Its rugged coastline, including beloved destinations such as Big Sur, is well-known California iconography protected by the California Coastal Act for nearly 50 years.

In a push to address the state’s gripping housing crisis, the California Coastal Commission last week approved a rule change to make it easier to build affordable housing in Monterey and elsewhere along the hundreds of miles of the Pacific coast. 

It was the latest effort by the powerful state agency to combat its poor reputation among housing advocates and Democratic leaders who see it as an obstacle to drastic housing reform in California’s coveted coastal regions. While minor and uncontroversial, the amendment was one of a few shifts the commission has made in recent months in an effort to be viewed as playing a part in addressing the state’s crippling housing crisis.

It released a report for the first time in 2024 that showed local governments were responsible for approving the vast majority of permits in coastal regions, and this year the agency worked with housing activists to make it easier to build student housing in coastal cities. Nor did the coastal commission oppose a landmark housing reform law that excludes most new developments from environmental review.

“I think it’s going to have a real-life change,” Susan Jordan, a longtime conservation activist and founder of the California Coastal Protection Network, said of the regulatory amendment at the meeting.

Reputation rehab: Steps toward more housing

Twelve people — six local elected officials and six members of the public — vote on the independent, quasi-judicial state agency tasked with conserving more than 800 miles of the California coast and keeping it open to the public. Its authority spans about 1,000 yards inland from where the land meets the water at high tide.

The commission has faced relentless scrutiny in recent years for not permitting enough affordable housing in coastal cities, or doing so too slowly, as state lawmakers have stripped numerous housing regulations to make it easier to build more apartments.

Gov. Gavin Newsom, a critic of the commission, and other top Democrats have appointed three pro-development local officials this year to help get more housing and other developments approved along the Pacific coast.

In October, Newsom appointed wealthy real estate developer Jaime Lee to replace Effie Turnbull Sanders. An attorney appointed by former Gov. Jerry Brown, Sanders was lauded by environmentalists for heralding environmental justice policies to the agency.

Assembly Speaker Robert Rivas, a Salinas Democrat, named two pro-development appointees to the commission in May: Chris Lopez, a Monterey County supervisor, and Chula Vista councilmember Jose Preciado.

Ray Jackson, a Hermosa Beach councilmember, was appointed earlier this year by Democratic Senate President Pro Tem Mike McGuire of Santa Rosa, and is largely a skeptic of big developers.

In a unanimous vote last week, Peciado, Lopez and Jackson each approved changing the commission’s rules to give affordable housing projects in coastal areas more time to be built, from two to five years after permits are issued. Lee was not at the Nov. 6 meeting.

Staff and commissioners hailed the change as a step in the right direction for affordable housing developments that cannot be financed quickly enough under the previous two-year deadline.

“I think next year would be a good opportunity to roll out an education campaign in the Legislature to highlight some of the movements we made toward this,” Commissioner Linda Escalante said. “I don’t know if we can have a white paper that we can walk around with and figure out some of the reputation issues that we have.”

A history of protecting the coastline

Critics of the agency point to the exorbitant coastal housing prices, some of the highest in the country, and the disproportionate number of white residents, as exacerbating the housing shortage. To some, the commission’s priorities have not matched the urgency of lawmakers and local officials to help solve the cost problem.

Two-thirds of coastal residents are white, about twice as many as in the state as a whole, according to an analysis by Nicholas Depsky at the United Nations Development Programme. 

Fewer than 2.5% of California residents live in coastal cities, or “coastal zones,” which comprise less than 1% of land in the state but are home to some of the most valuable real estate in the world, from Malibu to Marin.

The Coastal Commission began as a 1972 ballot initiative in the shadow of the 1969 Santa Barbara oil spill, one of the worst environmental disasters in the country at the time. Amid a broader national environmental movement, there was greater concern about how to protect California’s coveted shoreline in the midst of unregulated offshore drilling and fears of relentless development that would mirror Miami’s coastline. 

Four years later, the state Legislature made the commission permanent with the Coastal Act to protect its natural habitats and keep beaches open to the public.

Early tensions between then-Gov. Jerry Brown and the commission brewed when he slammed its members as “bureaucratic thugs” in 1978, just years after championing its creation. Brown would spend his final years in office, nearly 40 years later, roiled by criticism from environmentalists who accused him of appointing commissioners who were too pro-development. Those fears were heightened with the ousting of executive director Charles Lester in 2016, a strong advocate for coastal protection.

Scrutiny of the commission has accelerated in the Newsom administration, as the governor has publicly chided the agency for its broad powers. After the Los Angeles fires, he swiftly moved to suspend all of its authority over rebuilding efforts in the Pacific Palisades, which abut the coastline. 

Last year, the commission rejected billionaire Elon Musk’s proposal to increase the number of SpaceX rocket launches off the Santa Barbara coast while criticizing his support of President Donald Trump. Newsom said he was “with Elon” after the company filed a lawsuit claiming political discrimination. The case is still pending. 

Lee, the newest commissioner, hails from Los Angeles and has built a reputation as a prolific builder known for revitalizing Koreatown. Her real estate company, Jamison properties, has built 6,600 multifamily units and is one of the largest private landowners in Los Angeles, according to its website.

Lee did not return emails and phone calls seeking comment from CalMatters.

The new appointments have made many pro-housing advocates hopeful. “We now have three out of 12 voting members who are appointed to the commission in this period when many legislators and the governor want reform at the commission to design more affordable housing,” said Louis Mirante, a lobbyist with the business coalition Bay Area Council. “That tells me that these members will probably move that vision forward.”

Lopez, who has emphasized his support for affordable housing on the coast since joining the commission, said the optimism is warranted.

“I think that that excitement is well placed given where we’re sitting at right now and given the voice that the speaker and the governor are giving at this issue and wanting to see a remedy to it,” Lopez said. “And I do feel it’s the reason I was put here was to have that conversation at the forefront.”

Environmental advocates watch

Environmentalists have mostly been quiet about the new appointments. Instead, they are waiting to see how they vote before raising the alarm.

“While there have been concerns expressed within the environmental movement, at this point we have no idea how this commissioner (Lee) will be,” said Jennifer Savage, associate director of Surfrider Foundation, a coastal protection advocacy group. Lee was not an obvious choice for many, but Savage is optimistic that she’ll support coastal protection.

“It’s actually not that surprising that the governor would appoint someone with housing expertise,” given the political climate, she continued. 

A longtime local water authority official and current administrator at San Diego State University, Preciado said part of his pitch for the role to Democratic leaders was that he wanted to see more of the coast developed to help create jobs and homes for working-class families.

“We have a keen interest in developing the California coast in such a way where underrepresented communities that live on the coast have more access,” Preciado said of himself and Lopez.

Wealthy coastal residents have long sparred with the commission over violations for blocking public access, such as Silicon Valley billionaire Vinod Khosla, who has been entangled in a slew of legal fights with regulators and coastal groups for years over access to Martins Beach near Half Moon Bay.

Many commissioners and staff view protecting public access and conservation as their primary purpose rather than housing policy. 

Conservationism is out of style, even among Democrats, which has led support for the commission to dramatically shift in recent years, according to legislative director Sarah Christie.

To some commissioners, lawmakers’ push to rip away more and more of its housing authority is a misguided attempt to simplify a complex issue. They point out that about 80% of coastal cities and counties have their own coastal laws and are not subject to the commission.

“It’s creating a lot of chaos and dysfunction at the local level and is making it harder,” Christie said of the movement toward slashing housing regulations. “In the Legislature’s enthusiasm and zeal in order to effectuate housing more quickly, they’re kind of stepping on themselves.”

Jackson, a commissioner who represents the South Bay, said lawmakers need to focus more on affordable housing rather than increasing supply more broadly.

Special environmental considerations and its highly sought after nature are what make the coastal zone uniquely expensive, Preciado said. “I think that a broader view, a more objective view, is that developing on the coast is different than developing in urban areas.”

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The CCC has entered the world stage by becoming part of the “Great Power Competition” between the U.S. and China and Russia. Unfortunately, they did not enter this power competition on the side of the U.S. by handcuffing our ability to achieve our national security strategy.

Our nation’s deliberate response to emerging threats is at risk if the CCC’s ruling stands. The U.S. has long recognized that access to space is a vital national and global interest. Not having required space capabilities on orbit undercuts the baseline strategies of the USSF. Low-Earth orbiting weather spacecraft, intelligence systems, global communications capability and elements of new proliferated constellations rely exclusively on the Vandenberg west coast space port. The CCC restrictions endanger our entire nation and could well cost lives. Denying the increased launch rate from Vandenberg provides Russia and China a big military victory without these adversaries having to commit any of their military resources. 

Over the past 30 years, the U.S. has been the dominant player in space, and has assured the free and open use of space. This has nurtured a vibrant national, international and commercial economy in space. Both the military and civilian worlds now depend on capabilities such as the Global Positioning System, satellite communications, global broadcast, weather monitoring and remote sensing. Unfortunately, external threats have emerged and access to space and the freedom to maneuver in space can no longer be treated as a given. Today, there are threats to our critical space capabilities. China and Russia have developed the capability to eliminate satellites through attacks from the ground, direct ascent attacks, co-orbital attacks (both kinetic and non-kinetic), jamming, spoofing and laser dazzling. The Space Force, in response, has adopted a strategy of affordable resilience, using proliferation as its centerpiece. In addition to proliferation, the Space Force has implemented a robust use of commercial space systems to support resilience. In this rapidly evolving threat environment, the more options we have, the better we can respond in a flexible and agile fashion to new challenges.

The mission of the USSF is to deter conflict in space and avoid a costly conflict that could have worldwide military, economic and social implications. Space is becoming a dangerous vulnerable place in which to operate — not just for us, but for the commercial and civil markets across the world. The threats are growing and expanding every day, and our ability to assure that space capabilities are always available in this threatening environment is critically important. These systems must be secure and protected. If our critical space-based capabilities are disrupted or denied, the consequences could be dire. The truth is that our adversaries now pose a clear and present threat to our national security, making the case for a strong defensive posture in space along with the critical access to space that Vandenberg provides. California’s Vandenberg is unique among U.S. space ports in that it enables launches into polar orbit by launching southerly without overflying populated areas.

Vandenberg now comes under the purview of the USSF to respond to new threats in space against the U.S., our allies and supporting commercial space systems. These threats, combined with new and advanced hypersonic threats to American and allied interests, have put U.S. military superiority at risk along with the lives of our men and women in uniform. In its short five-year history, the USSF has turned our military space programs on a dime, moving to proliferated constellations to counteract the threats to our space-based capabilities, including the integration of commercial communications and Tactical Surveillance, Reconnaissance and Tracking (TacSRT) into the fabric of military space, along with newly demonstrated responsive launch capabilities. This has considerably increased the number of SpaceX launches as the Space Force seeks to address:

1. Increased military demand as the USSF moves to proliferated constellations to respond to adversary demonstrated capabilities in space and ramped up TacSRT systems,
2. Increased commercial demands and
3. The increased reliance on Starlink launches to support allies and provide critical communications in natural disasters such as hurricane Helene.

In order to implement its new strategy, the USSF must increase the number of SpaceX launches from Vandenberg from 50 by the end of this year to 100 or more annual launches going forward. Vandenberg has always bent over backwards to be a good neighbor in California, and they are committed to continue doing their best to be a responsible steward of the amazing national treasure in the California coastline that they occupy. They could have rightfully declared the launch activities at Vandenberg to be a federal agency activity, a designation that would mean that the CCC could not regulate it through its permit process. Vandenberg has opted to work within the CCC’s purview. While sometimes difficult and costly, Vandenberg has respected the wishes of the Commission as well as those of California and Santa Barbara County. 

While the CCC can approve or deny permits from private companies and individuals that affect the coast, it can’t deny a federal activity. At the same time, the state agency has increasingly questioned in public meetings whether SpaceX should instead be forced to apply for launch permits going forward since 80% to 87% of its rocket launches are carrying satellites for one of Elon Musk’s other private companies rather than U.S. government payloads. While Starlink, other commercial communications and TacSRT missions are commercial missions, they have become part of the fabric of USSF strategy, and both are supporting military and military-supported humanitarian operations. This makes the assumption that these are purely commercial not accurate. Therefore, the commission must reach an agreement with the military, known as a federal consistency plan, to regulate the impacts on the coast and wildlife.

To be fair, the CCC may not know how critical commercial communications and TacSRT have become to the fabric of the USSF and U.S. Space Command. These capabilities, along with the ability to get them to space, are critical to maintaining our ability to defend our nation. California Governor Gavin Newsom understands all of this. Considering this, I believe that the CCC must reconsider its ruling. The free and open use of space for all must be preserved, and Vandenberg must be able to implement our national security strategy of increasing launch rates to implement proliferated constellations, critical commercial TacSRT and communications capabilities needed in these challenging times.

The post The California Coastal Commission’s ruling to limit SpaceX launches threatens national defense appeared first on The Hemet & San Jacinto Chronicle.