{"id":401675,"date":"2026-07-17T02:30:18","date_gmt":"2026-07-17T02:30:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/401675\/"},"modified":"2026-07-17T02:30:18","modified_gmt":"2026-07-17T02:30:18","slug":"california-sues-turlock-4-other-cities-over-housing-plan-requirements","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/401675\/","title":{"rendered":"California sues Turlock, 4 other cities over housing plan requirements"},"content":{"rendered":"

California<\/a> is suing five cities, including Turlock, alleging they failed to comply with the state’s Housing Element Law by missing deadlines to adopt housing plans.<\/p>\n

The Housing Element Law requires local governments to adopt a housing plan as part of their general plan, including a blueprint for how the city or county will grow and develop housing.<\/p>\n

Attorney General Rob Bonta said the cities had multiple opportunities to comply but failed to meet the state’s requirements.<\/p>\n

“They’ve failed to meet clearly laid out deadlines for adopting compliant housing elements, and after having multiple opportunities to correct course, they’ve continued to choose to not comply,” Bonta said.<\/p>\n

Bonta said the cities named in the lawsuits, including Turlock and Ridgecrest, have delayed compliance for years.<\/p>\n

“In all of these cases, compliance has been delayed for years. They have missed deadlines by 3.5 years or more,” Bonta said.<\/p>\n

Republican Assemblymember Stan Ellis (R-Bakersfield) who represents the Ridgecrest area, criticized the lawsuits, saying they are not productive while California faces an affordability and housing crisis.<\/p>\n

“It takes a long time and a lot of resources to comply. And it makes no sense. All he has to do is send, hey, we’d like to get you, let’s work with you. Let’s not sue you,” Ellis said.<\/p>\n

Ellis said communities such as Ridgecrest face ongoing challenges because they lack the resources and time needed to comply with the state’s requirements.<\/p>\n

“All these communities they don’t have the resources. They don’t have the time and we’re in an affordability crisis,” Ellis said.<\/p>\n

The city of Turlock declined ABC10’s request for an interview.<\/p>\n

In a news release, the city said it is working to comply with the Housing Element Law and plans to present a required rezoning package to the Planning Commission in August. City Manager Dr. John J. Murphy said the city’s focus is completing the remaining public process needed to achieve compliance.<\/p>\n

The other cities named in the lawsuits are Calexico, Costa Mesa and Half Moon Bay.<\/p>\n

ABC10 also requested comment from Sen. Marie Alvarado-Gil and Assemblymember Juan Alanis, who represent the Turlock area, but both declined.<\/p>\n

WATCH ALSO:<\/p>\n

The new housing law is here. Here’s what it could mean for California<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"California is suing five cities, including Turlock, alleging they failed to comply with the state’s Housing Element Law…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":401676,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[7,9,8,161172,1336,107579,25508,2794,8538,161173],"class_list":["post-401675","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-california","tag-california","tag-california-headlines","tag-california-news","tag-element-law","tag-housing-crisis","tag-housing-element-law","tag-local-governments","tag-rob-bonta","tag-turlock","tag-turlock-area"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401675","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=401675"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/401675\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/401676"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=401675"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=401675"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=401675"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}