Our action this week is urging Governor Newsom to sign legislation that we support and the Legislature has passed this session.

Our Action Letter:

We write to urge you to sign the following bills, which would strengthen protections for Altadena amid the Eaton Fire recovery, advance the production of affordable housing across California, and expand clean and affordable energy access:

• SB 1090 (Pérez) would establish a temporary moratorium in Altadena on existing state density laws in the wake of the Eaton Fire, thereby putting survivors first and preventing real estate speculators from acquiring fire-damaged properties to pursue higher-density development at a scale that would overwhelm the community’s infrastructure.
• SB 1091 (Caballero) would establish a program to fund the acquisition and rehabilitation of current market-rate rental housing, converting it to long-term deed-restricted affordable housing while protecting the tenants already living there from eviction or displacement during that conversion.
• AB 2433 (Alvarez) would strengthen the state’s Density Bonus Law—already responsible for more than 140,000 approved homes since 2021—by making it easier to use and more supportive of 100%-affordable and for-sale developments.
• AB 2480 (Ávila Farías) would extend the state’s density bonus tools to student housing developments, opening the door to the state’s first privately built, deed-restricted affordable student housing.
• SB 1116 (Caballero) would strengthen the Starter Home Revitalization Act, building on earlier reforms to make it easier to build modest, for-sale homes on urban lots.
• SB 1117 (Cervantes) would remove the inconsistent application of fees that currently makes larger accessory dwelling units disproportionately expensive to build.
• AB 1732 (Alvarez) would close a gap in CEQA’s infill exemption that has left public university and college housing vulnerable to delay-driven litigation, even as students face rising rates of housing instability.
• SB 868 (Wiener) would exempt small, certified “plug-in solar” devices—portable panels that plug into a standard outlet—from utility interconnection requirements, making it easier and cheaper for those without access to rooftop solar to generate their own clean power and reduce strain on the grid.
• SB 222 (Wiener) would standardize and speed up local permitting for residential heat pump water heaters and HVAC systems by capping permit fees, requiring faster inspections, and prohibiting HOA rules that block households from swapping out fossil-fuel appliances for efficient, all-electric alternatives that keep homes cool during extreme heat.
• SB 905 (Becker) would hold utilities accountable for controlling electricity costs by tying a portion of executive compensation to rate growth, establishing performance metrics for reliability and grid utilization, and requiring utilities to publish data on unused grid capacity so ratepayers get more out of the system already built before paying for costly new infrastructure.
• SB 913 (Becker) would direct state regulators to fully integrate aggregated distributed energy resources—such as home batteries, smart thermostats, and electric vehicles—into California’s resource adequacy program, unlocking grid capacity already sitting in millions of homes to help keep the lights and air conditioning on during periods of peak demand.

Together, these bills reflect values that we hold as a community of faith. Eaton Fire survivors deserve to rebuild on their own terms, free from speculators seeking to profit on their loss. We need more housing across our state to ensure all Californians have a safe, affordable place to live. As California builds a cleaner energy future, its benefits must reach everyday people, not concentrate further in the hands of utility shareholders and executives. As such, we respectfully ask you to sign these eleven bills into law.

Options to Take Action:

1. 1. Sign an action letter at the Action Table on Sunday.
   2. Download an action letter that you can sign and mail.

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For personal actions or information, here are some helpful resources:

Contact the White House at https://www.whitehouse.gov/contact/ or leave a phone comment at 1-202-456-1111.

If you ever need to look up your member of the U.S. House of Representatives or your U.S. Senators check here: www.house.gov and www.senate.gov.

To find contact information for your California State Senator or California State Assemblymember check here: www.senate.ca.gov and www.assembly.ca.gov.