I’m writing in support of Mayor Pro Tempore and City Council member Kristen Sneddon, who is running for Mayor of Santa Barbara. As a long-time advocate for affordable housing and downtown revitalization, I have had many opportunities to watch Kristen in action. She has been at the forefront of these issues.
Two years ago, when the city engaged in extensive public outreach to assess the viability of a sales tax increase, affordable housing turned out to be the top reason why voters would support such a measure. When voters subsequently approved a half-cent increase in the sales tax, it was understood that a significant portion of the resulting $15 million would be used to fund affordable housing through the city’s Local Housing Trust Fund.
When only $1.5 million was budgeted for that purpose, Kristen fought hard to assure that the Trust Fund got $5 million a year for each of the next two years. As noted by Josh Molina (then South County editor of Noozhawk), current editor of the News-Press, “Santa Barbara City Councilwoman Kristen Sneddon is on a mission: Find a way to put $5 million into the Local Housing Trust Fund.”
When this required the city to come up with $1 million from its reserves, her motion also directed the city and the finance committee to come up with a plan to replenish the reserves.
Kristen has never veered from her mission to make housing affordable. She has taken hits for being co-author and unwavering proponent of the city’s just-adopted Rent Stabilization Ordinance (RSO). In a city where renting a two-bedroom apartment goes for $4,000 — a figure which has increased by over a third in only five years — Kristen’s leadership is needed.
While Santa Barbara’ RSO is described by its critics as among the strictest of California’s three dozen ordinances, in fact under California law all of these ordinances are moderate when compared with old-fashioned rent control. State law exempts all rental housing built after 1995, as well as most single-family homes and condos, so new construction and most owner-rented homes aren’t affected. Landlords are also allowed to charge whatever they want once a unit is vacated (“vacancy decontrol”); the unit is then subject to rent stabilization only once it is again rented.
As early as 2019, when she was chair of the city’s ordinance committee, Kristen pushed for a city ordinance that would protect tenants from being unjustly evicted. A number of “just cause” protections were achieved, culminating in last year’s “renoviction” ordinance, which Kristen cosponsored, that includes a cap on rent increases when displaced tenants are forced to temporarily relocate so necessary renovations can occur.
Last year AB Commercial, an investment firm that had acquired most of the Paseo Nuevo mall, made the city a scaled-down offer: give us title to the land under the mall, and we may provide 24 units of affordable housing. If you refuse, we’ll let the mall die. Kristen would have none of their threat. When the investment firm presented its final proposal to the City Council, she picked it apart, commenting that representatives from the firm, “looked me in the eye … and said: ‘If you don’t pass this deal, we’re going to leave it fallow like we’ve done to two other properties in Los Angeles right now — and that’s just the reality.’”
The City Council called AB’s bluff, effectively rejecting the offer.
Six months later, Kristen’s stand against giving the mall to AB Commercial paid off. Goleta-based Yardi Systems proposed to move its corporate headquarters to Paseo Nuevo, bringing some 600 employees to the long vacant Macy’s — a boost to downtown business. Yardi additionally agreed to put $5 million into the Local Housing Trust Fund. The deal also involves DSP, a joint venture that owns the Nordstroms property; DSP agreed to provide rental housing, $1 million for downtown improvement, and $700,000 to the Local Housing Trust Fund.
Kristen has delivered where we need it most. That is why I support her for mayor.
Richard Appelbaum
Distinguished Professor Emeritus and former MacArthur Chair in Sociology and Global & International Studies, UCSB