THERE’S ONLY 290 DAYS UNTIL CHRISTMAS! WHAT’LL I DO!! I GOTTA GET THE GIFT SHOPPING DONE! THE KIDS WANT A PIANO, THE OL’ BALL AND CHAIN WANTS A DEEP FRYER, MY BROTHER WANTS A 2006 GO 4 INTERCEPTOR III AND A FORD RANGER — GREEDY BASTARD — WHERE IN THE HELL AM I GOING TO GET IT ALL?????????

Is that you? Relax! You’re set! With some luck, you could get all of that stuff on the cheap — and not even have to leave town! The city of Arcata is auctioning off 39 items that the city has decided it doesn’t need anymore on GovDeals.com, some of them worth marveling at. 

Ever thought it’d be cool to own a street sweeper? Here’s one: current bid, only $24. That 2006 Go 4 Interceptor III mentioned earlier? A sweet-ass four-banger three-wheeled Meter maid mobile, currently going for $360. There’s two up for grabs, but one doesn’t have a title. 

A few Fords, all of which only start with a jump: an Expedition, an Escape, a Ranger, and three Crown Vics, one of them, inexplicably, going for four times as much as the others. (One has a busted alternator and the other one’s transmission is non-op, so maybe not entirely inexplicable.)

Some other highlights: a pitching machine. A 150 KW generator. Another generator with the beginnings of a nice lawn growing in it. Two trailers. A beefy lawnmower.  “Lot of Miscellaneous Plastic Containers with Lids.” And a bunch of other assorted detritus. 

Even if you do manage to snag a street sweeper for the cost of a decent restaurant meal, there are still plenty of hurdles to clear before you can claim it. The city can reject any bid for any reason; buyers have to pick the property up wherever it’s located. The minimum bid increases vary; sales close March 18, 8 p.m. Arcata’s tacking on a 12.5% buyer’s premium on everything, and buyers also must pay sales tax. Visual inspections are allowed from 8 a.m. to 4 p.m. on weekdays. 

Also, if you read this article and buy the street sweeper, you have to let me drive it.

PREVIOUSLY:

• YOU SHALL NOT PASS! Samoa Bridge Will Be Closed for the Next Few Nights for Bridge and Broadband Work
• Progress Report: That Fiber Optic Line They’re Laying Alongside 299 Will, in Fact, Include Access Points for Local Communities
• Major Datacenter Company Purchases Arcata Warehouse, Starts Filing Paperwork to Build Fiber Optic Line to Samoa Peninsula

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Construction work that has shuttered the Samoa bridge in overnight stretches will soon bring reliable broadband connectivity to the Samoa Peninsula.

“This is it! This is the long term solution to make sure the peninsula is not left behind,” Connie Stewart, Director of Initiatives at Cal Poly Humboldt, tells the Outpost.

Vero Fiber recently added conduit lines across the bridges in overnight work. By the end of the month, fiber will be pulled through.

The finalization of the leg of infrastructure on State Route 255 follows years of work to bridge the so-called “digital divide” for Humboldt County communities which have lacked reliable internet providers.

Commonly referred to as “middle mile,” the infrastructure will be an open-access line that internet service providers can later connect to to bring internet access to homes — either with direct cable or a wireless connection.

Stewart expects this to be an option for peninsula dwellers in fall 2026, possibly sooner.

“This is really designed around making sure that the peninsula gets service that is reliable,” said Stewart.

The section recently installed in the bridge is the last piece of a middle mile route funded largely by the California Department of Technology, during a historic state investment in the infrastructure.

According to a grant announcement for the work, it will bring fiber internet access to over 500 homes, businesses and public safety locations, half of which are “unserved.” The announcement put the cost of the project at $6.3 million with a $4.4 million grant from the state.

Internet service on the peninsula has been spotty for years.

There are above-ground wires that lead to some communities, while other areas rely on satellite coverage, said Dale Unea, operations manager for the Peninsula Community Services District and fire chief of the Samoa Peninsula Volunteer Fire Department.

The district’s wastewater and water communications are through cellular uplink, which can come with delays if the wind is blowing.

And above-ground internet infrastructure is subject to the peninsula’s harsh coastal environment. Overall, Unea said the infrastructure is needed.

“I just see the future as bright for the peninsula, and this is just another ray of sunshine put on the area,” he said.

One effort to bring the peninsula community of Fairhaven internet in a 2022 contest fizzled out. Bay Area-based startup Dalet Access Labs built out free internet for the neighborhood, but the California Department of Education ultimately failed to announce a winner for a $1 million prize.

Dalet Access still has installed assets in Fairhaven that will need to be recovered at some point, said Odion Edehomon, CEO of Dalet Access in an email to the Outpost.

Fairhaven could see fiber access soon — Stewart notes enough residents in a neighborhood need to sign up before installation can happen.

She said the long-term goal is to link up the bridge fiber to the Old Arcata Road fiber to create resilience around Arcata Bay and Eureka.

The COVID-19 pandemic brought to light gaps in internet access across the state. Economic disparities and a lack of infrastructure meant swaths of schoolchildren were without reliable internet access when school went online.

Stewart says it’s been six years of trying to find a permanent solution. She said broadband is an essential utility — for students going to school, for emergency services, for economic development and telehealth appointments.

“These projects that are being built right now and almost finished are going to give us that foundation to live, work, play, for generations to come,” she said.

The next exciting project for Humboldt County is middle-mile infrastructure along U.S. 101, said Stewart.

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Press release from Humboldt Athletics:

ARCATA, Calif. – For the first time since 2016, Cal Poly Humboldt men’s basketball is headed back to the NCAA Division II Men’s Basketball Tournament.

The Lumberjacks (17-14) earned the No. 8 seed in the NCAA West Region and will face No. 1 seed and site host Cal State East Bay (30-0) on Friday, March 13 at 7:30 p.m. from Pioneer Gymnasium in Hayward. The winner will advance to the West Region semifinal on Saturday, March 14 at 7:30 p.m. to take on the winner of No. 4 seed Alaska Anchorage (21-10) and No. 5 seed Cal State Dominguez Hills (22-8).

Humboldt was the final team selected into the eight-team West Region field, setting up a rematch with the undefeated Pioneers after the two programs squared off in the California Collegiate Athletic Association (CCAA) Tournament Championship this past weekend. East Bay claimed the tournament title with an 80-63 victory, but the Lumberjacks’ run to the championship game secured their place in the NCAA Tournament field.

The berth marks Cal State East Bay’s first NCAA Division II Tournament appearance this century, as the CCAA Regular Season and Tournament Champions will see Humboldt for the fourth time this season. The Lumberjacks are the only team to take Cal State East Bay to overtime this season. 

In his first season at the helm, head coach DJ Broome has guided the Lumberjacks back to the national stage alongside assistant coaches John Seavey and Kevin Johnson Jr. The trio has orchestrated a remarkable season, culminating in Humboldt punching its ticket to the Big Dance for the 15th time in program history. 

The Lumberjacks now turn their focus to Friday night’s showdown with top-seeded East Bay. Tip-off is scheduled for 7:30 p.m. inside Pioneer Gymnasium, with a trip to the regional semifinals on the line.

Additional information regarding live stats, streaming links and ticketing will be available at humboldtathletics.com. 

PREVIOUSLY

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Press release from Humboldt Green Events:

Humboldt Green Events is proud to officially announce that Cannifest 2026 will take place at the historic Arcata Ball Park on September 12th and 13th, 2026. This year’s theme, “Build the Village,” marks a return to the grassroots, community-focused roots of the Emerald Triangle, transforming the “Crown Jewel” of Arcata into a vibrant space for families, farmers, and music lovers.

In a major shift toward inclusivity, Cannifest 2026 is a free concert for all children. The entire festival has been reimagined as a multi-generational experience where families are encouraged to enjoy the weekend together in a safe, celebratory environment.

“We are bringing Cannifest home to the heart of the community,” says Stephen Gieder, Executive Director. “By moving to the Ball Park, we are creating a village where our kids can play, our farmers can share their stories, and we can all dance to the same rhythm. This isn’t just a festival; it’s a family reunion for the culture.”

2026 Festival Features:

• The F.I.Z. (Family Interactive Zone) & Unity Stage: A cornerstone of the “Village,” the F.I.Z. is a dedicated space for youth and families to engage with hands-on art, workshops, and community building. The Unity Stage will feature a full lineup of music and programming designed to inspire the next generation—completely free for all children under 12!
• The Main Stage: Produced by Cannifest Presents, featuring a world-class lineup of music that will provide the soundtrack for the weekend.
• Into the CannAbyss Talk Stage: A premier educational hub featuring deep-dive panel discussions, heritage storytelling, and the Dan Mar Sustainability Symposium.
• The Grow Games: Humboldt’s legendary agricultural athletes take the field for a high-energy display of cultivation skill and community spirit.
• Shakedown Street & The Makers Market: A curated marketplace featuring local artisans, heritage farmers, and small businesses showcasing the best of Humboldt’s creative and agricultural output.
• The Headstash Hub: An interactive activation where the public can meet the region’s master judges and sign up for the 2026 Headstash competition.

Community & Compliance

To ensure a safe environment for all ages, Cannifest will not host a regulated sales and consumption area this year. To support our local industry partners, the Dispensary Flight Club will provide dedicated shuttle transportation from the Ball Park to premier retail locations in Arcata, Eureka, and McKinleyville, allowing patrons to support the local dispensaries directly at their licensed storefronts.

Sponsorship packages and vendor applications for Shakedown Street and the Makers Market are now open. Community members and non-profits are invited to step up to the plate and help “Build the Village” this September.

For more information, visit www.cannifest.com.

About Humboldt Green Events:

Humboldt Green Events produces high-impact gatherings that celebrate the intersection of agriculture, music, and community. Led by Stephen Gieder, the organization remains a steadfast advocate for the legacy culture of the Emerald Triangle.

Press release from the city of Fortuna:

When the City of Fortuna began updating its General Plan and Strategic Plan, officials chose to start by listening first. Last fall, the City launched a communitywide Listening Campaign, conducting in depth conversations with community members, City staff representing every department, all five City Council members, and focus groups with teenagers and immigrant families. The newly published report summarizing these conversations shows a remarkable degree of unity across groups that often have different perspectives.

The City is now inviting the broader community to build on that shared foundation through two hands-on public workshops at River Lodge. Everyone who lives, works, raises a family, or simply cares about Fortuna is encouraged to attend.

Workshop 1 — IMAGINE FUTURE FORTUNA - Wednesday, March 25, 2026

• Doors open: 4:00 p.m. (preview)
• Workshop: 5:30–8:00 p.m.
• Location: River Lodge, 1800 Riverwalk Drive, Fortuna

Focus: Developing guiding principles—vision, purpose, community values, and decision-making criteria that will help shape Fortuna’s future.

Workshop 2 — CHART A COURSE TO FUTURE FORTUNA - Saturday, April 11, 2026

• Doors open: 10:00 a.m. (preview)
• Workshop: 11:00 a.m.–3:00 p.m.
• Location: River Lodge, 1800 Riverwalk Drive, Fortuna

Focus: Turning shared principles into clear priorities across key community topics, including:

• Youth & belonging
• Economic development
• Land use & community character
• Infrastructure & safety
• City services & programs
• Leadership & communications

Both workshops will include snacks and drinks, childcare for ages 5 and up, teen and youth spaces, and Spanish interpretation (traducción al español). No registration is required — drop in, bring family and friends, and help shape Fortuna’s future.

For more information and the full listening campaign report check out Future Fortuna:Community Workshops & Listening Campaign.

The calls rang out over and over, in the dispassionate water system codes that meant unmistakably: “Something’s wrong. I need you. Help.”

Like a little kid pleading for someone – anyone — to respond, the alarm calls on that rainy January morning went to three different phone numbers at 3:02 a.m., 3:04 a.m. and 3:06 a.m. Then minutes later calls went again to all three phones, and yet again, before roping in a fourth phone by 3:35 a.m.

No one answered.

While 70,000 gallons an hour rushed from a broken pipe, two key Trinidad city workers slept, each thinking the other was supposed to be on call that night.

The ensuing water crisis shuttered restaurants for days, dented Trinidad’s water reserve funds and prompted fresh conversations about a long-smoldering pipeline debate.

More than that, though, Trinidad’s waterfall of water loss underscores a national reality that policy analysts have acknowledged for decades: Many of America’s water systems are broken, too fragmented to be relied on, especially in rural areas.

Humboldt County alone has 51 different water systems, including at least four that are “failing” and four that are “at risk,” according to a list that’s updated daily by the state Water Resources Control Board.

Among the failing, the state water board says, is the Scotia Community Services District, which just last week, on March 5, told residents to boil their water before drinking it. The others are the Redway Community Services District, the Weott Community Services District and the tiny Palomino Estates Water Company near Garberville.

The biggest “at risk” system in Humboldt County, the state says, is the city of Trinidad, which provides water to around 1,000 people, restaurants and businesses within and beyond city limits. (The other three at-risk systems are much smaller: Alderpoint County Water, Moonstone Heights MWA and Trinidad Extended Stay RV.)

“Running a modern, safe, reliable, resilient, sustainable water system is hard,” says water distribution expert Manny Teodoro, a professor of public affairs at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. And while catastrophic failures like the one in Trinidad can happen anywhere, he says, “your probability of catastrophic failure is much higher when you’re small.”

Teodoro, who has edited a new book looking at 50 years of water policy, can summarize decades of studies finding that small districts have more trouble meeting safe drinking water standards. As a group, he says, they charge more for lower quality systems.

One of the benefits of these rural water enclaves, though, is a sense of place, rooted in local history and local control, says Kristin Dobbin, a UC Berkeley professor who focuses on water policy research and community outreach.

To preserve that, she says, tiny water systems scramble to maintain equipment and pay workers, struggle to save for emergencies, and often have a lone water source that makes them especially vulnerable to fire, landslide or drought.

The state of California has been a leader in encouraging small districts to meld into larger ones, and has fostered well over 200 consolidations since 2015, she says. But that push isn’t always welcome.

“There are places that are really concerned about consolidation because they’re concerned about growth,” Dobbin says. “Or what I hear more often, people really don’t want to give up control of their local decisions.”

In Trinidad, local control has come at a high cost. The city burned through its entire water system capital improvement budget, more than $1 million between 2021 and 2024, just to cover operating expenses, including outside contractors who had the required licenses to run a water plant. It raised rates in 2024 and was just clawing back toward a solid reserve fund when trouble hit.

A dark and stormy night

The failure began when a 6-inch PVC pipe, which lay buried near a slowly sliding section of Scenic Drive, began to crack. Water plant records show first a trickle of loss around 1 a.m., and then a flood, likely when the crack forced open a wide horizontal wedge along the top of the pipe.

The city’s SCADA (“supervisory control and data acquisition”) system began sending out more and more alarms. But the city worker who had volunteered his work cell number for the primary alarm phone had handed off the on-call job that night to another worker – or thought he had.

“There was a misunderstanding there. There was a mishap,” said Kyle Shipman, Trinidad’s public works supervisor.

Such misunderstandings are not trivial. For a water plant operator, neglecting an alarm call is like a fire department picking and choosing which fire alarms it responds to, says Michael Sims of the California Rural Water Association.

“If they are a state water operator, certified by the state, they have to pick up the call. That’s their job,” says Sims, the water association’s lead specialist in leak detection training. “They are supposed to pick up. They are supposed to shut it down.”

People familiar with small water systems say the logical thing to do after such an alarm that would be to go to the water plant, consider isolating one or more tanks to preserve some water supply, then drive first to areas with known weaknesses to look for leaks. Good places to start looking would be areas with past leaks or with known slides or earth movement.

In this case, though, Shipman said that an immediate response wouldn’t have helped much. Someone would still have had to get dressed, drive to the plant to check its systems, then drive to the water tanks to verify levels were really dropping so drastically, and finally drive to potential leak sites, find the leak and turn the right valves to seal it off. That all would have taken three hours at best, he and his staff have estimated.

None of that was even attempted at 3 a.m. though.

Instead, the water flowed on, eventually forming a slurry that oozed through a slope below Scenic Drive, where it was spotted by a Trinidad Rancheria worker in the morning’s light. That worker called Interim City Manager Gabe Adams at 7 a.m.

Adams dispatched a city staffer to the site, who isolated the leaking pipe by turning two valves, in two separate but nearby locations. Shutting both valves only took about 20 minutes, Shipman said. By then it was too late.

Both of Trindad’s water tanks, with a combined capacity of 400,000 gallons, had drained away.

That level of detail was missing from the presentation given to the Trinidad City Council on Jan. 13, during its first meeting after the water leak.

To prepare for their upcoming March 10 meeting, council members were just sent a much more detailed account, which stresses that the fastest possible leak fix would have taken three hours. The report called Trinidad’s water team “heroes” and said in part: “Considering the unprecedented set of circumstances surrounding the incident, including the fact that our team of young operators have never experienced a leak of this size and scope, the response was outstanding.”

Even after reading past council minutes and talking with city council members, Trinidad Eatery owner Betsy Musick has been among those frustrated by the city’s response.

“I don’t think it’s clear what happened between the team getting those first alarms between 3 or 3:30 and being boots on the ground between 7 and 7:30,” Musick said. “There’s clearly a breakdown here. If it’s human that’s OK but that needs to be admitted.”

Musick has surveyed business owners and believes that over the five days that a boil water order was in effect, forcing restaurants and the grocery deli to close or partially close, $150,000 was lost. That includes lost revenues, spoiled food and lost wages and tips for employees.

As a business owner, her concerns are threefold. “I want to hear what actually happened, where the fault lies so it doesn’t happen again; how is the city learning from the situation: and is there anything they can do for us financially.”

From creek to table

Trinidad’s water comes from a mossy bend of Luffenholtz Creek, a little inland from where the creek runs under the freeway and tumbles toward Luffenholtz Beach. Water is pumped up from a gravelly bed about 10 feet below the creek, and shunted through a series of tanks and treatments, filters and a flocculator to remove sediment and screen out anything you wouldn’t want to drink.

“It’s archaic — this is like 1970s technology,” says Carl Anderson, who is working toward getting a “T3” license that will allow him to serve as chief plant operator, eliminating a need for outside contractors.

Well, perhaps not archaic, public works chief Shipman qualifies during a recent water plant tour. But, he says, “It’s very finicky. It likes what it likes.”

The finickiness, a storm that sent churning muck down through the riverbed to where the pumps lay, and a failed motherboard in a key sensor all slowed efforts to get clean water back to Trinidad’s taps.

For days, a convoy of water trucks fed the water system’s tanks, at a cost of close to $20,000. City staffers shared shifts around the clock, racking up substantial overtime. “No matter what we did, it wasn’t looking right,” Shipman said.

When Trinidad first imposed a boil water order that Saturday morning, the city said it hoped to restore service in 48 hours. Instead, the order wasn’t lifted until that Wednesday evening.

At council meetings since, council member and public comments have ranged between praise for herculean work from 7 a.m. that Saturday morning onward to questions about what, if anything, could have helped – including a much-debated pipeline.

Pandora’s pipeline

Trinidad Rancheria has long yearned to build a hotel beside its The Heights casino, just outside Trinidad town limits. One roadblock has been water supply, although a lawsuit from opponents has put fire protection criteria in play, too.

Back in 2020, the rancheria asked the Humboldt Bay Municipal Water District to consider sending some of its supply north, via a new pipeline.

People who hate the idea of a five-story hotel rising up above coastal cliffs, and even some who might tolerate it, hate the pipeline idea even more. They’ve flooded local and regional meetings in protest, and filed a lawsuit that forced more consideration of fire risks.

For almost as long, the city of Trinidad has gone back and forth over whether to even study the implications of connecting to that pipeline if it is built.

Opponents predict that if water comes, sprawl would infest the green ridges from northern McKinleyville to Trinidad, peppering vacation rentals throughout Moonstone Heights, Westhaven and beyond. The Pandora’s pipeline would gush with multiple misfortunes -– higher water rates, swarming crowds at the local market, a casino gas station that could rob the city of revenue.

To opponents of the pipeline, even asking -– as one Trinidad council member did in January -– whether a pipeline could make Trinidad’s water more secure is like asking if you could save your kid’s school by firing every teacher.

Nonetheless, the question is there.

The answer, interim manager Adams told the council, is that a big pipeline from the south could have supplied far more water, and that Humboldt Bay’s much larger staff of operators, working overnight, would have made it far easier to respond to the leak quickly.

The pipeline itself is no slam dunk, and years of deliberation by multiple regulatory bodies lie ahead, whether Trinidad chooses to join in or not.

Still, Trinidad’s five-day boil water episode has put a fresh focus on what kind of water system it wants, and what tradeoffs it might make to get there.

“Those who want the pipeline are absolutely going to try to take this to the bank,” says Steve Madrone, the Humboldt County Supervisor whose district includes Trinidad. (Full disclosure: I volunteered for Madrone’s supervisorial campaign in 2018.)

Madrone is chair of the Local Agency Formation Commission, one of several government boards that would ultimately consider the pipeline, and as such he says he cannot take a position on the issue.

But in general, Madrone says, merging small water districts into larger ones tends to be a remedy for repeated water safety violations, and Trinidad has not had repeated water safety issues. What Trinidad has had instead, he says, are serious management issues.

“If I were a city resident or a ratepayer, I’d be lividly pissed about their mismanagement,” Madrone says, particularly under prior city managers whose tenures saw big contracting bills and the departures of some water staffers.

Council member Kati Breckenridge bristles at that criticism as unfair and poorly informed. “Our staff works so hard, and the councilors do too,” she says. The water leak was rough on staffers, rough on local businesses, expensive, and potentially scary, she says.

“It increased the feeling, at least for me, that we really need a feasibility study about our water processing and whether it’s wise to continue the path we’re on or to make a change,” Breckenridge says.

Community soul-searching is a sound starting point, says UC Berkeley expert Dobbin.

“If a community wants to grow that’s great,” Dobbin says, “and if a community doesn’t want to grow that’s great. But there has to be a plan for investing in the system.”

What people in any small water district, from Scotia to Trinidad, should ask themselves is whether the water district they have is able to do the job they want.

The questions Dobbin recommends include: Does my district have enough money for regular maintenance? Does it have enough funds to cover emergencies? And does it have enough sources of water to handle an uncertain future?

If those answers lean toward no, she recommends a crucial next step: How can the community find ways to keep its local voice, while exploring some kind of connection, physical or managerial, to a larger agency?

Like Luffenholtz Creek in winter, that conversation will keep churning on.

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This story was originally published by CalMatters. Sign up for their newsletters.

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The apartment building planned on East Morris Avenue in Modesto is exactly the kind of thing that California’s political leaders want to see a whole lot more of: The project promises 44 units of affordable housing — half reserved for people without homes. It’s received zoning approval, weathered public feedback, earned the support of local elected officials and sits beside a busy bus line. Once built, the project promises on-site mental health services, job training and Zumba classes.

What the project lacks is money.

Having quilted together a financial patchwork of local government and corporate grants, private debt, and a plot of land donated by a foundation, it remains just shy of the total needed to break ground.

Six years and 13 funding applications after it was first proposed, the Morris Village project sits ready, but waiting.

An estimated 39,880 affordable units across California are stuck in financial purgatory, according to a new report by Enterprise Community Partners, a national nonprofit that funds, consults and advocates for affordable housing. That’s 461 “shovel-ready developments” that, like the one on East Morris, are fully designed, legally green-lit and backed with a significant — but still insufficient — amount of money.

Many have “been sitting for a year or two waiting for funding,” said Justine Marcus, policy director for Enterprise’s Northern California office and one of the report’s co-authors. “There’s no exit route right now. It’s a bottleneck.”

For many developers and affordable housing advocates, that bottleneck represents an especially frustrating inconsistency of California public policy. Lawmakers are desperate to see the state build more homes — of all kinds, but especially for people with the least ability to pay the state’s exorbitant rents. State housing regulators have ordered local governments to plan for the construction of an additional 2.5 million units by the end of the decade. One million of those are supposed to be for people making less than 80% of each region’s median income.

As a general rule, that’s a population of hard-up renters that the private market has been unable to profitably serve at scale. To fill that gap, non-profit low-income housing developers typically turn to taxpayer-funded support. At the moment, according to the report, there isn’t enough of that to go around.

Enterprise took publicly available but hard-to-parse applicant lists from seven subsidy programs administered by various wings of California’s state government going back three years. With a combination of number crunching and a little inference, the report estimates that clearing the current backlog would require an extra $4.1 billion, split between state administered grants, low-cost loans and tax write-offs.

Once awarded, this final layer of state subsidy has to be spent in relatively short order. That means this list of 39,880 units comprise a group of affordable housing projects that are all but ready to go, said Marcus. “They kinda have to have their (stuff) together.”

Case in point: Two-thirds of the projects on the list have already received support from at least one other state program. Those dollars aren’t awarded to just any developer, said Betsy McGovern-Garcia, vice president of Self-Help Enterprises, one of two non-profits behind Morris Village.

“These are all projects that are close to amenities,” she said. “These are all projects providing resident services. These are all projects that are financially feasible…They are all meeting the bar for what we want to see as a state out of our affordable housing community.”

In February, McGovern-Garcia and her colleagues applied for a final round of financial support from the state “to close the gap” and finally start construction.

“We are optimistic this might be our round,” she said in an interview, her fingers crossed.

A moving bottleneck

California has seen gridlock in affordable housing production before, but the precise location of the traffic jam has changed over time.

When Nevada Merriman was leading a team of affordable developers in Silicon Valley a decade ago, she said local approval was the major hold-up. Getting the legal okay to build low-income housing on a particular site in a particular town required developers to run a gauntlet of planning department and city council meetings, win over hostile neighbors with costly concessions, community meetings and design revisions and to fend off the ever-present possibility of litigation. Because relatively few projects survived that ordeal, the competition for funding on the other side wasn’t especially stiff, said Merriman, who is now policy advocate for MidPen Housing, an affordable developer in San Mateo County.

That began to change earlier this decade. California lawmakers began passing laws overriding these local impediments — especially for affordable projects. All of a sudden more projects were clearing those early regulatory hurdles and competing for Low-Income Housing Tax Credits, the federal government’s signature affordable housing construction subsidy. The bottleneck moved further up the road.

But then that too began to change late last year. Buried in President Donald Trump’s signature tax bill from 2025 was a significant boost to the tax credit program. (Specifically, the law increased the total supply of one type of credit while allowing another kind to be spread out over twice as many projects).

Which brings us to the latest bottleneck.

Now projects can get through local approval. They can more easily acquire the final and most important layer of federal financing. But project sponsors typically can’t apply for that until all other financial holes are plugged.

“We’re looking for state sources to fill that gap,” said Merriman. “We want to make sure we don’t leave those federal sources on the table.”

MidPen currently has 1,198 units spread across seven developments waiting for that last bit of funding, she said. “Should there be a source…there’s a pipeline that is ready to go.”

“There’s no exit route right now. It’s a bottleneck.”
—Justine Marcus, Northern California policy director, Enterprise Community Partners

California’s last major infusion of public affordable housing dollars came in the form of a voter-approved bond in 2018. That well has run dry. A hodgepodge of funding streams remain.

Adding together funding that has already been approved by legislators but not yet spent and a variety of other state and federal sources, California’s Housing and Community Development department says at least $1.8 billion should be available for affordable developer applicants this year. Gov. Gavin Newsom’s budget proposal for the coming fiscal year doesn’t include any new discretionary spending beyond that.

Boosters of more funding have reasons to be optimistic. Newsom has taken such an austere posture in early budget negotiations before only to have the Legislature successfully pour hundreds of millions of dollars of affordable housing subsidies back into the final budget agreement.

California lawmakers are also considering a record-breaking $10 billion affordable housing bond for the 2026 ballot. If a majority of voters go for that, “we’d be off to the races,” said Merriman.

Cutting costs

One way to get more affordable housing built is by spending more money. The other is trying to make the existing money go further by cutting costs.

The cost of affordable housing construction is notoriously high in California: A 2025 study estimated that tax credit-financed projects here cost two- to four-times the amount of comparable projects in Colorado and Texas. There is no single reason for this disparity. Land costs in California are significantly higher. So too, often, is the cost of labor. Regulatory barriers like restrictive zoning, slow permitting and stiff impact fees are frequently named as culprits. Sometimes old-fashioned construction methods and materials get blamed.

But there’s also the cost of just waiting around.

A typical affordable development in California will have two or three public funding sources, with some drawing on six or more. Many of these sources are awarded on their own timelines. Each has its own program-specific requirements that can take time to meet. Some are conditional on the receipt of another. As time goes by, developers still have to make payroll, pay interest on pre-construction loans and watch as inflation drives construction costs up further. As delays compound, funding sources that have already been secured might expire, setting things back further.

Each additional funding source delays the start of construction on a project by an average of four months, adding an extra $20,460 per unit, according to an analysis by the Terner Center for Housing Innovation at UC Berkeley.

The Newsom administration is currently tinkering under the hood of California’s affordable housing finance system in an effort to speed things up.

Last year, the governor proposed the creation of the state’s first ever cabinet-level housing agency. The California Housing and Homelessness Agency is scheduled to take over the state’s disparate housing loan and grant programs. The governor’s office also proposed legislative language that would force the new agency and the Treasurer’s Office to operate in tandem, giving affordable housing developers a single place to apply for the state’s various funding programs — and to cut out some of the time they spend stuck in line.