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Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. is honored for his courageous civil rights efforts. He advised, “The forces of good and evil are always in play.” He warned it’s not what bad people do, but the silence of good people.
Like the dark days of 1968, when both King and Robert Kennedy were assassinated and the Viet Nam war raged on, we face new challenges: COVID, wild inflation, escalating homelessness, and Sacramento legislators’ efforts to eliminate local control.
Four Good News Stories
- OurNeighborhoodVoices.com.. A team of California elected officials and community activists have refused to be silent. They have launched a ballot initiative with a goal of returning planning and zoning decisions to locally elected officials who know their constituents and environmental constraints better than Sacramento legislators. They aim to collect a million qualified signatures by April in order to get the initiative on the November ballot. www.OurNeighborhoodVoices.com.
- SCAG, the Southern California version of the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG), voted 30-12, to endorse the initiative on January 7th. SCAG covers 191 cities, 19 million residents, and 6 counties, and represents almost half the state population.
- The California State Auditor is auditing Housing and Community Development (HCD). They are investigating the inflated and flawed Regional Housing Need Assessment (RHNA) numbers that lead to the eye-popping quotas handed out to each city.
- Assembly Member Marc Levine has introduced AB1445. While the bill iwouldn't go into effect until 2025, it seems to be a practical law that takes the impact of climate change into account when setting RHNA numbers.
Assembly Housing Committee at Work
The CA Assembly Housing & Community Development Committee kicked off the new year on Wednesday, January 12. Buffy Wicks (D, East Bay) chairs the seven-member committee. They considered ten housing bills in about two and a half hours, allowing about 20 minutes per bill. All the bills were approved to move forward to the next Committee. The standard format includes:
- The author introduces the bill.
- Two supporters and two in opposition get two minutes each to make a case for or against the bill. Occasionally no one speaks for the opposition; perhaps because it’s up to the author of the bill to find speakers and they want their bill to pass.
- Q&A among the committee.
- Public Testimony: Each person is allowed 15-20 seconds to give name, city or group, and whether they support or oppose the bill.Your mic gets pulled if you deviate with elaboration.
- More Q&A among the committee.
- Call for the vote among committee members.
Three Not-So-Good News Stories
- We've had more than 10 years of the legislative mantra "It's a housing crisis! We’ve got to do something." Yet during these years when dozens of housing bills have created new state housing law: 1) housing prices are skyrocketing; b) density is adding to the cost of housing and increasing gentrification; and c) homelessness is spiraling out of control.
- To listen to some of the Assembly Housing Committee members, you might assume they have not taken the time to examine housing assumptions, review the numbers, reflect on the impact and the unintended consequences of housing laws passed in previous years.
For example, some assembly members seem to believe:
- Cities are to blame for a housing shortage, so legislators pass laws that eliminate local control;
- Cities can pass tax measures to cover costs of city infrastructure. So they pass laws that give bonuses and incentive to developers. Developers get their desired return on investment, but constituents are burdened with the perpetual costs;
- They seem unaware that the “affordability” problem is related to the growing gap between wage-earners and people with investor wealth. The need for community housing that is affordable won’t be solved with a supply and demand strategy.
Example #1: AB 672 (Garcia) – This bill would give incentives for cities to convert publicly-owned golf courses to affordable housing. Unreliable RHNA numbers make this a tough call for cities. Should they give up open space and recreational opportunities at affordable prices, abandon youth golf programs, and forfeit an amenity to attract business to respond to inflated state quotas based on numbers that are in dispute?
Example 2: AB 916 (Salas) – This is one of those bills reminiscent to the expression, “Give a legislator an inch and they’ll take a mile.” Having passed ADU (Accessory Dwelling Unit) height restrictions at 16’, this bill would force communities to comply to developers’ wishes to build up to 18’. Why does two more feet matter? The extra two feet creates room for a second story, which can translate into greater density, reduced visual and air space. Developers/investors reap greater profits, while the community suffers the impacts.
Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. is best known for his “I Have a Dream” speech. To keep dreams about democracy alive requires education and engagement. Make a New Year’s resolution to do your part.
This year is a good year to get involved. Sign the OurNeighborhoodVoices petition.
Join us on a Catalysts Call any Monday from 5-6:00 pm. For Zoom log-in details, go to the Catalysts website.