A bill that taps $23 million to get a trust fund going to boost affordable housing in Pasadena, Glendale and Burbank has been approved by the state Legislature and is headed to the governor’s desk for his signature.

State Sen. Anthony J. Portantino’s Senate Bill 1177 creates an affordable housing regional trust among the three cities. The trust got a push when Portantino secured the $23 million from the fiscal 2023 budget. The money would help finance affordable housing.

“Burbank, Glendale and Pasadena have been at the forefront of meeting California’s housing needs,” Portantino said, announcing the passage of the bill. “I’m happy to help them create and fund this effort. The high cost of housing has had a devastating effect on Californians, especially on lower income and workforce households in the Burbank, Glendale, and Pasadena area. These three great cities have initiated a creative solution and I look forward to the governor’s signature on this critical housing measure.”

A skyrocketing housing market — coupled with rising interests and still relatively short supply of inventory — has put the dream of a home out of reach for many Southern Californians, despite recent dips in some markets. And rents are spiking upward in what is said to be the tightest market in two decades.Although vacancies eased slightly in the spring quarter, availability rates remain among the lowest in data dating to the year 2000.

“In many of the SoCal markets, there has been a longstanding challenge in delivering new housing,” said real estate economist Carl Whitaker, research director for Dallas-based rental market tracker RealPage. “The lack of supply relative to local housing demand means limited vacancy.”

Portantino’s legislation — if the governor signs it — would go toward building a fund administered by a joint powers authority representing the three cities.

“This is a huge step toward adding affordable housing in our community,” said Burbank Mayor Jess Talamantes in the statement. “We are grateful to Sen. Portantino for sponsoring this bill.”

Pasadena Mayor Victor Gordo echoed that point.

“Housing is a regional issue and cities working together in partnership, together with the state is the best strategy to constructing more affordable housing for our communities,” he said. “We are stronger when we work together.”

The devastating impact of the soaring price of housing can be seen through a lens of the state’s regional housing assessment, which has found that Southern California cities, in particular, haven’t done enough to to comply with new, stricter state laws designed to promote greater development across California.

California needs to build 2.5 million homes by the end of the decade to address the state’s current housing shortage. Of those, at least 1 million must be affordable to low-income households.

Several state officials have argued that strict city zoning laws on development are a big reason why rents and housing costs are so high. Moreover, cities across Southern California — including in this tricity region — have been found to be falling short of state-mandated housing goals, despite robust pushes to create more housing, according to data from the state.

Take, for example, Pasadena. Under the state’s affordable housing goals, the city has been asked to plan for more than 9,400 new units from 2021 to 2029 — 600% more units than the previous eight-year cycle. And, like many cities in the region, it missed those earlier marks, though Pasadena made more progress than any of its neighbors.

Of late, Pasadena has ramped up efforts to open up more housing for its “missing middle” and at the grass-roots level, advocates are seeking to convince voters to approve rent control in the city.

Still, such efforts run parallel to the tensions inherent in creating more affordable places for people to live in a built-out region.

For one thing, the Pasadena City Council recently chose not to weigh in on a rent-control measure headed for the ballot in November. Though proponents say the measure if vital. Others say it could depress the building of more affordable housing.

It was just last April when Gordo fired off a sharply worded letter to state Attorney General Rob Bonta acknowledging more affordable housing is needed in the state, but that SB 9 — which seeks to ease the affordability crisis by allowing homeowners to build up to four units on a single-family lot — was wrongheaded.

Gordo emphasized that the city has previously approved 3,000 units of affordable housing with 1,000 more in the works, according to Gordo’s letter.

At least four Los Angeles County cities have filed a legal challenge to the bill.

Portantino’s legislation leans on long-standing relationships among the three cities.

The Burbank Democrat noted that they are members of the Arroyo Verdugo Sub-Region and “have worked collaboratively in the past,” on share concerns, and he emphasized that Glendale and Pasadena are two of the three cities in the state that have their own homeless continuum of care.

Under his bill, the JPA would be allowed to request and receive private and state funding allocations. It also would be able to authorize and issue bonds, and help finance affordable housing projects for people living in extremely low-, very-low-, low- and moderate-income households.