1) Housing Element Update 2023-2031 Project # 22-2157-GP Address: Citywide Applicant: City of Carpinteria Planner: John Douglas Hearing to review comments from the California Department of Housing and Community Development (HCD), the City's revised draft 2023-2031 Housing Element addressing comments from HCD and other parties, receive additional public comments, and consider a recommendation to the City Council for adoption of the Housing Element. PROJECT LOCATION: The Housing Element is a component of the General Plan and applies citywide. PROJECT DESCRIPTION: The Housing Element includes analysis of housing needs, opportunities and constraints, an assessment of fair housing, as well as policies, programs and objectives to facilitate the construction, rehabilitation, and preservation of housing for all economic segments of the community and persons with special needs, including strategies for affirmatively furthering fair housing and accommodating at least 901 new housing units during the 2023-2031 period, which is the share of the region's housing need assigned to the City of Carpinteria by the Santa Barbara County Association of Governments through the Regional Housing Needs Assessment. ENVIRONMENTAL REVIEW: The 2023-2031 Housing Element update is exempt from CEQA (California Public Resources Code Sections 21000, et seq.), pursuant to State CEQA Guidelines Section 15061(b)(3), the "common sense exemption" covering activities with no possibility of having a significant effect on the environment because the Housing Element update would not approve any development project or other physical change to the environment. Future land use decisions and housing development projects will be subject to CEQA review to the extent required by law, as well as required compliance with numerous existing City, State and federal laws and regulations that provide for environmental protection independent of the CEQA review process (e.g., air and water quality standards, protection of cultural and historic resources, sensitive biological habitat areas, mitigation of environmental hazards, etc.).