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Please join us in opposing AB 609, SB 607, and SB 79
May/June 2025
A series of dangerous bills are rapidly advancing in Sacramento that threaten the very foundation of California’s historic, cultural, and architectural heritage.
 Each of these bills sacrifices the shared history and community character of San Diego and California in the name of new housing development—without actually delivering the affordable, equitable housing solutions that San Diegans truly need.
🚫 AB 609 (Wicks)
This bill would gut CEQA protections by redefining "infill" to include up to 20 acres of demolition—even of existing buildings and neighborhoods. Public input? Ignored. Environmental review? Sidestepped. Historic buildings? Bulldozed.
This bill isn’t about smart growth. It’s about clearing neighborhoods and commercial corridors, bypassing environmental review and cutting out public input. CEQA is often the only tool low-income residents and communities of color have to understand and influence development in their neighborhoods. AB 609 silences those voices and risks repeating the mistakes of urban renewal—when entire cultural districts were displaced in the name of progress.
Environmentally, the bill is a step backward. Demolition unleashes embodied carbon, sends waste to landfills, and takes decades for new buildings to offset those climate impacts.
The state already has multiple CEQA exemptions for infill and affordable housing (SB 35, SB 9, SB 10, PRC §21094.5)
This is not smart growth. It's clearance disguised as progress.
🚫 SB 607 (Wiener)
SB 607 eliminates CEQA’s long-standing “fair argument” standard, the only mechanism that ensures significant historic sites receive a proper environmental review. It would allow demolition of cultural and historic places without any study or alternatives, even when there is credible evidence of their value.
SB 607 would allow the demolition of significant cultural and historic sites. This is not a technical update but a dangerous shift in policy.
This isn’t streamlining—it’s silencing.
🚫 SB 79 (Wiener)
This bill hands over land use authority to transit agencies, overriding local planning, bypassing CEQA, and disregarding community voices. It would fast-track massive, by-right development—including on historically significant sites—with no requirement for affordability and no regard for local plans or neighborhoods.
SB 79 doubles down on the state's recent trend of overriding the local housing elements it mandates. This latest overreaching effort forces cities to approve transit-oriented development projects near specified transit stops—up to seven stories high and 120 homes per acre—without regard to community needs, environmental review, or public input. Most alarmingly, it allows transit agencies unlimited land use authority on property they own or control, regardless of distance from a transit stop.
This is displacement by design.
What You Can Do
- Contact your legislators – Tell them to vote NO on AB 609, SB 607, and SB 79. You can use the above talking points and/or just say NO to these harmful bills.
- Share this message – Let your community know what’s at stake.
- Stay engaged – We’ll keep you updated as these bills move through committee.
Let’s be clear: Preservation and housing are not mutually exclusive. We can—and must—build a future that respects the past, serves all Californians, and protects the unique character of our communities.
Let Sacramento know: These bills go too far.
Thank you for standing with us.
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