Breed sets ambitious goal to create 82K new homes in San Francisco

San Francisco Mayor London Breed offered new details on her ambitious plan to create 82,000 news homes in the city.

Breed said her housing for all initiative will fundamentally change how the city approves and builds housing by streamlining the process.

Housing affordability is a perennial issue in San Francisco.

"Part of our plan to get to this ambitious goal of building 82,000 units in eight years as mandated by the state is going to require us to completely re-zone the city, completely remove a lot of barriers and get really serious and aggressive about housing production," said Breed on KTVU's Mornings on 2.

The mayor's office says her executive directive focuses on three strategies to create more housing.

The first is more accountability and oversight in developing housing. Second is wrangling all the city's departments to clear red tape. Lastly, set a definitive timeline and get legislation in place to help build more housing.

The mayor says the plan is for new housing to be built everywhere in the city.

"We don't want to change a lot of neighborhood character, this is not about that," said Breed. "This is about looking at potential opportunities to build more dense housing, to build in some cases, taller. But, not too tall. So, it's really about a balance."

Housing advocates said the housing for all initiative is a step in the right direction.

"My first take is this is a good ambitious first step. We're going to need a lot more like this," said Jane Matoli from YIMBY Action.

Matoli said adding new housing units will allow more people to live and work in San Francisco and could be a critical step in helping to resolve the homelessness crisis.

She says concerns that additional housing will cause existing homes to lose value are overinflated.

"Maybe in some far off world, property value might go down, but I don't think that's a major concern because we have such a built-up demand for more homes," said Matoli. "That day is far off."