Today the California Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD) is announcing that, in partnership with the State Department of Justice, we have prepared for filing, an enforceable judgment against the City of Anaheim, terms of which, if accepted by the Anaheim City Council, and the court, will result in enforcement of the Notice of Violation issued to Anaheim by HCD on December 8, 2021 under the Surplus Land Act.

The stipulated judgment will result in nearly $96 million for affordable housing development in Anaheim. Those funds must be spent in five years and, if leveraged with other sources, will result in homes for thousands of families struggling to make ends meet in the midst of a statewide housing crisis. In addition, this judgment extracts and sets aside another $27 million - which when leveraged with state and federal dollars will build hundreds more affordable homes directly on the Angel Stadium property itself, creating a truly mixed-income community in one of the city’s signature locations – one that will provide workers and new residents with access to critical resources and amenities and connect them to the rest of the city.

While the $96 million is equivalent to the fine provided under the Surplus Land Act, the additional funds and commitments for onsite affordable housing go beyond this requirement – and that is a credit to HCD and Attorney General Bonta for pursuing this enforcement and the City for agreeing to these terms.

While the proposed consent judgment permits the parties to move forward, HCD will continue to monitor the City of Anaheim for future Surplus Land Act compliance. It is our hope that the penalty and additional housing proposed to be built is complied with so we can move forward from the unfortunate missteps the City of Anaheim took when proposing the sale of Angel Stadium in disregard of its Surplus Land Act requirements.

Under the upcoming 6th Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA) cycle, the City of Anaheim has a goal of producing 17,453 additional units of housing. The outcome of this judgment gives the City the opportunity not just to make amends under the Surplus Land Act, but to expedite the creation of thousands of new homes and get closer to meeting its RHNA mandate.

On behalf of the Newsom Administration, we want to thank Attorney General Bonta for representing the people of California and HCD and by using public land for public good. His Housing Strike Force and HCD’s Housing Accountability Unit worked hard to get to this point, just like we are in many other instances where the State of California is prioritizing the enforcement of State housing law.