At Disney theme parks, the “Lightning Lane” pass lets you skip to the front of the line for the Matterhorn, Space Mountain, and other famous rides.
Housing development in San Francisco — a roller coaster in its own right — has its own version of the Lightning Lane. It’s called ministerial approval. (Alas, the name’s not quite as catchy.)
In recent years, the city’s approval process for new housing was the longest and most arduous in the state. But that’s changed, thanks to a constellation of state laws that expand the kinds of projects that can get ministerial, or fast-track, approval. That is, they can skip various steps in the approval process, such as public hearings, commission votes, and neighborhood notification.
As long as the project in question meets building codes and affordable housing requirements, the project can sail through. That’s how two waterfront buildings with more than 600 homes are on their way to breaking ground.
“If the site meets eligibility standards and the proposal complies with objective requirements, we are generally bound to approve it,” SF Planning Chief of Staff Dan Sider tells The Frisc.
Several state laws, sometimes overlapping, have made these new green lights possible. Here are the most significant:
AB 2162: This 2019 law, authored by now-SF City Attorney David Chiu, fast-tracks new 100 percent affordable development if at least 20 percent of total units are reserved for the formerly homeless.
SB 9: The 2021 HOME ACT automatically allows property owners to split what were formerly single-family homes and build as many as four units instead.
AB 2011: Passed in 2022 to make it easier to turn dead strip malls into housing, the law requires that cities greenlight new housing “located on sites where office, retail, or parking are principally permitted” and along a “major transit corridor” — like Mission Street, Sloat Boulevard, and Ocean Avenue.
To get ministerial review, AB 2011 projects must also include at least 15 percent affordable housing, or 13 percent if priced for “very low-income” households. Of the thousands of homes planned under the law, many are at this South of Market site that proposes two 50-story towers.
SB 423: This 2023 law allows automatic approval of any code-compliant project if 1) it proposes nine or fewer units, or 2) with 10 or more units, at least 10 percent are priced for households making 50 percent of a city’s median income, or 80 percent if they’re condos. The law affects the entire state, but its author, state Sen. Scott Wiener, made sure it kicked in early for his hometown of San Francisco.
There’s also a law (SB 4) that grants ministerial approval to certain projects built on property owned by churches and schools, but nobody has yet made use of it.
Unless a developer makes an egregious paperwork error, these projects should be done deals, planners say. Developers must present projects to the Planning Commission for discussion, but the commission does not have a vote.
However, neighbors have exploited a legal loophole at least twice, resulting in delays and appeals to the Board of Supervisors that the board has rejected. Both instances the projects have been 100 percent affordable housing.
Sider calls these weak points in the law “agonizingly appealable” and predicts more attempts are likely.
PTSD and pandemic hangover
Even with all these state laws loosening approval rules, there’s been little rush to take advantage. That might change with SF’s new Family Zoning Plan. The zoning overhaul, which just took effect, opens wide swaths of the city to potential construction.
So far, SF has approved or is processing 80 new projects under laws like SB 423. They comprise more than 7,200 new units, and about 22 percent of them are affordable homes.
But all these terms — “in the pipeline,” “under review,” even “approved” — don’t mean actual housing will happen. The first project to invoke SB 423 in San Francisco, 1965 Market Street, put in a preliminary application in July 2024, but since then, nothing.
The developer did not return requests for comment. Architect Riyad Ghannam, who worked on the project, confirmed it hasn’t broken ground but couldn’t say why.
While the AI boom is helping breathe new life into SF’s tech market, things are simply not at the level they were before the pandemic.
We can — and do — issue permits all day long, but at the end of the day it’s up to the builder.
SFPlanning chief of staff Dan Sider
Writ large, the reasons for the development doldrums are well known: high interest rates, tariff chaos, and altered work and commute patterns. “In-office work and foot traffic are still significantly lagging pre-pandemic levels,” says Chris Salviati, an economist with SF-based rental site ApartmentList.
Sam Moss, director of affordable housing developer Mission Housing, says less red tape — thanks to the state laws and other changes like the Family Zoning Plan — isn’t an instant lure for the financing that development requires. “There’s serious PTSD from lenders when it comes to building in San Francisco,” Moss tells The Frisc.
“We can — and do — issue permits all day long, but at the end of the day it’s up to the builder,” Sider says.
How SF can flex
So what else can SF do to encourage more home-building? Last week, UC Berkeley’s Terner Center For Housing noted that the impact fees that California cities (including SF) charge developers add nearly $20,000 per unit in costs to new affordable housing projects, enough to finance another 1,250 homes, which is about how much affordable housing SF added in 2024. (Final estimates for 2025 construction are not yet available.)
Cities use impact fees to pay for schools, transit, infrastructure, and more. Cutting those fees willy-nilly could lead to other problems. Terner researchers recommend that more funding for city services come from the state instead.
Sup. Stephen Sherrill, appointed to his District 2 seat in late 2024, has pushed to nix or lower impact fees as long as he’s been in office, calling them one of the few levers SF has over development.
Sherrill also cites other obstacles to remove, such as “duplicative requirements.” SF requires two kinds of seismic evaluations for buildings over 160 feet. One “provides a more rigorous assessment,” Sherill tells The Frisc, so why bother with the second?
These are granular technical ideas, but they go hand-in-hand with Sherrill’s broader worldview that SF needs to build more housing. He was a staunch supporter of the Family Zoning Plan, despite vocal opposition in his well-off district to the prospect of taller buildings and denser blocks. The final version of the plan passed 7 to 4, a slimmer majority than some backers hoped for.
A big test of Sherrill’s stance comes in the June election. He’s facing a challenge from neighborhood activist Lori Brooke, who led opposition to the zoning plan.
There’s a chance development skeptics win special elections not just in D2 but also District 4, where Lurie appointee Alan Wong must also run in June.
If Lurie’s housing allies continue to control the board come 2027, they’ll likely keep chipping away at development obstacles. But a density-skeptical board will likely look to slow down the fast track and block future zoning expansions — even in the face of state sanctions.