Votes! At The County
- Santa Clara Housing Advocates
- Nov 18
- 3 min read
This morning, the County Board of Supervisors renewed their support for the Benton Project - now called the Santa Clara Family Community. Passed unanimously as part of the consent calendar, the BoS confirmed that the county can enter into agreements with the State of California, City of Santa Clara, and LifeMoves for the funding, construction, and operations of the project. Thank you to Jeff for attending the meeting and Shalini for giving public comment! We had two speakers in favor of the agenda item, and none opposing. This is a good sign as we prep for next steps! The whispers around town on when BentonVote_Final_Final(1) will take place continue to push down the calendar a month at a time. While we wait, we are continuing our efforts with relationship building on the Council. When the time comes, we will encourage emails to City Council, create a plan for public comment at the Council Meeting, and other forms of advocacy. If you want to be part of the strategy discussions, please let us know! It will be all hands on deck.
If you didn't get a notification about this vote, please sign up for updates from the County and City here. And if you want to add a friend or family member to the SCHA email list, you can have them sign up on our website, email me directly, or you can swoop in and sign them up as a surprise.
Answer the survey linked above or reply to this email to join one of interest groups. Like everything in SCHA, the groups are only as active as its members. The level of commitment is completely up to you. If you have an idea for another topic for SCHA to work on, please share that too!
Group A: Project Advocacy / Evaluation
There are multiple (market rate) projects coming up this year that we hope to evaluate, write a letter to council, and potentially speak at council about. We will be evaluating projects against our Mission, Values, Strategy (MVS) statements. Joining this working group would likely include discussing the details of the project against our MVS, making a recommendation on what SCHA's position should be (including recommended changes if needed), and participating or even leading the charge in advocating to Council or other entities.
Inclusion on the list below does not necessarily mean that we will support them, but it hopefully means that we will evaluate and track them.
Group B: Public Education
From the beginning, Public Education has been a priority for SCHA. We spent much of the Benton campaign trying to educate the public and decision makers about not only that specific project, but larger issues related to housing as well. This group works on furthering that goal.
Group C: Tracking City Activities
This group monitors City Council and Commission agendas, new projects, and anything else happening in the city that SCHA might want to know about. Thank you to Jeff and Melinda for always being on top of this!
Group D: Recruitment / Organizing
We are a grassroots group of people who live in Santa Clara, and we can't accomplish our goals with just a few people. This group will work on recruiting more people who live / work in Santa Clara to join our email list, take actions, join working groups, and otherwise get involved. This is also a great group for people who do not live in Santa Clara but want to help SCHA grow.
Group E: State Legislation
While our primary focus is the City of Santa Clara, state legislation has a direct impact as well. Several housing bills have been proposed by our own State Senator Aisha Wahab, and others are being championed by ally organizations. This group will start by researching those bills and making recommendations on if SCHA should take actions and what those actions would be. If there are other bills you think we should look at, let us know that as well!
Group F: Tenant Rights / Rent Control
This group is in its early stages, as the Leadership Team is interested in this area and trying to figure out what potential actions might come up. Our city does not have any rent control caps beyond statewide mandates. We plan to look into the Housing Element for any potential actions we can take down the line.
Group G: El Camino Real Specific Plan
This group will take a look at proposed amendments to the El Camino Real Specific Plan, likely following a similar process to what was described in #1. This plan includes housing, retail, and more and is expected to come before Council in the near future.