The SAFER Bay Project is a multi-benefit regional effort led by the San Francisquito Creek Joint Powers Authority to protect communities, critical infrastructure, and habitat along the San Mateo County shoreline from flooding and projected sea-level rise through integrated engineered and nature-based flood protection. SPUR, Nuestra Casa, and other partners have been following and participating in this effort for years. The Draft Environmental Impact Report was released for public comment in December and was due end of January. We identified areas for improvement in the project, focused on groundwater rise and contamination issues.

A broad coalition of environmental, health, labor, and building experts including SPUR urges the California Air Resources Board to strengthen its proposed Zero-Emission Space and Water Heater Standard, warning that the current draft falls short of California’s climate, air quality, equity, and affordability goals. Our letter calls for earlier and stricter limits on sales of polluting equipment aligned with the state’s Scoping Plan, more accurate treatment of equipment size and emissions, limits on credit multipliers, and stronger penalties for noncompliance. It also emphasizes the need for better data, streamlined permitting, workforce and consumer support, and targeted assistance for low-income households to ensure a faster, fairer transition to clean heating.

The Bay Area Air District, SPUR, and the Building Decarbonization Coalition Action Fund urge support for SB 222, the Heat Pump Access Act, which would modernize and standardize permitting to make heat pump installations faster and more affordable statewide. Inconsistent, costly, and slow local permitting is a major barrier to meeting California’s climate goals, driving up installation costs and sometimes pushing homeowners toward unpermitted work. SB 222 would streamline approvals, cap excessive local requirements, enable automated permitting, and protect consumers while still allowing jurisdictions to recover reasonable costs.

On the one-year anniversary of the Los Angeles fires, a new SPUR report examines the Bay Area’s vulnerability to fire risk. Responsibility for wildfire prevention in California is spread across multiple government agencies at the federal, state, and local levels. Fire mitigation is undermined by fragmented coordination, short-term or insufficient funding, and weak alignment between local risk reduction efforts and the insurance market. SPUR recommends new governance structures for achieving community wildfire resilience.