State Asks Court to Reinstate $50,000-a-Month Penalties on Huntington Beach
Regulators say the city's June housing plan still lacks the zoning changes needed to comply with state law. A hearing is set for Oct. 2.
California is asking a court to reinstate $50,000-a-month penalties against Huntington Beach, arguing the city still has not complied with state housing law despite adopting a new housing plan in June. State officials filed the request Sept. 8, according to reporting by the Orange County Register and the New York Post.
The filing is the latest turn in a fight that began in March 2023, when the state sued Huntington Beach for failing to adopt a compliant housing element. The state's Department of Housing and Community Development and the Attorney General's office have brought four separate lawsuits against the city over its housing practices, according to the Governor's office.
In May 2026, Judge Katherine Bacal ordered the city to pay $10,000 a month in penalties dating back to Jan. 1, 2025, totaling $170,000, plus attorneys' fees and costs. The order said penalties would escalate to $50,000 a month starting in June 2026 until the city cured its violations.
Huntington Beach adopted a new housing element in June in an effort to stop the fines, saying the plan would pave the way for more than 13,000 new housing units by the end of the decade. Judge Bacal temporarily paused the penalties while the California Department of Housing and Community Development reviewed the updated plan, but warned the fines could return if regulators found the city had not substantially complied.
In an Aug. 18 letter cited in the state's latest court filing, HCD said Huntington Beach had not completed the zoning changes necessary to bring its housing element into compliance. The state argued that without enforceable zoning changes, the newly adopted plan amounts to little more than a promise on paper.
The money from any reinstated penalties would go to a state housing trust that supports affordable housing and homeownership programs, according to the Post's reporting.
A hearing on the pending penalties is set for Oct. 2, according to a land-use update from the law firm Allen Matkins summarizing the Register's Sept. 12 coverage.
The state's Housing Accountability Unit has continued tracking the dispute. In May, when the court ordered the initial penalties, the Governor's office said Huntington Beach's deadline to submit a compliant housing element was Oct. 15, 2021, leaving the city more than four and a half years behind schedule at that point.
The outcome matters for how much housing can actually be built in Huntington Beach in the coming years. Until the zoning changes behind the housing element are enforceable, developers face uncertainty about what the city will permit, and the city faces the prospect of fines rising to $50,000 every month they remain outstanding.
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