Where Did the Students Go? Housing & the School Enrollment Crisis

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August 27, 2025

Expanding Housing Options for Residents with Special Needs

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Two years into the 6th Cycle Housing Element, Santa Clara County cities are beginning to deliver on programs for residents with special needs—including people with disabilities, older adults, and extremely low-income households. Early successes show what is possible when funding, partnerships, and policy alignment come together. Still, uneven progress highlights the need for stronger commitments, targeted resources, and continued collaboration to ensure inclusive communities.

California’s AB 686 requires every city and county to do more than plan for housing—they must actively affirmatively further fair housing (AFFH) by addressing segregation and expanding access to opportunity for all. For the first time, the 6th Cycle Housing Element puts this mandate into practice, and two years in, local jurisdictions are being held accountable for delivering results. We can track results through Annual Progress Reports (APRs), a self-evaluation each City completes assessing its Housing Element Progress to date.

For priority populations—including people with disabilities, older adults, extremely low-income households, and people experiencing homelessness—the stakes are especially high. These groups often face barriers such as limited incomes, accessibility challenges, and a lack of technology skills and/or access, heightening their risk of displacement. General housing strategies are not sufficient; Housing Elements are expected to translate documented needs into specific, resourced, and measurable programs that expand special needs housing and services in our communities.

Special Needs Housing

Special needs housing entails more than just the construction of new units. It includes a continuum of solutions: permanent supportive housing (PSH) for people exiting homelessness, accessible homes for residents with physical or cognitive disabilities, affordable senior housing that allows older adults to age in place, and rehabilitation or retrofits that make existing homes safer and more inclusive. Advancing this continuum also depends on the right policy tools—from zoning reforms that expand where special-needs housing can be built near services, to targeted funding that ensures deeply affordable, service-rich developments move forward.

Across Santa Clara County, Housing Elements have highlighted the gap between the need and existing supply of housing for residents with special needs. A required component of the Housing Element, the housing needs assessment points to persistent challenges in local cities: high rates of cost burden, increasing housing needs among people with disabilities, and a rapidly aging population living on fixed incomes. In response, cities have committed to program areas such as:

  • Initiatives to advance housing for people with physical disabilities and/or intellectual and developmental disability (IDD)
  • Age-friendly and older-adult housing strategies
  • Accessibility retrofits, rehabilitation, and reasonable accommodation ordinances
  • Zoning and policy reforms to expand where special-needs housing can be built
  • Funding tools such as Notices of Funding Availability (NOFAs) and targeted local allocations

While many cities have set timelines, targets, and commitments, progress on the ground remains uneven. This article looks more closely at how jurisdictions are advancing—or struggling to advance—their special needs housing programs, and what these efforts mean for meeting the AFFH goals of creating inclusive, opportunity-rich communities.

Where Cities Are Advancing

Layered funding and partnerships enable delivery: Mountain View is moving forward with roughly 200 homes of permanent supportive housing to serve the needs of chronically unhoused residents through a City–County partnership that combines funds from the County’s Measure A and local funding commitments with state and federal resources. This is AFFH in action: resourced, targeted, and impactful.

Early unit delivery signals alignment: Sunnyvale’s Meridian development delivered and fully leased 23 homes for residents with intellectual and developmental disabilities in 2024. Early-cycle completion demonstrates what is possible when program goals, funding, and nonprofit partnerships align.

Targeted funding brings movement: Cupertino leveraged its Below-Market-Rate Affordable Housing Fund to award two developments (Mary Avenue and Wolf Road) that will serve residents with IDD and extremely low incomes. It is also advancing 19 additional homes for individuals with developmental disabilities in collaboration with Charities Housing.

Policy reforms remove barriers: Los Altos adopted a reasonable accommodation ordinance, streamlining processes for residents with disabilities and addressing a long-standing regulatory gap. Other jurisdictions have begun refining objective design standards and approval processes to ease pathways for special-needs housing.

Where Progress Lags

Funding priorities without uptake: Sunnyvale’s 2024 Notice of Funding Availability (NOFA) included a priority for special-needs and age-friendly homes, but no developers submitted applications in those categories. The intent is there, but uptake is missing—highlighting the need for proactive city action: partnership with the development community to understand barriers, early technical assistance, gap funding, and site control to make these developments feasible.

Delays in outreach and planning: Campbell postponed disability-focused outreach until mid-2025, citing limited staff capacity. Smaller cities often face these constraints, underscoring the importance of regional collaboration and shared technical resources.

Expanding housing options without reported outcomes: Los Gatos has committed to a wide range of zoning and code changes to expand housing options for residents with special needs. These include allowing larger group homes by right in residential districts, removing barriers in the reasonable accommodation process, prioritizing reduced processing times for special-needs housing applications, and aligning local ordinances with state requirements on supportive and transitional housing, employee housing, and emergency shelters. 

While these commitments demonstrate alignment with state law and HCD guidance, the Town’s APR indicates that these programs remain “in progress.” It is not yet clear which elements of the program have been fully adopted or implemented. Stronger reporting and evidence of targeted implementation will be critical to ensure these regulatory reforms translate into real housing opportunities for people with disabilities, older adults, and other residents with special needs.

Older adult housing remains under-addressed: In Cupertino, the city’s residential rehabilitation program served only nine households in the first two years of the Housing Element cycle, against a target of 100 over eight years. While some progress has been made, the pace falls far short of what is needed to meet long-term goals. 

This is especially concerning as older adults are one of the fastest-growing populations in the county. Without accessible and affordable housing options, many risk being priced out of their communities or pushed into unsuitable living arrangements. A variety of housing solutions are needed to ensure older adults can age in place safely and with dignity.

Looking Ahead

Encouragingly, most Housing Element programs across Santa Clara County now include metrics, and nearly four in five include measurable numeric targets. The challenge ahead is converting those commitments into delivered housing, completed retrofits, and adopted ordinances. Early successes in Sunnyvale, Mountain View, and Cupertino prove that programs can succeed when all four criteria are met: clear goals, funding, partnerships, and timelines.

Santa Clara County cities have established promising frameworks: priority language in NOFAs, clearer metrics, and initial delivery of developments for people with disabilities. But meaningful progress requires scaling up what works and closing the gaps.

The next phase must focus on:

  • Pairing targeted funding with site control to reduce barriers for developers
  • Identifying sites for special-needs and senior housing
  • Streamlining accessibility and rehabilitation programs so older adults can remain safely housed
  • Expanding City–County–State collaboration to braid resources and deliver results

Different people have different needs. Meeting the obligation to affirmatively further fair housing means delivering various types of housing—and the services and accessibility measures that go with them—so that all residents, especially those with the greatest barriers, have a stable place to call home.