SPOTLIGHT: California Housing Initiative
The California Housing Initiative (CHI) is a student-led pro bono project at Berkeley Law partnering with the California Housing Defense Fund (CalHDF) to enforce California’s pro-housing state preemption laws. The California Legislature has enacted nearly a hundred landmark housing statutes since 2017 — from SB 35 to SB 79 — designed to override exclusionary local zoning, streamline permitting, and increase housing density near jobs and transit. But laws on paper don’t build homes. Cities across California routinely misinterpret or fail to implement these statutes, contributing to our current housing affordability crisis.
CHI exists to close that gap. Working alongside CalHDF’s team of attorneys and planners, CHI students monitor city general plans and zoning ordinances, identify non-compliance with state housing law, and draft enforcement letters to cities providing legal guidance and demanding corrective action. Our work is upstream, targeted, and consequential: eliminating a redlined zoning map today can mean hundreds of new homes tomorrow.
We are training the next generation of pro-housing lawyers and public servants while doing real legal work to build a California that makes room for everyone.
To learn more about the California Housing Initiative, visit their webpage.
Current SLPS
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- Animal Law and Advocacy
- Arts and Innovation Representation
- Berkeley Immigrant Survivors Project
- Berkeley Immigration Group
- Berkeley Law and Organizing Collective
- Berkeley Name, Image, and Likeness Initiative
- Business Community Legal Advice Workshop
- California Asylum Representation Clinic
- California Housing Initiative
- Clean Energy Leaders in Law
- Climate Migration & Displacement Project
- Consumer Protection Public Policy Order
- Contra Costa Reentry Project
- Digital Rights Project
- Disability Rights Project
- Drug Policy Project
- East Bay Dreamers Project
- Environmental Conservation Outreach
- Family Defense Project
- Food Justice Project
- Foster Education Project
- Freedom of Information Advocates
- Gun Violence Prevention Project
- Homelessness Service Project
- International Human Rights Workshop
- International Refugee Assistance Project
- La Alianza Workers’ and Tenants’ Rights Clinic
- Legal Obstacles Veterans Encounter
- Name and Gender Change Workshop
- Native American Legal Assistance Project
- Palestine Advocacy Legal Assistance Project
- Police Review Project
- Political and Election Empowerment Project
- Post-Conviction Advocacy Project
- Queer Justice Project
- Reproductive Justice Project
- Startup Law Initiative
- Survivor Advocacy Project
- Tenants’ Rights Workshop
- Workers’ Rights Clinic
- Youth Advocacy Project