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ISSUE | AFFORDABLE HOUSING: Housing is a key issue across California. In Folsom, debate over affordable housing has intensified as the city weighs how to expand housing options while meeting state housing requirements.
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In Folsom’s 5th City Council District, incumbent Anna Rohrbough and her challenger, government relations and advocacy manager Justin Hurst, have said they would take different approaches to housing access and affordability.
Anna Rohrbough, incumbent: infrastructure comes first
At a candidate forum Monday hosted by the League of Women Voters, Rohrbough said the city should take a cautious approach to affordable housing to ensure there is enough infrastructure to support new development.
“We are mandated by the state to reach these housing needs,” Rohrbough said. “Folsom’s doing a great job overall in accomplishing much of that.”
Rohrbough said the city’s ability to add affordable housing depends on finding developers willing to build it.
“The thing is that we can’t build affordable housing unless we have a developer willing to build affordable housing,” she said.
She pointed to the city’s recent purchase of a property near Lakeside Church with affordable housing funds. Because the city owns the property, it can control housing is developed there and wait until more infrastructure is in place, she said.
“That’s one way that we can control, first of all, the timing on that, because we don’t want to build anything really quickly until we have more infrastructure in place,” Rohrbough said.
The property could eventually be used for workforce, student, or other affordable housing, Rohrbough said.
She said the city is also considering locations near Sacramento Regional Transit, where access to transportation could reduce parking needs.
“We want to take a very thoughtful approach to this,” she said at the forum. “Any additional housing at all is kind of frowned on by our public at this moment.”
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Justin Hurst, challenger: Folsom needs mixed-income housing
At Monday’s forum, Hurst agreed that infrastructure and transportation should accompany new housing, particularly in developments south of Highway 50.
“I would also be in favor … of possibly revisiting the structure of our in-lieu fees,” Hurst said Monday. “I don’t think that it necessarily kept up with costs, especially in the last few years where we’ve seen lots of inflation, increasing costs for construction materials due to the tariffs, which I can’t do anything about the tariffs as a City Council member, I wish I could.”
Hurst said the city should work with developers to prioritize what he called the “missing middle,” including condominiums and somewhat higher-density housing.
“But I also think it’s working proactively with developers to prioritize projects that really cater towards the missing middle,” Hurst said. “Think condos, think a little bit higher density, but more of an affordable home for someone who wants to come to Folsom to bring their family.”
He also said the distribution of affordable housing is important and warned against repeatedly deferring it to future projects.
“If we just kick the can down the road for every project, eventually we’re going to get to a point where we’re just going to have to approve everything, and it’s going to be less thoughtful,” Hurst said at the candidate forum.
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Why it matters
The candidates’ positions highlight the tension in Folsom over how to accommodate affordable housing while addressing residents’ concerns about new development.
In 2021, state and regional officials determined that about 2,200 very low-income housing units and about 1,300 low-income units were needed to meet the city’s regional housing allocation. But by August 2025, only 225 very low-income and 347 low-income housing units had been built, according to a City Council presentation by the director of the Folsom Community Development Department.
When the city purchased the Lakeside property in August, it outbid 10 other offers from affordable multifamily housing developers, the director said. She told City Council members they could make decisions about the property’s development on their own timeline or push it off until the city’s next housing element cycle begins in 2029.
In Folsom’s 2021 Housing Element Update Survey, about 46% of the 280 residents surveyed said housing was not affordable in the city. At a candidate forum Monday, City Council members said their constituents continue to express concerns about new development, especially apartments. They said that for many residents, preserving the city’s character is a priority.
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