A regional campaign to build the public will, the coalition, and the accountability needed to deliver 10,000 housing units for the people who make this region work.
The 10,000 reasons aren't data points. They're the teacher grading papers tonight who doesn't know if she can renew her lease. The technician driving an hour each way because nothing closer is affordable. The nurse who knows exactly how to help you when you arrive at the emergency department. The family that's been here for decades watching their kids move away.
They are your neighbors, your employees, your community. And they are running out of runway. Here's what the employers who know them best have to say.
"We celebrate when an employee buys their first home here. It's a sign they're going to stay long-term."
"One of the top reasons we can't place talented team members is they can't afford to live here."
"Housing is at the core of what makes our community a community."
Each one is a real person, a real employer, a real family that should be here. We're collecting 10,000 of them.
"If people can't find or buy a home here, they won't stay — or come in the first place. Housing leads to jobs, which leads to people, which leads to a better Central Coast."
A real local employer
"Recruiting from outside the area is difficult to near impossible. Those outside looking in see it as a non-starter."
A real local employer
"When a recruit buys a house we've got them for life."
A real local employer
"I have raised three children which are now starting to raise their own families in Central California — and all struggle to achieve the dream to own their own home here."
A real local employer
"When teachers leave, students lose more than instruction. They lose the people most likely to point them toward what comes next."
A real local employer
Of SLO County residents surveyed named affordable housing as the community's single most pressing need. The public will is there.
SLO County Community Development Needs Assessment, 2024
In 1983, the median home in South Santa Barbara County cost 4 times the median family income. Today it's 19x. That's not a market. That's a crisis.
Housing Trust Fund of Santa Barbara County, 2024
10,000 new homes across San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara Counties increases the total housing stock 3.4 percent. Modest in scale, enormous in impact. Every one of those homes is a family that gets to stay.
Isn't 10,000 homes a lot to ask for?
Actually, it's a remarkably modest ask. SLO and Santa Barbara Counties together have roughly 295,000 housing units. Adding 10,000 homes for the people who power the Central Coast would increase the total housing stock by just 3.4%. We're not talking about transforming the region. We're talking about a modest, targeted correction to decades of underbuilding, one that makes room for the nurses, teachers, and technicians already living and working here. The question isn't whether the Central Coast can absorb 3.4% more housing. It's whether we can afford not to build it.
How far behind are we, really?
Further than most people realize, and the gap has been widening for decades in both counties. In SLO County, a healthy regional economy needs roughly one housing unit for every 1.5 jobs. SLO County has about 3.5 jobs per housing unit, more than twice the healthy ratio. Economists estimated the county needed to build approximately 5,000 units between 2015 and 2020 alone just to keep pace with job growth. It didn't come close, producing only about 24% of the workforce and affordable homes the region actually needed. In Santa Barbara County, the region added roughly 25,700 jobs while producing only 12,500 housing units, a structural deficit of around 8,000 homes. The City of Santa Barbara tells the starkest version: 7,000 new jobs, 1,300 new housing units, a gap of more than 4,300 homes in a single city. Across both counties, we've been adding jobs and subtracting housing options for a generation. 10,000 homes is how we start closing that gap.
Do developers actually have a path to get this done?
Yes, and that's by design. The 10,000 goal isn't a construction mandate. It counts homes that are planned, entitled, permitted, or built. That means every project that clears a planning commission vote counts. Every environmental review that gets completed counts. Every entitlement that gets approved counts. We're tracking progress across the entire pipeline because that's where housing actually gets made, or stalled. If you're a builder or developer working on a project in SLO or Santa Barbara County, your work counts toward this goal. We want you at the table, and we want to help remove the barriers in your way.
I love this place the way it is. Why should I support more housing?
Because the place you love is already changing, not because of new housing, but because of the absence of it. When the people who teach your kids, staff the ER, and fix the roads can't afford to live here, the community doesn't stay the same. It gets older, thinner, more transient. The things that make a place worth living in (the Little League coach who's been here twenty years, the nurse who knows your family, the small business owner who grew up down the street) all depend on people being able to afford to stay. When quality of life goes up for the people who work here, it goes up for everyone. Housing doesn't change the character of a place. It stabilizes it.
Every name here is a public statement: I stand for housing on the Central Coast. Over time, these names become something REACH can activate — at a planning meeting, in a public comment period, at the moment it matters most.
Right now, we're building the list.
By submitting, you agree your name may appear on this site.
10,000 Reasons is a campaign by REACH Central Coast — the regional economic development organization for San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara Counties. REACH connects employers, educators, civic leaders, and policymakers to build a more prosperous Central Coast. Visit reachcentralcoast.org →