REPORT TO PLANNING COMMISSION
SUBJECT
Title
Public Hearing: Recommendation on The Adoption of The Citywide Objective Design Standards for Multi-Family and Residential Mixed-Use Projects into The Santa Clara Zoning Code. CEQA: Addendum to the 2010-2035 General Plan EIR
Report
BACKGROUND
In recent years, the State Legislature has adopted a series of bills to address the state's housing shortage and high housing costs. For a variety of multifamily and mixed-use residential projects, cities are now required to provide a streamlined ministerial approval process to facilitate and expedite the construction of housing. Laws like the Housing Accountability Act, the Housing Crisis Act (also known as SB 330 (2019)), and SB 35 (2017) expedite the review process for qualifying projects and limit local governments' authority to impose zoning and design standards that are not "objective" criteria. Both the state statutes and the Guidelines of the California Department of Housing & Community Development (HCD) define "Objective Standards" as "involving no personal or subjective judgment by a public official and . . . uniformly verifiable by reference to an external and uniform benchmark or criterion". Importantly, the standards once established are applied ministerially.
Policy A-3 of the City's certified sixth cycle Housing Element is to "Utilize objective design standards to streamline the housing development process." Currently, architectural review is still required for most residential projects, including multi-family developments, as well as single-family attached developments and developments taller than one story. The development of Objective Design Standards (ODS) will help to clarify the applicable standards and potentially reduce review times.
Since the certification of the Housing Element, Planning staff have undertaken the task of developing ODS for Multi-family Residential and Residential Mixed-Use Projects.
On November 12, 2025, the Planning Commission conduc...
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