Member Profile

Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG)

Council of Governments

The Association of Bay Area Governments, or ABAG, is the comprehensive regional planning agency and council of governments for the nine counties and 101 cities and towns of the San Francisco Bay region. One of California’s earliest COGs, ABAG was founded by local government leaders who recognized the need to address common
issues from a regional perspective. ABAG’s work includes the Regional Housing Technical Assistance Program (RHTA). The RHTA team has built a robust collection of more than 300 housing technical assistance resources through ABAG’s Technical Assistance (TA) Portal, an easily searchable online collection of resources for government staff. ABAG has provided services as varied as customized data packets, an online tool for the public to visualize potential new housing sites, communication resources, and opportunities for local jurisdiction staff to gather by county to share consultant support and collaborate on regional issues.

ABAG is also the COG that conducts the regional housing needs assessment (RHNA) every eight years as required by state law. The heart of ABAG’s work on RHNA is developing the methodology to allocate a portion of housing needs to each city, town and county in the region.

The ABAG POWER Natural Gas Pool conducts pooled purchasing of natural gas on behalf of nearly 40 local governments and special districts.

ABAG and the Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC) have a combined staff, serving both the ABAG Executive Board and the MTC Commission.

Bay Area Regional Energy Network – BayREN provides Bay Area homeowners the option of upgrading their homes in exchange for rebates and offers a codes and standards program for buildings to have higher performance rates by complying with energy codes and advocating for the adoption of green building codes. Since 2013, BayREN has upgraded 72,000 homes, paid $78 million in incentives, avoided 166 million tons of carbon dioxide and educated thousands at 403 Codes and Standards trainings.
San Francisco Estuary Partnership – The San Francisco Estuary Partnership (Estuary Partnership) is part of the National Estuary Program, a place-based nonregulatory program of the US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The Estuary Partnership leverages federal funding, along with millions of dollars in state and local funds, for restoration, water quality improvement and resilience-building projects across the Bay Area’s nine counties.

https://abag.ca.gov/