The City of Palo Alto and many other bay area cities have been struggling to comply with the regional housing mandate required by Senate Bill 375 (2008). The Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) have been setting the goals for individual cities to meet.
The City of Palo Alto was required to plan for 2,860 units of new housing for the 2007-2014 time period. On Monday June 17, 2013 the city council voted to adopt the needed new housing vision. A recent complication to the plan was the inclusion of the planned development of Maybell Avenue. The vote took place shortly after a zoning change was approved allowing the Maybell Avenue development to proceed forward.
http://www.paloaltoonline.com/news/show_story.php?id=30048&e=y
City of Palo Alto June 19 Planning and Transportation Issues of Interest: http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/civicax/filebank/blobdload.aspx?BlobID=34954
Maybell Development Approval: http://www.cityofpaloalto.org/news/displaynews.asp?NewsID=2298&TargetID=268