housing map shows, there is a concentration of Project-Based Section 8 housing in the western part of the County, with LIHTCs more prevalent in the eastern, segregated part of San José . A large majority of Project - Based Section 8 units are 0 -1 bedrooms, which may pose a problem for tenants with disabili ties who need a live -in aide or who reside with family members . This may have the effect of segregating people with disabilities. In San Benito County, which makes up the balance of the region, the vast majority of housing units are single family houses. People who need accessibility modifications and cannot access multifamily units constructed to meet the FHA’s accessibility requirements will need to utilize accessibility modification funding or some other resource to meet their needs.
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Map, Median Year Structure Built, Santa Clara County
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Map, Units in Structure (20-49), Santa Clara County
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Map, Units in Structure (50+), Santa Clara County
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Map, Publicly Supported Housing, Santa Clara County
Location of Employers
The major cities in Santa Clara County boast employers providing tens of thousands of jobs to residents of the County.45 However, these major employers also provide jobs to tens of thousands 45 Largest Silicon Valley Employers, SILICON VALLEY BUS. J. (Jul. 19, 2019), https://www.bizjournals.com/sanjose/subscriber-only/2019/07/19/largest-silicon-valley-employers.html.
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out-of-county residents,46 indicating that the expensive housing in Santa Clara County47 has forced at least some people who would otherwise prefer to reside close to work to live elsewhere.
The relatively high commute times for Santa Clara County residents backs up this anecdotal finding. On average, Santa Clara County commuters spend more time in traffic than most United States citizens,
48 as they are subject to increasing congestion affecting the entire Bay Area 49 and sometimes imperfect public transportation options. 50 These lengthening commutes add evidence that many people live further than they would like from their employment, a feature that can impose significant burdens, particularly on lower-income employees.
Even so, this factor is no more a problem in Santa Clara County than it is in the broader region (San Benito County). Average commutes in San Benito are significantly longer than those for Santa Clara County residents,
51 and the number of “super -commuters” has risen over the past decade in San Benito just as it has in Santa Clara County.52 San Benito, far less populous, does not have the same breadth of employers offering jobs as does Santa Clara County. 53 Therefore, whatever stress created by location of employers for Santa Clara relative to fair housing is primarily a region-wide issue, rather than a county-specific one.
Location of Environmental Health Hazards
Santa Clara has a total of twenty -three active superfund sites, more than any other county in the United States. 54 Recently, these sites have come under scrutiny after EPA groundwater testing revealed that toxic chemicals were present.55 These sites are largely the byproduct of Santa Clara County’s role as the home of “Silicon Valley,” which – particularly in the 1980s – drove 46 Id.
47 See, e.g., Bay Area in 2010s: Soaring Real Estate Prices Ending the California Dream , KPIX 5 (Jan. 1, 2020), https://sanfrancisco.cbslocal.com/2020/01/01/bay-area-in-2010s-soaring-real-estate-prices-ending-the-california- dream/ (noting that Santa Clara County led the broader Bay Area by having 17 zip codes on the 100 priciest list in the United States at the turn of the decade).
48 QuickFacts: United States; Santa Clara County, California, UNITED STATES CENSUS BUREAU, https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/US,santaclaracountycalifornia/PST045219 (last accessed Jan. 30, 2020).
49 Erin Baldassari, Bay Area Super-Commuting Growing: Here’s Where It’s the Worst, THE MERCURY NEWS (Sept. 11, 2019), https://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/2020/01/02/slammed-by-critics-vta-strives-to-fix-leadership (noting that the number of “super-commuters,” or those with an over-90 minute commute to work each way, had grown by 85% in Santa Clara County from 2009-2017).
50 Mark Noack, Slammed by Critics, VTA Strives to Fix Leadership, PALO ALTO ONLINE (Jan. 2, 2020), https://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/2020/01/02/slammed-by-critics-vta-strives-to-fix-leadership (noting the criticism of the management of the leading public transit option in Santa Clara County). 51 QuickFacts: San Benito County, California; Santa Clara County, California, UNITED STATES CENSUS BUREAU, https://www.census.gov/quickfacts/fact/table/santaclaracountycalifornia,sanbenitocountycalifornia/PST045219 (last accessed Jan. 30, 2020).
52 Baldassari, supra note 5 (the number of “super-commuters” rose 58% in San Benito county from 2009-2017). 53 Largest Silicon Valley Employers, supra note 1.
54 Tatiana Schlossberg, Silicon Valley Is One of the Most Polluted Places in the Country, THE ATLANTIC (Sept. 22, 2019), https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2019/09/silicon-valley-full-superfund-sites/598531/. 55 Id.
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manufacturing of chemicals needed to make the technological products companies in the region are famous for. 56 According to the HUD Data and Mapping Tool, the environmental health of Santa Clara varies widely. In particular, tracts in and around San José (the largest city in the Santa Clara County) receive scores as low as 4 in the Environmental Health Index, revealing significant problems in environmental health close to the county’s largest population center. 57 There are,
however, some tracts with scores in the 80s and 90s – but these are the exception, not the norm.58 The Santa Clara Department of Public Health does offer information and resources concerning environmental impacts broadly and operates clean water and site mitigation programs to h elp residents avoid the effects of water contamination.
59 Santa Clara’s environmental health status compares poorly with the rest of the region (San Benito County). San Benito’s lowest-scoring tract on the Environmental Health Index receives a 41, and all of the other tracts range between the high 60s-high 80s. 60 Likely, this is a result of San Benito’s
relative lack of chemical manufacturing and superfunds (only one superfund site exists in San Benito – the New Idria Mercury Mine).
61 Location of proficient schools and school assignment policies The locations of proficient schools and school assignment policies are less of a factor in Gilroy, both because the distance between Gilroy and parts of the county with higher performing schools would be pr ohibitive for the feasibility of inter -district transfers and because there are not wide disparities between Gilroy’s public schools that correspond to its demographic patterns. For instance, Gilroy High School and Christopher High School serve the southern and northern portions of the city whereas the primary demographic divide is between the more heavily Hispanic eastern portion of the city and the more heavily White western portion of the city. The two high schools have similar test scores and similar de mographic compositions. In the northern part of Santa Clara County, however, there is a high degree of fragmentation among school districts, inter- district transfers for purposes of accessing higher quality programs are difficulty to achieve, and patterns in school proficiency consistently show that Hispanic and Vietnamese residents have less access to high performing schools.
Location and type of affordable housing
As is documented in the Publicly Supported Housing section of this Assessment, publicly supported housing is concentrated in parts of the County that have disproportionate concentrations of Hispanic Residents (in the case of the east side of San José, Vietnamese residents). These areas 56 Id.
57 Environmental Health Hazard Index, ARCGIS,
https://www.arcgis.com/home/item.html?id=8d292db7263c44eea5064186a91229ff. 58 Id.
59 COUNTY OF SANTA CLARA: DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENTAL HEALTH, https://www.sccgov.org/sites/deh/Pages/deh.aspx (last visited Jan. 30, 2020). 60 Environmental Health Hazard Index, supra note 4.
61 New Idria Mercury Mine: Idria, CA, ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION AGENCY, https://cumulis.epa.gov/supercpad/cursites/csitinfo.cfm?id=0905346.
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include San José (except for west San José and parts of far south San José), Morgan Hill, and parts of Mountain View, Santa Clara, and Sunnyvale. By contrast, areas that have small Hispanic and Vietnamese populations – whether they are majority White or have a high combined population of White residents, Chinese residents, and Indian residents – have relatively little affordable housing.
This is particularly true in the city of Cupertino, the West Valley cities that are part of the Urban County, and the parts of the cities of Mountain View, Santa Clara, and Sunnyvale that are furthest from the San Francisco Bay. Thus, and in light of the correlation between Hispanic ethnicity and Vietnamese ancestry, respectively, and low -income status, the location of affordable housing contributes to patterns of segregation. This is exacerbated by the heavy focus on affordable housing for seniors in Cupertino and Santa Clara. Because the low -income senior population is more heavily White than the broader low-income population, siting this housing in areas that are more heavily White than the broader region is less likely to foster integration. Additionally, the County’s broader focus on permanent supportive housing has led to a comparative underinvestment in affordable housing for extremely low-income families with children, which are more likely to be Hispanic or Vietnamese.
Loss of affordable housing
Gilroy and San José have instituted mobile home park rent control, which is a significant source of affordable housing for low -income residents. San José and Mountain View have existing rent control ordinances, and the state of California recently passed a rent control law. Statewide rent control will not preempt any existing, more generous ordinances; however, it will only be in effect for ten years. On the flipside, lower-priced apartments that might represent another significant source of unsubsidized affordable housing remain vulnerable to Ellis Act evictions and conversions. San José, in particular, has modified the Ellis Act, allowing for a reduction in the number of rent -controlled apartments that must be brought back when a rent -controlled development is demolished, and giving developers more generous waiver requirements. The National Housing Preservation Database shows that there are 39 properties in the County with “inactive” subsidies, with a total of 1,567 total units. Additionally, several developments with active subsidies are scheduled to expire within the next decade. On the regional level, San Benito County has just two small developments with inactive subsidies, versus fourteen with active subsidies. Statewide rent control and the Ellis Act cut in opposite directions, and have a similar effect on San Benito, albeit on a smaller scale.
Occupancy Codes and Restrictions
The state of California has not ado pted the Universal Building Code. Instead, they have enacted the California Building Code, which also incorporates the International Building Code. The California Building Code has a rather broad definition of family, in that it does not only limit a family to “an individual or two or more persons who are related by blood or marriage,” but expands the definition to any persons who “otherwise live together in a dwelling unit.” 62 This definition is
not restrictive in a way that would negatively affect access to housing. 62 CAL., BUILDING CODE § 202.
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Santa Clara County also defines family broadly, as “one or more persons . . . living as a single . . . household,” explicitly excluding only those “operating a hotel, club, fraternity or sorority house.”63 Moreover, the code explicitly deems “necessary domestic help” as included within the definition of family.
64 In examining the five largest cities in Santa Clara County, all five have definitions of family that, while often using language distinct from one another, retain the expansive, non- restrictive view adopted by both California and Santa Clara County. 65 Accordingly, occupancy
codes and restrictions are not a major factor in reducing access to fair housing in Santa Clara County.
The Santa Clara approach to occupancy codes is matched by the rest of the region (San Benito County). Specifically, San Benito’s definition of “family” is nearly identical to Santa Clara County’s defining family as “[o]ne or more persons occupying a premises and living as a single, non-profit, housekeeping unit” and explicitly including “servants” (rather the Santa Clara County’s formulation of “domestic help”) within the definition of family. 66 Therefore, there are not major
disparities region-wide on this issue.
Private Discrimination
According to the California Department of Fair Employment and Housing (DFEH) Annual Report, there were 623 complaints in Santa Clara County in 2017. 67 Broken down by category, there were
191 employment complaints, 33 housing complaints, 4 under the Ralph Civil Rights Act, and 22 under the Unruh Civil Rights Act. 373 of the complaints were investigated and determined actionable.
Project Sentinel, which receives housing complaints locally, reported during the community engagement process that since 2016, they have received 598 complaints. Of those, 332 were based on disability, 121 on familial status, 71 on national origin, 33 on race, 40 on sex (including harassment, domestic violence, and lease break/eviction), 4 on source of income, 1 on gender identify, 3 on sexual orientation, 3 on marital status, 3 were “arbitrary” under the Uhruh Civil Rights Act, 1 was based on immigration status, and 2 were “other.” Project Sentinel also reported changes in discrimination regarding immigration status – with a marked increase in this type of discrimination following the 2016 election. Project Sentinel reported more fear amongst immigrant communities in bringing housing complaints. In the past, immigrant communities were more likely 63 SANTA CLARA COUNTY, CAL., CODE § 1.30.030.
64 Id.
65 See SAN JOSÉ, CAL., CODE § 20.200.370 (defining family as “one or more persons occupying a premises and living as a single housekeeping unit”); SUNNYVALE, CAL., CODE § 19.12.070 (including in the definition of family a “group of two or more persons who need not be related, living together in a single [dwelling] unit”); CITY OF SANTA CLARA, CAL., CODE § 18.06.010 (defining family as “an individual or group of persons living together as a single housekeeping unit in a dwelling unit”); MOUNTAIN VIEW, CAL., CODE § 29.54 (using the same definition as San José); MILPITAS, CAL., CODE § XI-10-2.03 (including in the definition of family “unrelated persons who function together as a single household unit”).
66 SAN BENITO COUNTY, CAL., CODE § 25.03.002.
67 https://www.dfeh.ca.gov/wp-content/uploads/sites/32/2018/08/DFEH-AnnualReport-2017.pdf Attachment 2
to fear landlord retaliation or loss of housing, but more recently landlords have threatened to call ICE, even when residents are not undocumented.68
With regard to disability -based complaints, Project Sentinel reports that most are related to requests for reasonable accommodations (animals, economic reasonable accommodations, tenancy extensions, caregivers, etc.). However, some involve evictions and/or harassment. In Project Sentinel’s last Private Enforcement Initiative (PEI), they conducted family status testing based on UC Berkeley opportunity mapping. After 43 tests, roughly half resulted in a complaint or a landlord education letter. Occupancy limits and state preferences for single professionals often appear in discriminatory housing advertisements. The rampant nature of familial status discrimination is backed up by stakeholder meetings, which noted that familial status discrimination is often cloaked by pretexts.
Stakeholder meetings revealed high levels of discrimination against people with disabilities, who often have income provided solely by social security, and cannot access affordable housing. One stakeholder reported discrimination by landlords against people with psychiatric disabilities, particularly against children in broader households. An additional challenge is posed by non- elderly disabled people who can’t work, but aren’t eligible for senior housing.
Finally, one stakeholder has highlighted private discrimination when it comes to accessory dwelling units which are eligible for assistance money. If they are eligible for assistance, they are governed by affordable housing rules. However, the individual homeowners that control the ADUs are making the real life choices about who will live in their ADU, and there is an increased risk of discrimination, especially by those ignorant of fair housing laws. To combat this, Housing Trust SV will do fair housing training for homeowners receiving their assistance.
The rest of the region is made up of San Benito County. Private discrimination is not a pressing issue in San Benito County, evidenced by the low numbers of complaints DFEH attributes to the County (1 employment, 9 right-to-sue, 10 total).
Quality of affordable housing information programs
There are no general -eligibility mobility counseling programs for Housing Choice Voucher holders in the County. There are a couple of discrete programs, which serve very small populations.
The Welfare to Work Program receives financial support from the County Social Services Agency to fund housing search staff and assist with housing counseling exclusively for Welfare to Work clients. Silicon Valley Independent Living Center provides housing counseling and placement to developmentally disabled adults. However, because of the recent passage of statewide source of income protections and the fact that the SCCHA is a County -wide agency, the need for mobility counseling is less pressing than in a highly fragmented, proportionally smaller part of a metropolitan area. Moving to a high opportunity area elsewhere in Santa Clara County can be accomplished with relative ease, especially considering that the payment standards in Santa Clara 68 See AB 291.
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are higher than the Fair Market Rents, there is a relatively large amount of units that fit within those payment standards, and there is no need to port vouchers into another housing authority’s territory. Regionally speaking, San Benito County is far less populous and there is less demand to port vouchers into the county. Although there are no mobility- specific housing counseling programs, San Benito’s Housing Element does call for the solicitation of organizations to provide bilingual rental housing counseling services, including tenant/landlord referral and mediation services.
69 Regulatory barriers to providing housing and supportive services for persons with disabilities
Regulatory barriers to providing housing and supportive services for persons with disabilities are not a significant contributing factor to fair housing issues for persons with disabilities in Santa Clara County and the cities of Cupertino, Gilroy, Mountain View, Palo Alto, San José, Santa Clara, and Sunnyvale. The amount of affordable housing available (and its cost), the extent of outreach and capacity among service providers, and the scope of service provision are the biggest drivers of the segregation of persons with disabilities. To the extent that barriers are regulatory in nature, they overlap significantly with the zoning and land use barriers to the construction of affordable housing generally. This Assessment discusses those in detail in the analysis of the Land Use and Zoning Laws contributing factor.
Siting selection policies, practices, and decisions for publicly supported housing, including discretionary aspects of Qualified Allocation Plans and other programs The main policy-driven factor related to the siting of publicly supported housing is the heavy focus of affordable housing development efforts throughout the state on transit -oriented development.
Overall, there is very high access to transportation throughout the County. When real affordability is built into transit-oriented development, these investments may have a positive effect on stable integration in areas undergoing gentrification by arresting the process of displacement.
The California Tax Credit Allocation Committee’s QAP heavily incentivizes family -occupancy Low Income Housing Tax Credit (LIHTC) development in what it terms “High Resource” or “Highest Resource” areas. As the map below illustrates, these areas are generally high opportunity areas that are disproportionately white. LIHTC development in these areas would contribute to greater residential racial integration. In light of the significant incentives for LIHTC development in High Resource and Highest Resource areas, the QAP does not currently contribute to segregation. At the same time, it is important to note that the California Tax Credit Allocation Committee adopted the incentives against the backdrop of a long history of allocating credits to developments that perpetuated segregation. The QAP includes set -aside pools for the South and West Bay Region (San Mateo and Santa Clara Counties) of 6%, which is roughly equal to its share in the population of the state.
69 http://www.cosb.us/wp-cont ent/uploads/2014-2023_Sec5_San_Benito_County_Housing_Element_2016-04- 12_BoS_adopted.pdf
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Source of income discrimination
Effective September 27, 2019, San José outlawed source of income discrimination. In October of 2019 the governor signed into law SB 329, prohibiting discrimination in housing based on source of income statewide. Since San José’s source of income ordinance was only enacted in fall of 2019, and the statewide law took effect shortly after, it is hard to know whether there will be widespread noncompliance, such that source of income discrimination remains a problem in Santa Clara County. If noncompliance presents itself as a problem, landlord education programs may become necessary in order to mitigate the negative experiences. Still, a decision regarding the Attachment 2
appropriateness of this move is premature. The community engagement process has yielded comments on this issue, but many of the comments have been restricted to a prospective hope that the new law(s) will be effective.
State or local laws, policies or practices that discourage individuals with disabilities from living in apartments, family homes, supportive housing and other integrated settings State or local laws, policies, or practices that discourage individuals with disabilities from living in apartments, family homes, supportive housing, and other integrated settings are not a significant contributing factor to fair housing issues in Santa Clara County and the cities of Cupertino, Gilroy, Mountain View, Palo Alto, San José, Santa Clara, and Sunnyvale. A severe shortage of available, integrated affordable housing is the primary driver of the segregation of persons with disabilities, rather than laws, policies, or practices that discourage persons with disabilities from living in integrated housing
Unresolved Violations of Fair Housing or Civil Rights Law As has been previously discussed in the Fair Housing Enforcement section, there have been very few recent/ongoing actions against any of the entitlement jurisdictions in this analysis, and these actions have been civil rights (though not specifically housing) focused. There have been multiple Voluntary Conciliation Agreements and Consent Decrees concerning fair housing actions occurring in Santa Clara County, but these have been effectuated against private landlords and other business entities, rather than jurisdictions. These successful settlements have been most often brought by Project Sentinel in its capacity as a private fair housing enforcement organization. In the region, made up of Santa Clara and San Benito Counties, San Benito County experiences far fewer fair housin g and civil rights violations – this conclusion is based on complaint reporting from DFEH, and is a consistent observation, based in part on its much smaller population.
Nevertheless, there has been a recent controversy in San Benito County regarding Hollister School District funding, which implicates civil rights issues. It is alleged that developer fees were withheld from the school district, meaning that the schools certainly faced a funding shortage and were therefore more constrained in their ability to provide a quality education to their students. The lawsuit was settled confidentially in 2018.
70 70 https://benitolink.com/county-and-h ollister-school-district-agree-to-confidential-settlement-details-still- sketchy/
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