San Rafael, Calif., is putting one of its own properties on the table to help address a housing affordability crisis that has made Marin County one of the least accessible housing markets in the country, with median home prices above $1.4 million and decades of underproduction pushing working families out.
The city has posted an RFP seeking developers for an affordable housing project on a city-owned parcel at 350 Merrydale Road near the Redwood Highway corridor in north San Rafael. The site sits close to the Highway 101 transit corridor and the Marin Civic Center, a location that qualifies for density bonuses and streamlined state permitting designed to accelerate housing construction.
The move comes amid California's push to hold cities accountable for lagging behind state-assigned housing targets. Under the Surplus Land Act, local governments must prioritize affordable housing when disposing of public land. San Rafael, as the county seat and largest city in Marin, has absorbed a sharply higher share of the region's mandated housing production under the state's 2023-2031 Regional Housing Needs Allocation cycle. Cities that fail to comply risk losing local zoning control under a provision known as the "builder's remedy," which allows developers to override local land-use rules.
Marin County has long been defined by single-family zoning and fierce resistance to denser development, particularly in its wealthier neighborhoods. San Rafael has become the primary pressure point for the county's housing obligations, and city-led projects like this one signal an effort to get ahead of state enforcement rather than wait for it.
Similar efforts to unlock public land for affordable housing have played out elsewhere in California and beyond. Georgia, for instance, has pursued its own public-land housing deals, converting former state property into affordable residential development.
Developer proposals for the Merrydale site are due May 1, 2026.
