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By James Bickerton
News Reporter
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Ambitious plans to erect a new city in Solano County, California, received a boost on Tuesday when a petition drawn up by the organizers crossed the threshold required to feature on the county's ballot in November.
The proposal comes from California Forever, a corporation backed by a number of prominent billionaires which has purchased 60,000 acres of land in the hopes of creating a new community "designed to be one of the most walkable and sustainable in the United States" in east Solano County.
On Tuesday the Solano County Registrar of Voters announced the California Forever plan had reached the statistically valid signatures threshold for November's ballot. This was concluded by examining a small sample of the petition from which they concluded it contained around 113.5 percent of the 14,369 valid signatures needed for a vote.
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The move comes as house prices in California hit an all-time high of over $900,000 in April according to the California Association of Realtors as the state battles what has been a chronic housing shortage. Federal data showed that between the beginning of 2024 and June authorities in San Francisco only approved 16 new housing units in the city, though when speaking to Newsweek, city officials insisted this did not show "a complete representation of housing permitting in San Francisco."
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The Solano County Registrar of Voters will next meet on June 25 when it will have to choose between approving the new city, putting it to a referendum on November's ballot or instructing the creation of a report on its potential impact before putting it on the ballot.
Speaking to Newsweek Jan Sramek, the former Goldman Sachs banker who is CEO of California Forever, said: "This is an important milestone for us, and we're excited to be moving the process forward.
"The East Solano Plan is a bold initiative to invest tens of billions of dollars in the community—to bring jobs, clean energy, and homes working families can afford to Solano County."
The California Forever proposal is not without critics.
California U.S. House Representative Mike Thompson, a Democrat who represents the county, said that the development would upend "the way of life in Solano County" and "cause increased congestion on our already strained highways and roads" in an article for the local Daily Republic newspaper.
In an interview with The Los Angeles Times ahead of the registrar's announcement, Sramek said if the proposal goes to the voters in November it will be "a referendum on what do we want the future of California to be."
He said The Golden State used to be a place that "built all these incredible things, bridges, water infrastructure, great public works" but has more recently become an "oasis for the rich, or people who bought houses when they were cheap and they get to live here."
Sramek argued that the California Forever proposal represents an alternative to "this defeatist build nothing argue about everything mode" which he said had engulfed the state.
California Forever wants to build a new city on 18,600 acres of the land they own in east Solano county, which they claim will create 15,000 new jobs. According to The Guardian the first phase would see the construction of 20,000 homes for around 50,000 people, though the population could eventually increase to 400,000.
Those backing the development include LinkedIn co-founder Reid Hoffman, investor Marc Andreessen and Lauren Powell Jobs, wife of the late Apple CEO Steve Jobs and founder of the Emerson Collective philanthropy group.
Organizers have pledged that if their city goes ahead they will provide $500 million in benefits to the existing community in Solano County, with an additional $200 million to improve its current major settlements.
Update 6/13/24 3:15 a.m. ET: This story has been updated with comment from California Forever CEO Jan Sramek.
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