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Late last year, I spoke with State Senator Scott Wiener about his Senate Bill 50, a second pass at a controversial fix for the state’s housing affordability crisis.

This week, that bill — along with others that take aim at various tension points in the housing debate — will face some early but important tests. My colleague Conor Dougherty, who has written extensively about housing in California, explained what’s at stake:

Pretty much anytime a group of experts is asked to prescribe a solution to California’s affordable housing crisis, the consensus view that comes out is that the state needs one set of policies that make it easier to build more and taller housing and another set that protects already-affordable housing and tenants in units that already exist. This week, bills that broadly address both sides of that equation — and could drastically change what California cities look like and how local landlords operate — are headed to crucial committee hearings that will go a long way toward determining how ambitious the current State Legislature will be on housing.

On Wednesday, S.B. 50, which was introduced by Senator Scott Wiener, a Democrat from San Francisco, will have its second committee hearing. S.B. 50, which is a rehashed version of Mr. Wiener’s controversial S.B. 827 bill from last year, would essentially force cities to allow denser apartment buildings near transit stops and job centers. The next day, several pro-tenant bills are headed to the State Assembly’s housing committee. One of the bills, A.B. 36, would allow cities to bring more units under rent control, while another, A.B. 1482, would impose a statewide rent cap. Were A.B. 1482 to get out of committee and ultimately pass, California would follow Oregon as the second state to pass statewide rent control.

Of course, there’s a long way to go until the legislative session ends in September, and these housing bills — along with the dozens of others that would, among other things, create homeless shelters, subsidized legal aid, streamline housing approvals and create a rental registry — can always be killed and amended at various points along the way.

The friction between the competing views on how to solve the housing crisis was thrust onto doorsteps this week when the prominent backer of a recent rent control initiative sent out a series of political mailers that said S.B. 50 would accelerate gentrification, and, evoking 1960s urban renewal programs and the author James Baldwin, likened the bill to “Negro removal.” The mailers were widely condemned by African-American leaders including London Breed, the mayor of San Francisco.

Housing is atop the list of California’s biggest problems, and the year began with bold bills to try to fix it. But housing is also touchy, complicated and a giant piece of the economy, so now the question is how far the boldest bills can really go.

Here’s what else we’re following

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• In a CNN Town Hall, Senator Kamala Harris said that if elected president, she’d take executive action on gun control. She also said that there was evidence of obstruction by President Trump and that she believes “Congress should take the steps toward impeachment.” [The New York Times]

• Rick Caruso has had a controversial tenure as one of Los Angeles’s highest-profile developers and civic leaders. Now, he’s expanding his role — and not ruling out a run for mayor. Still, questions loom about whether his influence is more in line with a dying breed of L.A. power brokers as the diverse city grapples with inequality. [The New York Times]

• Utility regulators are working on creating a kind of financial “stress test” to determine how much Pacific Gas & Electric can raise rates to cover the costs of wildfires its equipment is believed to have started. The plan is getting pushback from San Francisco officials and consumer advocates. [The San Francisco Chronicle]

• Five years ago, lawyers for the man who killed eight people at a Seal Beach salon claimed that prosecutors had planted an informant in the man’s jail cell. The ensuing scandal rocked the Orange County district attorney’s office and sheriff’s department. Now, some are concerned that nothing has changed and no one will be punished. [The Los Angeles Times]

• Flooding in expensive neighborhoods and heat waves: Explore how climate change will affect Long Beach. [The Long Beach Post]

• Bob Iger, Disney’s chief executive, got paid 1,424 times as much as the company’s median employee. Abigail Disney, granddaughter of the co-founder Roy Disney, said that’s way out of line. Ms. Disney, who has become an advocate for corporate social responsibility, spoke at a Fast Company event. [Fast Company]

More California stories

• Jonathan Gold waxed poetic about Bavel’s hummus in his last review for The Los Angeles Times. Now, the Middle Eastern-inspired spot is the paper’s restaurant of the year. [The Los Angeles Times]

• “The truth is, you can get people to read anything if you put it in food terms.” The San Francisco Chronicle’s food critic, Soleil Ho, talks with the pioneering food writer Ruth Reichl, who has a new memoir about her time as editor in chief of Gourmet magazine. [The San Francisco Chronicle]

• And if you missed it, here’s The Times’s review of that memoir, “Save Me the Plums.” It’s described as “poignant and hilarious.” [The New York Times]

• Forget Vegas bachelorette parties. Now, the trend is celebrating the end of a marriage with divorce parties in Sin City. The former brides and grooms tend to be a bit older and more financially established, which means they can spend more. [Bloomberg]

And Finally …

By the time we talk about preserving historic places, they’re often already in danger.

But the National Trust for Historic Preservation, a nonprofit that raises money to protect and restore significant sites, recently unveiled an effort to get ahead of the game: Its “40 Under 40” list is aimed at highlighting important places built between 1978 and 2018 that could someday be at risk.

One of the most popular sites among voters who weighed in online was the “Go for Broke” monument in L.A.’s Little Tokyo. Built in 1999, the monument honors the roughly 33,000 Japanese Americans who served in World War II, despite the fact that many of their families were incarcerated by the U.S. government.

Other California sites on the list included the Frank Gehry-designed Walt Disney Concert Hall and the Glidehouse, a prefabricated modular home designed by Michelle Kaufmann, in Novato.

The list spans the country, including a fan favorite, Prince’s Paisley Park outside Minneapolis, and the Atlantis Condominium building in Miami.

But I bet we could make a list just within California. What newish places would you make sure were preserved in perpetuity?

California Today goes live at 6:30 a.m. Pacific time weekdays. Tell us what you want to see: [email protected]. Were you forwarded this email? Sign up for California Today here.

Jill Cowan grew up in Orange County, went to school at U.C. Berkeley and has reported all over the state, including the Bay Area, Bakersfield and Los Angeles — but she always wants to see more. Follow along here or on Twitter, @jillcowan.

California Today is edited by Julie Bloom, who grew up in Los Angeles and graduated from U.C. Berkeley.

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