This is a short general-information note on developments that have been showing up in Bay Area real estate, land use, and California landlord-tenant work. It is not legal advice and does not address any particular property or tenancy. Confirm current statutes, ordinances, and case filings before relying on them.
Richmond’s data-center pause is now a two-year pause. On October 20, 2026, the City Council adopted an urgency ordinance under Government Code section 65858 that restates Ordinance No. 13-26 N.S. and extends the moratorium on new data-center permits and land-use approvals for 22 months and 15 days, through September 15, 2028. The staff report notes that no data-center application is pending, and the City’s hearing notice says lawfully operating facilities with existing permits may continue. Locunity’s meeting report records a 7–0 vote, above the four-fifths the statute requires. Owners and brokers looking at Richmond industrial or flex sites for that kind of use should plan around the 2028 date and watch the consultant study and any permanent rules that come out of it.
Closer to the office, the same meeting took up the Keller Beach Sanitary Sewer, a 1959 shoreline line serving about 290 connections (roughly 340 lots) in Point Richmond. According to the Public Works staff report, the moratorium on new connections to that interceptor runs through February 16, 2027, under the interim ordinance adopted April 1, 2025. Locunity reports that the Council voted 7–0 to have staff pursue an interim diversion (Alternative A1, about $800,000) while designing a longer-term rehabilitation or replacement of the shoreline pipe (Group B), with no money appropriated yet. If you are buying, selling, financing, or planning an addition or ADU on a Point Richmond lot served by that line, confirm its connection status first, and watch what the City does as the February 2027 date gets closer.
On the landlord side, the Richmond Rent Board met October 21 with Item G-1 on applying rent control to Section 8 and LIHTC housing and next steps on Regulation 202, Regulation 204, and Resolution 19-01. As of this writing, no minutes are posted on the Rent Board page, so we have not confirmed what direction the Board gave. Next door, San Pablo voters decide Measure S on November 3. According to the City Attorney’s impartial analysis, the citizen-initiated measure would roll back rents for existing tenancies to the amount charged as of July 1, 2025, and then generally cap annual increases on covered units at 60% of the regional CPI increase, with a 3% maximum. It would also add just-cause notice and procedure rules, set relocation payments generally at the greater of four months’ fair market rent or $12,000, regulate buyout agreements, and fund the program with annual fees on rental property owners. San Pablo owners should read the full text and wait for certified results before assuming effective dates or exemptions.
A newly published First District decision matters for commercial leases. In USPA City Center, LLC v. Law Offices of Jason W. Estavillo, P.C. (A174766), certified for publication October 19, the Court of Appeal affirmed an Alameda County judgment entered on a stipulation from a settled commercial unlawful detainer over a downtown Oakland office suite. The judgment included about $1.22 million in future rent under Civil Code section 1951.2. The court held that broker testimony and vacancy data supported a three-year future-rent award, that the stipulation was not an unenforceable penalty because it tracked what the lease and statute already allowed, and that the double-recovery argument failed. The tenant offered no counter-evidence on mitigation, and the opinion makes clear that this mattered. If you are signing a stipulation in a commercial settlement, assume it will be enforced as written.
In San Francisco, the SHADE Act we noted last week is now enacted. Legistar shows final action and mayoral approval on October 23 (Ordinance No. 216-26). The ordinance removes shadow analysis as a specific CEQA impact category in the Administrative Code and cuts the time to appeal CEQA determinations to the Board of Supervisors from 30 to 15 days. Check the effective date before counting days. SF Daily Brief reports that the same October 20 meeting gave first-reading approval to a rental fee-disclosure ordinance and to an ordinance barring evictions over unpaid rent below a fair-market-rent threshold. Both still need a second vote.
Rules and dockets change. Read the current text and the actual file, not a weekly summary.