San Diego officials will adopt a new policy prioritizing fair housing across the city and direct at least 70 percent of affordable housing to moderate- and higher-resourced neighborhoods by 2028 under a legal settlement approved Tuesday by the City Council.
The city also agreed to prioritize housing density in more affluent areas of San Diego and to promote city-funded affordable housing projects in higher-income communities.
City officials further pledged to offer a sales-tax rebate to promote new grocery stores in lower-income neighborhoods and allocate up to $500,000 to boost a first-time homebuyers program run by the San Diego Housing Commission.
The settlement also calls for the city to pay $650,000 to plaintiffs to cover attorney fees and other costs. It was approved on a 8-0 council vote without public debate.
The concessions were reached as part of a settlement to resolve a lawsuit filed against the city in 2019 by a group of women from southeastern San Diego who complained that officials for too long had wrongly concentrated low-income housing in their neighborhoods, and kept it out of wealthier areas.
“This agreement will put in place a moderate process in which lower-income families will have an opportunity to live in the higher-resource areas of our city,” said plaintiffs’ lawyer Michael Aguirre, a former elected San Diego city attorney.
“There will be an effort to locate areas where lower-income housing can be integrated across the city seamlessly,” Aguirre said.
The federal court will retain jurisdiction over the case and enforce the agreement, according to the staff report presented to the City Council. The city did not acknowledge any liability as a result of the lawsuit.
“While the city denied any discriminatory impact caused by its housing policies, settling the litigation provides certainty and avoids years of protracted litigation and avoids a potential injunction on affordable housing if plaintiffs were to prevail at trial,” the report said.
Councilmember Vivian Moreno was absent from the Tuesday meeting.
Councilmember Henry Foster III, who represents the home neighborhoods of most of the plaintiffs, opposed the settlement in closed session, records show. He voted in favor of the deal Tuesday. Foster did not immediately respond to a request for an explanation.
With their lawsuit, plaintiffs Patrice Baker, Gloria Cooper, Leslie Dudley, Letitia Flynn, Kathleen MacLeod, Eileen Osborne and Khalada Salaam-Alaji accused San Diego officials of violating state fair-housing laws in Mt. Hope, Encanto, Jamacha and other neighborhoods.
“The city has a pattern and practice of either waiving or deferring (development fees) for the additional housing units in these affected communities,” the suit said. “The non-collection of these fees will negatively influence the quality of life and creates unsafe living conditions.”
The lawsuit originally included San Diego County as a defendant. But county lawyers successfully argued that it should be excluded from the complaint, and a federal judge in 2020 agreed to remove the county from the suit.
The plaintiffs subsequently amended the lawsuit along narrower legal grounds. In 2022, the judge rejected the city’s motion for dismissal and instead agreed to allow the lawsuit to move forward.
“No legitimate purpose is served by concentrating poverty in these low-income areas,” the third amended complaint said. “Rather, keeping the low-income housing out of the non-affected communities feeds to the will of those with higher incomes and the resulting ability to influence politics through their wealth.”
The settlement terms were negotiated over the past number of months.
All told, the city agreed to implement seven specific actions in coming months and to pay the $650,000 in legal fees and litigation costs.
In addition to permitting 70 percent of affordable housing projects in moderate- and higher-resourced communities across San Diego and incentivizing new grocery stores in lower-income neighborhoods, the city will prioritize and increase housing density in higher-resourced areas.
The San Diego Housing Commission did not immediately respond to a request for an explanation about how it plans to implement the new affordable-housing components of the settlement.
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