By Vanguard Staff
Key ponts:
- California’s affordable housing project in Goleta moves forward.
- Settlement follows court ruling siding with developer and Attorney General.
- Goleta’s housing project will now undergo a full environmental impact report.
In a major victory for California’s efforts to address its housing crisis, Attorney General Rob Bonta announced a settlement that will allow a long-stalled affordable housing project in the City of Goleta to move forward. The agreement follows a ruling by the Santa Barbara County Superior Court siding with the Attorney General and the developer, Shelby Family Partnership, against the city’s refusal to process a revised application for a 56-unit housing project, 19.6 percent of which will be affordable to lower-income households.
“There is simply no denying that we need more affordable housing up and down our state — every new unit that we can bring online matters,” Bonta said in a statement. “The settlement agreement is also good news for the rule of law. My office argued that Goleta acted unlawfully by refusing to process the application for this Builder’s Remedy project, the Santa Barbara County Superior Court agreed with us, and now, the application is finally moving forward. We will continue to monitor the situation closely.”
The dispute began when the City of Goleta rejected a revised SB 330 preliminary application submitted in November 2023 by Shelby Family Partnership for a housing development on a parcel located at 7400 Cathedral Oaks Road. The property had long been earmarked for residential development, with the city having approved a vesting tentative tract map in 2011. That approval was later put on hold due to a water moratorium by the Goleta Water District, which remained in effect until December 2023.
With the lifting of the moratorium, Shelby sought to update the previously approved plan by submitting a preliminary application under Senate Bill 330, a 2019 law designed to expedite housing approvals and freeze local development standards at the time of application. Because Goleta did not have a state-certified housing element at the time, the revised project qualified for the Builder’s Remedy, a provision that limits a city’s ability to deny housing projects that include a minimum amount of affordable housing.
Goleta rejected the application, asserting that SB 330 does not apply to projects that amend earlier development applications. On December 20, 2024, Bonta’s office filed an amicus brief arguing that the city’s position was unlawful and that SB 330 protections extend to revised applications. The court agreed, issuing a ruling on Feb. 26, 2025, that found the city had a legal duty to accept and process the application.
In the court’s ruling, Judge Thomas P. Anderle wrote that Shelby “has provided all of the information and payment required by former section 65941.1, subdivision (a), so that under the plain meaning of the statute the applicant … shall be deemed to have submitted a preliminary application.” The judge granted Shelby’s motion for judgment on its first and second causes of action and denied Goleta’s motion for judgment on the pleadings.
Goleta’s rejection of the application was deemed a “disapproval” of the project under the Housing Accountability Act, as the city did not issue the required written findings. The court found the city’s legal position was not made in bad faith but emphasized that the law clearly required the city to process the revised application.
The settlement agreement, authorized by the Goleta City Council on June 23, 2025, establishes that the city will accept and process the project application and its associated environmental documents. The project must now undergo a full environmental impact report (EIR) in accordance with the California Environmental Quality Act. A final decision on the project could come by August 30, 2026.
“We believe the settlement agreement represents the best resolution possible, given the circumstances,” said Goleta City Manager Robert Nisbet. “It allows us a path forward that includes meaningful affordable housing and robust environmental review.”
Under the terms of the agreement, the revised project would provide 11 affordable homes, including four units for extremely low-income households, one for low-income, three for moderate-income, and three for above-moderate-income households earning between 120 percent and 200 percent of area median income. The units must be for-sale and constructed of similar materials and appearance as the market-rate homes.
The revised project is largely identical to the earlier plan approved in 2011, but includes a higher percentage of affordable housing. While Shelby could have pursued a denser development under Builder’s Remedy provisions, the settlement allows for a more modest project that conforms more closely to the city’s development standards, while still exceeding state affordability requirements.
Attorney General Bonta has emphasized statewide enforcement of housing laws in the face of local obstruction. In addition to his legal filings in the Goleta case, Bonta recently issued a legal alert urging local jurisdictions to comply with the Housing Accountability Act and SB 330, and warning of legal consequences for unjustified rejections of qualified housing projects.
The Goleta settlement highlights the growing influence of state law in forcing local compliance with housing production mandates. The court’s ruling and subsequent agreement reinforce the legal authority of SB 330 and the Builder’s Remedy to override local decisions that impede affordable housing development.
The Shelby Family Partnership’s proposal, originally filed in 2005, now enters a new phase of review, including the environmental process and public hearings. If approved, the project would help alleviate Goleta’s acute housing needs — in a city where 75 percent of low-income renters and 64 percent of low-income homeowners spend more than 30 percent of their income on housing.
