Opinion: Davis Risks Losing Control If It Fails on Housing, Jobs and Climate
Key points:
- Davis city plan must address housing shortages, job mismatches, and climate change.
- City needs 2,000 new housing units to meet future needs at all income levels.
- Davis faces a critical mismatch between jobs and housing within city limits.
When Eric Yurkovich, a principal at Raimi + Associates, addressed the City of Davis during the first phase of its general plan update, he made clear that the choices ahead are both urgent and far-reaching.
The city’s plan, he said, must grapple with housing shortages, job and transportation mismatches, and the growing effects of climate change.
“During that process, it was identified that the city needed about 2000 new housing units to meet the needs of future housing within the city. That’s at all income levels, everything from very low income to moderate and above moderate income levels.”
Davis’s population surpassed 65,000 according to the 2020 Census, and the city has largely met state housing requirements through infill development.
But with nearly 97 percent of the city already built out and only a handful of vacant parcels remaining, it will be increasingly difficult to rely on infill alone.
That reality, Yurkovich said, means the city will need to get creative about how and where to meet future housing and job needs, even as the politically sensitive question of expanding beyond current boundaries remains unresolved.
That shift will not be easy in a community where most development beyond city limits must go before voters under Measure J, but it is unavoidable.
The land use and mobility element of the plan, which Yurkovich described as the “heart” of the general plan, will set the framework for how Davis organizes itself in the decades to come.
It will determine which parts of the city allow housing, which are reserved for jobs, which for amenities and open space, and which allow for a mix of uses.
These decisions, he said, “affect how we travel, the great places we have in our communities and how we foster different spaces in the sustainability of our community and our natural systems and ourselves.”
These factors will be especially critical because those decisions shape not just the physical map of Davis, but the community’s ability to remain inclusive and livable.
Nowhere is that more apparent than in the housing market.
As Yurkovich noted, the city faces “an increased need for workforce and affordable housing” that cannot be met under current conditions. UC Davis adds another layer of pressure.
The university’s 2018 Long Range Development Plan projected capacity for an additional 2,500 students and 3,000 employees compared with 2023–24 enrollment. Even if the campus falls short of that growth by 2030, the squeeze on the local housing market will remain, and the city will be asked to shoulder the burden.
The reality is critical because without more housing, particularly at affordable levels, residents, students and workers alike will be priced out, forced into longer commutes, and driven to surrounding communities in search of shelter.
Jobs add another dimension to the imbalance. Only a fraction of Davis residents both live and work in the city.
According to Yurkovich, about 75 percent of jobs in Davis are filled by people who commute into the city, while roughly 85 percent of Davis residents leave the city each day for work. That mismatch means more vehicle miles traveled, more greenhouse gas emissions, and more strain on infrastructure.
“Part of what we’re going to be talking about in general plan process is matching our jobs and housing needs so we can better create a more balanced transportation system and match up those needs better through this process,” he said.
The state of California has little patience for cities that ignore these realities.
Through the Regional Housing Needs Allocation (RHNA), the state requires each jurisdiction to plan for and zone sufficient housing across all income categories.
Failure to comply carries consequences. The Department of Housing and Community Development can revoke a city’s housing element certification, stripping access to state funding and exposing it to lawsuits.
Developers can invoke the so-called builder’s remedy, allowing them to bypass local zoning if their projects include affordable housing.
The attorney general has stepped in elsewhere to enforce state law, and Davis is no less vulnerable than any other city. Put simply, Davis can either plan for growth on its own terms through the general plan, or it can have growth imposed upon it by Sacramento and the courts.
Climate change overlays every piece of the conversation. Yurkovich pointed to the link between land use decisions, transportation systems, and the city’s climate footprint.
“These amenities really help to support everything from our walkable and sustainable neighborhoods to reducing our daily trips and making them be met through more active modes of travel. So we can walk or we can bike, or we can take the bus to those places. That really helps us to lower our contribution to greenhouse gases and our effects on climate change overall.”
Davis has long been known as a leader in bike infrastructure, but the city cannot rest on its laurels. A warming climate means more extreme heat days, heavier precipitation, and other hazards that will affect both the natural and built environment.
These impacts, he said, “are going to fall disproportionately on the most sensitive populations… many of the most sensitive populations are already burdened by higher environmental pollution, by pesticides, lower incomes, and higher housing costs.” A responsible general plan must ensure these burdens are not worsened and that equity remains central to the city’s climate policies.
The choices ahead go to the core of whether Davis can live up to its stated values.
“How we shape that land use helps us foster what we love about communities. So we want to create neighborhoods that are safe, fair, healthy. We want to create places where there are homes for people of different cultures, different income, low and different places in their lives,” Yurkovich said.
The path forward will demand political courage to approve housing, creativity in rethinking infill, and persistence in aligning jobs with housing. It will mean balancing growth with the protection of agricultural land and open space. And it will require acknowledging that failure to act carries risks far beyond local politics.
Davis has always taken pride in its agricultural roots, its university identity and its environmental conscience. The general plan update is an opportunity to bring those traditions into alignment with the city’s present challenges.
If Davis succeeds, it can remain a model of sustainability, inclusion and thoughtful planning. If it fails, it risks stagnation, worsening inequality, and loss of local control over growth.
The choice is ours, but the urgency could not be clearer.
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