13 ms·

Urban activists set out to sue San Francisco’s suburbs

142 points by apsec112 11y ago

teen 11y ago
Ha, the first SFBARF meeting was actually held in my apartment, when Sonja was still not sure if it was something people were interested in. Crazy to see how much it grew.
- raldi 11y ago
  Cool! When was that?
  - teen 11y ago
    I think around last August : )
jinushaun 11y ago
Love this quote: “Most people would be very uncomfortable tearing down 315 houses. But they don’t have a similar objection to never building them in the first place, even though I feel they’re morally equivalent. Those people show up anyway. They get born anyway. They get a job in the area anyway. What do they do? They live in an overcrowded situation, they pay too much rent, they have a commute that’s too long. Or maybe they outbid someone else, and someone else is displaced.” “It’s easy to see the problem when you’re tearing down someone’s home. But when you’re not building, it’s hard to see whose home it is.”
- ChuckMcM 11y ago
  I was coming to say the same thing. I think this is a good question to ask of the folks who object to building homes, "What if the people who lived in this town before you moved here had blocked the building of the home you are living in?" You wouldn't have had that wonderful experience you are trying to preserve because you would never have lived here." It is very sobering.
  - x0x0 11y ago
    I live in an sf suburb. I talk to local homeowners in the dog park at night and they're all wildly opposed to density, often with a nice core of racism too (I'm white so white people say some wild shit to me; you hear references to "those people" and it's not that deeply coded.) The only thing that cheers me about all the nimbys where I live is all their kids are getting kicked out. Seriously. In 20 years when their kids want a house, it will cost $2.5mm on the low end to own a home here. There will be a tiny handful of careers that pay the necessary wages.
    - mc32 11y ago
      To be fair, lots of people who are minorities who live in gentrifying neighborhoods also tinge their conversation with racism. To presume one "race" should be less or more prone to racism is problematic, as if they are or should be better than they show.
      - PhasmaFelis 11y ago
        People in gentrifying neighborhoods always blame the people moving in for, apparently, bullying the poor helpless landlords into increasing the rent. I'm really not sure how that mindset propagates, but the landlords must love it.
      - rtpg 11y ago
        The situations are radically different. The reason gentrification is even a thing is because of the massive wealth imbalance between whites and minorities. It's not "oh my god these people are going to ruin my culture" it's "Oh great the people are flying in to price me out of my home in 3 years."
    - vasilipupkin 11y ago
      it's not irrational to be opposed to density. Racism aside, density changes the character of the neighborhood and potentially lowers property values of existing homeowners. So, it's not surprising people are apprehensive
- hugh4 11y ago
  That's a rather odd perspective. Does this person also view murder as morally equivalent to contraception?
  - dogecoinbase 11y ago
    Do you view tearing down a house as equivalent to murder? The syllogism depends on the process in question -- hypothesizing a different version by swapping out nouns contributes nothing to the conversation.
  - gavazzy 11y ago
    Next time they're drinking a latte or beer, smack it out of their hands. After all, having your drink taken from you is morally equiavlent to never having it in the first place, right?
    - fineman 11y ago
      And you're going to pay for it? Because there's a big difference in simply not having a latte, and having paid for one only to have to knocked all over your shirt...
      - gavazzy 11y ago
        This is exactly what the speaker seems to be missing. Building homes required significant money in the first place; there's no such thing as a free house. My point is that if Person A purchases something, and then Person B says that having that thing taken is equivalent to not having it in the first place, then Person B is ignoring the cost that Person A had to incur in the first place.
        cowsandmilk 11y ago
        > This is exactly what the speaker seems to be missing. Building homes required significant money in the first place; there's no such thing as a free house. You do realize the speaker is advocating for developers, who have the money (typically through financing, which is fairly straightforward to get if you are a competent developer), to be allowed to build the projects they propose. Not for housing to magically appear out of the ether.
- nickff 11y ago
  The author here is essentially describing the classic 'seen vs unseen' problem which Bastiat outlined in his 1850 essay titled "What is Seen and What is Not Seen".[1][2] [1] http://www.econlib.org/library/Bastiat/basEss1.html http://www.econlib.org/library/Bastiat/basEss1.html [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window#CITEREFBastiat1850 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window#C...
- cbd1984 11y ago
  By that logic, we shouldn't be building houses, but hospitals, homeless shelters, orphanages, and retirement homes. After all, what kind of a monster tears down those things?
  - icebraining 11y ago
    Building houses doesn't prevent building hospitals and etc. And if they are needed, of course you should.
- avz 11y ago
  Looks like a case of the Copenhagen Interpretation of ethics recently discussed here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10367855 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10367855
- pbreit 11y ago
  Sorry, but destroying something and not building something are not even slightly morally equivalent. And that's the problem with some activists: they are so far removed from common sense.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
musesum 11y ago
Here's Scott Wiener's post about meeting 2040 housing growth plans: https://medium.com/@Scott_Wiener/want-to-know-why-the-bay-area-has-a-housing-crisis-read-this-map-b4d7a56d12f1 https://medium.com/@Scott_Wiener/want-to-know-why-the-bay-ar... Looks like East bay is falling behind schedule. Here's housing prices since crash peek:http://west.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/hugolefebvre-changeinhousingprice.jpg http://west.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/hugolefebvre-ch... I live several doors down from the old KFC. I miss the old Sugoi Sushi that was there - but am fine with the new construction. Am lucky to have rent control. Right now, if I move away, I wouldn't be able to afford moving back.
- zyxley 11y ago
  > Am lucky to have rent control. Right now, if I move away, I wouldn't be able to afford moving back. SF-style widepsread rent control seems like part of the problem to me, in the sense that it hides the true extent of market distortions from many people living in the area (especially the demographics most likely to vote), while incentivizing weird and unethical behavior to circumvent it by developers who could probably be nudged into tenant-friendly density increases under more sane conditions.
  - musesum 11y ago
    Owners have an incentive to keep supply low and to maximize the value of their asset. Next, add AirBnB to add yet more demand. Crazy is the new normal. Homeowner associations organize the vote during off-election years, as per http://techcrunch.com/2014/11/02/so-you-want-to-fix-the-housing-crisis/ http://techcrunch.com/2014/11/02/so-you-want-to-fix-the-hous... Removing rent-control would accelerate the displacement. A friend saw his rent nearly triple in 1999. So, he moved back to a more affordable Paris. He was developing a super cool visual-music platform. A neighbor is developing really cool music apps for the iPad. I am doing iOS based art tools. GAFFTA is in the neighborhood. There are advantages to encouraging a cultural mix.
  - simoncion 11y ago
    > ...rent control seems like part of the problem to me, in the sense that it hides the true extent of market distortions from many people living in the area... musesum mentions: > Am lucky to have rent control. Right now, if I move away, I wouldn't be able to afford moving back. Everyone I speak to in my building [0] is very aware of the current ludicrously high rents in the city and how it limits their ability to keep a slumlord in line. I can't imagine the situation is substantially different in any other rent-controlled building in the city. Also, be aware that SF's rent-control is more correctly termed rent-stabilization. Vacated units can have their rent set to any rate. Stabilization only kicks in once that unit is occupied. > ...while incentivizing weird and unethical behavior to circumvent it by developers who could probably be nudged... I honestly don't know what you're talking about here. Were you aware that rent control in SF doesn't apply to new construction [1]; only to housing built or occupied before June 13, 1979? [2] If you were aware of that, would you be so kind as to tell me what you are referring to? :) [0] Including the old lady who is afflicted with alzheimer's. [1] Unless -as happened with Sangiacomo's Trinity Place on Market street- a special arrangement is reached to destroy existing rent-controlled units, but have a 1:1 replacement in the new construction. [2] https://www.sftu.org/rentcontrol/#Rent_Control_Coverage https://www.sftu.org/rentcontrol/#Rent_Control_Coverage
mc32 11y ago
I hope she wins. I hope other people see her insight. I have not seen this kind of attitude against development in other countries. Sure, some speculators will make out on some locations near transit,and some will lose out a bit. Who cares, what we need are more units, in SF, down the Camino corridor from SF to san Jose. Build up, have BART go all the way down the el cam, and have local Surface-bahns. I'm tired of the homeowning middle class as well as the poor (or more accurately, those advocating in the name of the poor) for being so utterly against development. It's time for change. I'd welcome a housing glut, it'll benefit most, but those who see real estate as investment for retirement. In the end, I think people will discover that mid density isn't so bad after all. You get convenience, but you lose some of your feeling of living in an enclave. From communist china to capitalist Korea, when housing is in short supply, buildings go up.
- wahsd 11y ago
  What you don't see to realize is that what you describe will be only a momentary and fleeing improvement. The problem is the irrational and unnecessary concentration of opportunities in that area. So you build more buildings, create a housing glut even ... so now even more people move to the area because it's the only place where opportunities exist because it's where the wealthy sprinkle crumbs to their pest scurrying underfoot. All the sudden housing doubles from what it was before the glut and maybe you make 80% more, but all the asset owners are really the only ones who benefit and the wealth concentration cycle simply continues to distort. What really needs to happen is that the whole area and other urban areas with similar concentrations need to be cut off from things like government funding, any tax advantages, etc. and put those and additional support into areas all around the country. That's really the only way that the cycle is broken, because what you are experiencing is a systemic cycle that no remedial action will have any kid of even mid term impact on without changing the system.
  - dllthomas 11y ago
    One of the things that I like about various proposals for a Basic Income is that it would shift opportunities away from concentrations of wealth and toward concentrations of people (where those differ). That should reduce the pressure somewhat.
gavazzy 11y ago
Is she suggesting that land be taken through eminent domain? Or is she merely suggesting that developers who own land should be allowed to build on it? Their DSP proposal is so clouded by the political language that it is difficult to determine their true intentions. Also, I'm quite troubled by their suggestion that tearing down homes is morally equivalent to not building them in the first place. Tearing down homes immediately destroys value; hundreds of thousands of dollars are put into a home with the expectation that at least part of it can be recovered after a sale. A government that destroys homes without taking into account this investment destroys the value that the developers put into it. On the other hand, having the homes not be built in the first place does no such thing.
- erispoe 11y ago
  Tearing down homes doesn't necessarily destroy value. It increases the value of other properties, because you have less supply and more demand. This is exactly the equivalent of not building while demand goes balistic. The price of homes has gone crazy in the Bay Area as a result of not allowing enough building. You don't need eminent domain, and SFBARF is not advocating for it. The project they are suing the City of Lafayette for was entirely private: willing landowner, willing developer, and most likely a lot of potential buyers or renters in a tense market. But no, the City of Lafayette decided to approve on condition of a drastically reduced number of housing. She is advocating that landowners and developers be allowed to build to meet market demand, without obstruction from nimby neighbors.
- SonjaKT 11y ago
  What words in the article suggested eminent domain to you?
- SonjaKT 11y ago
  Also, what is "DSP proposal"?
- cowsandmilk 11y ago
  > Tearing down homes immediately destroys value Decreasing the zoning on land so less housing can be built immediately destroys value. That land can now house 10% of the people it previously was able to house.
7Figures2Commas 11y ago
It's disappointing that this type of activism is only gaining traction in places like the Bay Area. For years, I pushed for more affordable housing in Aspen, but nobody listened even though I was willing to walk 1.7 miles to get to the nearest lift.
- hugh4 11y ago
  I've been pushing for more affordable housing at Buckingham Palace. It sucks that there's only one house there and the Queen isn't selling. And what's with the lack of affordable housing in Yellowstone National Park? There's loads of room for condos!
hugh4 11y ago
Handy hint for people who want to live in the Bay Area and can't afford to: tough cookies. Have you considered living somewhere else? I'd like to live on a private island in the Whitsundays, but there aren't enough to go around. It has never occurred to me to whine about this fact.
- 7Figures2Commas 11y ago
  We have a meetup group that gets together at 6:00 pm on the second Tuesday of every month at The Creamery in which members lament their inability to afford private islands, jets, etc. You're welcome to join us on the 13th and vent over a latte. It's not all sadness though. I believe a representative from the local Maserati dealership will be there this week to tell us about a special lease deal available to well-qualified lessees.
SonjaKT 11y ago
Guess what - suethesuburbs is applying for Y Combinator for non-profits. Sooo....... get ready
- SonjaKT 11y ago
  Who down voted this? Why?
spiralpolitik 11y ago
Good luck to her. Although unless you also fix the Bay Area transport infrastructure then building more housing in the suburbs isn't going to solve anything. BART is already at capacity, Buses are constrained by the lack of bus lanes on the major freeway interchanges leading to the bridges. Congestion inside the city is choking things. So yes we need more housing, but that is merely the first step.
- epistasis 11y ago
  I think that those that are proposing more development would heartily welcome simultaneously expanding the infrastructure. Those who oppose such infrastructure improvements typically oppose them because they want to stop growth entirely.
  - simoncion 11y ago
    > I think that those that are proposing more development would heartily welcome simultaneously expanding the infrastructure. Hear, hear! I would heartily welcome infrastructure improvement programs that brought the state of the SFBA's public transit within shooting distance of the quality of public transit in and around NYC. I would happily have my personal not-really-that-much-higher-than-Alabama tax burden increased to help pay for such a program.
naveen99 11y ago
Sonia's AMA on reddit https://www.reddit.com/r/sanfrancisco/comments/34urng/im_sonja_trauss_founder_of_sfbarf_i_fight_for_the/ https://www.reddit.com/r/sanfrancisco/comments/34urng/im_son...
johnwatson11218 11y ago
In my opinion this is one of the worst aspects of the bay area and california in general. It is my understanding that it is very easy to get land set aside for environmental reason in california and that is used to stop development. Then I read about minimum lot sizes in places like San Jose and locals getting together to block new construction. I think that San Francisco should look like Tokyo at this point with high density sprawl that takes an hour to cross on a bullet train. Keep in mind they get earthquakes over there as well. I know it is unlikely but this is the kind of thing that I could see causing a "Detroit Type" situation to emerge with US tech. Other countries figure out the software thing and we get hit with global competition that we can not respond to quickly enough. Rather than pointing our fingers at the autoworker unions we will point it at the nimby types that kept San Fran from reaching its full potential.
capkutay 11y ago
I really support the ideals of this group, but I can't help but think they're politically doomed. They'll have 'progressive', borderline socialist politicians fighting them on one side and then they'll have elitist, wealthy homeowners fighting them on the other side. Both those groups have the same goal: don't build anything OR if you're going to build something, it will be low density, low income housing purposely planned to make sure there is no new housing supply for market-rate home owners.
Recoveringhobo 11y ago
As a former resident of Lafayette, I'm glad that someone is taking action against the NIMBYs but BARF is out of line here. The picture BARF paints of what happened is not entirely accurate. The city did not deny the developer from developing the land. After years of public planning meetings the owner of the land decided to work with the city after overwhelming public opposition against the development.
- SonjaKT 11y ago
  The argument is that the city "approved the project conditional on lower density." Which is in violation of the HAA. Here's more info about it: http://www.trauss.com/HAA_Lafayette.pdf http://www.trauss.com/HAA_Lafayette.pdf pg 6 is where the Lafayette thing starts. What do you think would have happened if instead of relenting, the developer had gone forward with the 315 unit version? Do you think it would have been approved?
rajacombinator 11y ago
Just too many burnt out brainless hippies/commies in California.
lindenksv1 11y ago
On "why can't those people move to___?" https://medium.com/b-copy-com-longform-content/why-can-t-those-people-move-to-be7f70e8ff91 https://medium.com/b-copy-com-longform-content/why-can-t-tho...

142 points by apsec112 11y ago

teen 11y ago

Ha, the first SFBARF meeting was actually held in my apartment, when Sonja was still not sure if it was something people were interested in. Crazy to see how much it grew.

raldi 11y ago
Cool! When was that?
- teen 11y ago
  I think around last August : )

jinushaun 11y ago

Love this quote: “Most people would be very uncomfortable tearing down 315 houses. But they don’t have a similar objection to never building them in the first place, even though I feel they’re morally equivalent. Those people show up anyway. They get born anyway. They get a job in the area anyway. What do they do? They live in an overcrowded situation, they pay too much rent, they have a commute that’s too long. Or maybe they outbid someone else, and someone else is displaced.” “It’s easy to see the problem when you’re tearing down someone’s home. But when you’re not building, it’s hard to see whose home it is.”

ChuckMcM 11y ago
I was coming to say the same thing. I think this is a good question to ask of the folks who object to building homes, "What if the people who lived in this town before you moved here had blocked the building of the home you are living in?" You wouldn't have had that wonderful experience you are trying to preserve because you would never have lived here." It is very sobering.
- x0x0 11y ago
  I live in an sf suburb. I talk to local homeowners in the dog park at night and they're all wildly opposed to density, often with a nice core of racism too (I'm white so white people say some wild shit to me; you hear references to "those people" and it's not that deeply coded.) The only thing that cheers me about all the nimbys where I live is all their kids are getting kicked out. Seriously. In 20 years when their kids want a house, it will cost $2.5mm on the low end to own a home here. There will be a tiny handful of careers that pay the necessary wages.
  - mc32 11y ago
    To be fair, lots of people who are minorities who live in gentrifying neighborhoods also tinge their conversation with racism. To presume one "race" should be less or more prone to racism is problematic, as if they are or should be better than they show.
    - PhasmaFelis 11y ago
      People in gentrifying neighborhoods always blame the people moving in for, apparently, bullying the poor helpless landlords into increasing the rent. I'm really not sure how that mindset propagates, but the landlords must love it.
    - rtpg 11y ago
      The situations are radically different. The reason gentrification is even a thing is because of the massive wealth imbalance between whites and minorities. It's not "oh my god these people are going to ruin my culture" it's "Oh great the people are flying in to price me out of my home in 3 years."
  - vasilipupkin 11y ago
    it's not irrational to be opposed to density. Racism aside, density changes the character of the neighborhood and potentially lowers property values of existing homeowners. So, it's not surprising people are apprehensive
hugh4 11y ago
That's a rather odd perspective. Does this person also view murder as morally equivalent to contraception?
- dogecoinbase 11y ago
  Do you view tearing down a house as equivalent to murder? The syllogism depends on the process in question -- hypothesizing a different version by swapping out nouns contributes nothing to the conversation.
- gavazzy 11y ago
  Next time they're drinking a latte or beer, smack it out of their hands. After all, having your drink taken from you is morally equiavlent to never having it in the first place, right?
  - fineman 11y ago
    And you're going to pay for it? Because there's a big difference in simply not having a latte, and having paid for one only to have to knocked all over your shirt...
    - gavazzy 11y ago
      This is exactly what the speaker seems to be missing. Building homes required significant money in the first place; there's no such thing as a free house. My point is that if Person A purchases something, and then Person B says that having that thing taken is equivalent to not having it in the first place, then Person B is ignoring the cost that Person A had to incur in the first place.
      - cowsandmilk 11y ago
        > This is exactly what the speaker seems to be missing. Building homes required significant money in the first place; there's no such thing as a free house. You do realize the speaker is advocating for developers, who have the money (typically through financing, which is fairly straightforward to get if you are a competent developer), to be allowed to build the projects they propose. Not for housing to magically appear out of the ether.
nickff 11y ago
The author here is essentially describing the classic 'seen vs unseen' problem which Bastiat outlined in his 1850 essay titled "What is Seen and What is Not Seen".[1][2] [1] http://www.econlib.org/library/Bastiat/basEss1.html http://www.econlib.org/library/Bastiat/basEss1.html [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window#CITEREFBastiat1850 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Parable_of_the_broken_window#C...
cbd1984 11y ago
By that logic, we shouldn't be building houses, but hospitals, homeless shelters, orphanages, and retirement homes. After all, what kind of a monster tears down those things?
- icebraining 11y ago
  Building houses doesn't prevent building hospitals and etc. And if they are needed, of course you should.
avz 11y ago
Looks like a case of the Copenhagen Interpretation of ethics recently discussed here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10367855 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=10367855
pbreit 11y ago
Sorry, but destroying something and not building something are not even slightly morally equivalent. And that's the problem with some activists: they are so far removed from common sense.
deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

musesum 11y ago

Here's Scott Wiener's post about meeting 2040 housing growth plans: https://medium.com/@Scott_Wiener/want-to-know-why-the-bay-area-has-a-housing-crisis-read-this-map-b4d7a56d12f1 https://medium.com/@Scott_Wiener/want-to-know-why-the-bay-ar... Looks like East bay is falling behind schedule. Here's housing prices since crash peek:http://west.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/hugolefebvre-changeinhousingprice.jpg http://west.stanford.edu/sites/default/files/hugolefebvre-ch... I live several doors down from the old KFC. I miss the old Sugoi Sushi that was there - but am fine with the new construction. Am lucky to have rent control. Right now, if I move away, I wouldn't be able to afford moving back.

zyxley 11y ago
> Am lucky to have rent control. Right now, if I move away, I wouldn't be able to afford moving back. SF-style widepsread rent control seems like part of the problem to me, in the sense that it hides the true extent of market distortions from many people living in the area (especially the demographics most likely to vote), while incentivizing weird and unethical behavior to circumvent it by developers who could probably be nudged into tenant-friendly density increases under more sane conditions.
- musesum 11y ago
  Owners have an incentive to keep supply low and to maximize the value of their asset. Next, add AirBnB to add yet more demand. Crazy is the new normal. Homeowner associations organize the vote during off-election years, as per http://techcrunch.com/2014/11/02/so-you-want-to-fix-the-housing-crisis/ http://techcrunch.com/2014/11/02/so-you-want-to-fix-the-hous... Removing rent-control would accelerate the displacement. A friend saw his rent nearly triple in 1999. So, he moved back to a more affordable Paris. He was developing a super cool visual-music platform. A neighbor is developing really cool music apps for the iPad. I am doing iOS based art tools. GAFFTA is in the neighborhood. There are advantages to encouraging a cultural mix.
- simoncion 11y ago
  > ...rent control seems like part of the problem to me, in the sense that it hides the true extent of market distortions from many people living in the area... musesum mentions: > Am lucky to have rent control. Right now, if I move away, I wouldn't be able to afford moving back. Everyone I speak to in my building [0] is very aware of the current ludicrously high rents in the city and how it limits their ability to keep a slumlord in line. I can't imagine the situation is substantially different in any other rent-controlled building in the city. Also, be aware that SF's rent-control is more correctly termed rent-stabilization. Vacated units can have their rent set to any rate. Stabilization only kicks in once that unit is occupied. > ...while incentivizing weird and unethical behavior to circumvent it by developers who could probably be nudged... I honestly don't know what you're talking about here. Were you aware that rent control in SF doesn't apply to new construction [1]; only to housing built or occupied before June 13, 1979? [2] If you were aware of that, would you be so kind as to tell me what you are referring to? :) [0] Including the old lady who is afflicted with alzheimer's. [1] Unless -as happened with Sangiacomo's Trinity Place on Market street- a special arrangement is reached to destroy existing rent-controlled units, but have a 1:1 replacement in the new construction. [2] https://www.sftu.org/rentcontrol/#Rent_Control_Coverage https://www.sftu.org/rentcontrol/#Rent_Control_Coverage

mc32 11y ago

I hope she wins. I hope other people see her insight. I have not seen this kind of attitude against development in other countries. Sure, some speculators will make out on some locations near transit,and some will lose out a bit. Who cares, what we need are more units, in SF, down the Camino corridor from SF to san Jose. Build up, have BART go all the way down the el cam, and have local Surface-bahns. I'm tired of the homeowning middle class as well as the poor (or more accurately, those advocating in the name of the poor) for being so utterly against development. It's time for change. I'd welcome a housing glut, it'll benefit most, but those who see real estate as investment for retirement. In the end, I think people will discover that mid density isn't so bad after all. You get convenience, but you lose some of your feeling of living in an enclave. From communist china to capitalist Korea, when housing is in short supply, buildings go up.

wahsd 11y ago
What you don't see to realize is that what you describe will be only a momentary and fleeing improvement. The problem is the irrational and unnecessary concentration of opportunities in that area. So you build more buildings, create a housing glut even ... so now even more people move to the area because it's the only place where opportunities exist because it's where the wealthy sprinkle crumbs to their pest scurrying underfoot. All the sudden housing doubles from what it was before the glut and maybe you make 80% more, but all the asset owners are really the only ones who benefit and the wealth concentration cycle simply continues to distort. What really needs to happen is that the whole area and other urban areas with similar concentrations need to be cut off from things like government funding, any tax advantages, etc. and put those and additional support into areas all around the country. That's really the only way that the cycle is broken, because what you are experiencing is a systemic cycle that no remedial action will have any kid of even mid term impact on without changing the system.
- dllthomas 11y ago
  One of the things that I like about various proposals for a Basic Income is that it would shift opportunities away from concentrations of wealth and toward concentrations of people (where those differ). That should reduce the pressure somewhat.

gavazzy 11y ago

Is she suggesting that land be taken through eminent domain? Or is she merely suggesting that developers who own land should be allowed to build on it? Their DSP proposal is so clouded by the political language that it is difficult to determine their true intentions. Also, I'm quite troubled by their suggestion that tearing down homes is morally equivalent to not building them in the first place. Tearing down homes immediately destroys value; hundreds of thousands of dollars are put into a home with the expectation that at least part of it can be recovered after a sale. A government that destroys homes without taking into account this investment destroys the value that the developers put into it. On the other hand, having the homes not be built in the first place does no such thing.

erispoe 11y ago
Tearing down homes doesn't necessarily destroy value. It increases the value of other properties, because you have less supply and more demand. This is exactly the equivalent of not building while demand goes balistic. The price of homes has gone crazy in the Bay Area as a result of not allowing enough building. You don't need eminent domain, and SFBARF is not advocating for it. The project they are suing the City of Lafayette for was entirely private: willing landowner, willing developer, and most likely a lot of potential buyers or renters in a tense market. But no, the City of Lafayette decided to approve on condition of a drastically reduced number of housing. She is advocating that landowners and developers be allowed to build to meet market demand, without obstruction from nimby neighbors.
SonjaKT 11y ago
What words in the article suggested eminent domain to you?
SonjaKT 11y ago
Also, what is "DSP proposal"?
cowsandmilk 11y ago
> Tearing down homes immediately destroys value Decreasing the zoning on land so less housing can be built immediately destroys value. That land can now house 10% of the people it previously was able to house.

7Figures2Commas 11y ago

It's disappointing that this type of activism is only gaining traction in places like the Bay Area. For years, I pushed for more affordable housing in Aspen, but nobody listened even though I was willing to walk 1.7 miles to get to the nearest lift.

hugh4 11y ago
I've been pushing for more affordable housing at Buckingham Palace. It sucks that there's only one house there and the Queen isn't selling. And what's with the lack of affordable housing in Yellowstone National Park? There's loads of room for condos!

hugh4 11y ago

Handy hint for people who want to live in the Bay Area and can't afford to: tough cookies. Have you considered living somewhere else? I'd like to live on a private island in the Whitsundays, but there aren't enough to go around. It has never occurred to me to whine about this fact.

7Figures2Commas 11y ago
We have a meetup group that gets together at 6:00 pm on the second Tuesday of every month at The Creamery in which members lament their inability to afford private islands, jets, etc. You're welcome to join us on the 13th and vent over a latte. It's not all sadness though. I believe a representative from the local Maserati dealership will be there this week to tell us about a special lease deal available to well-qualified lessees.

SonjaKT 11y ago

Guess what - suethesuburbs is applying for Y Combinator for non-profits. Sooo....... get ready

SonjaKT 11y ago
Who down voted this? Why?

spiralpolitik 11y ago

Good luck to her. Although unless you also fix the Bay Area transport infrastructure then building more housing in the suburbs isn't going to solve anything. BART is already at capacity, Buses are constrained by the lack of bus lanes on the major freeway interchanges leading to the bridges. Congestion inside the city is choking things. So yes we need more housing, but that is merely the first step.

epistasis 11y ago
I think that those that are proposing more development would heartily welcome simultaneously expanding the infrastructure. Those who oppose such infrastructure improvements typically oppose them because they want to stop growth entirely.
- simoncion 11y ago
  > I think that those that are proposing more development would heartily welcome simultaneously expanding the infrastructure. Hear, hear! I would heartily welcome infrastructure improvement programs that brought the state of the SFBA's public transit within shooting distance of the quality of public transit in and around NYC. I would happily have my personal not-really-that-much-higher-than-Alabama tax burden increased to help pay for such a program.

naveen99 11y ago

Sonia's AMA on reddit https://www.reddit.com/r/sanfrancisco/comments/34urng/im_sonja_trauss_founder_of_sfbarf_i_fight_for_the/ https://www.reddit.com/r/sanfrancisco/comments/34urng/im_son...

johnwatson11218 11y ago

In my opinion this is one of the worst aspects of the bay area and california in general. It is my understanding that it is very easy to get land set aside for environmental reason in california and that is used to stop development. Then I read about minimum lot sizes in places like San Jose and locals getting together to block new construction. I think that San Francisco should look like Tokyo at this point with high density sprawl that takes an hour to cross on a bullet train. Keep in mind they get earthquakes over there as well. I know it is unlikely but this is the kind of thing that I could see causing a "Detroit Type" situation to emerge with US tech. Other countries figure out the software thing and we get hit with global competition that we can not respond to quickly enough. Rather than pointing our fingers at the autoworker unions we will point it at the nimby types that kept San Fran from reaching its full potential.

capkutay 11y ago

I really support the ideals of this group, but I can't help but think they're politically doomed. They'll have 'progressive', borderline socialist politicians fighting them on one side and then they'll have elitist, wealthy homeowners fighting them on the other side. Both those groups have the same goal: don't build anything OR if you're going to build something, it will be low density, low income housing purposely planned to make sure there is no new housing supply for market-rate home owners.

Recoveringhobo 11y ago

As a former resident of Lafayette, I'm glad that someone is taking action against the NIMBYs but BARF is out of line here. The picture BARF paints of what happened is not entirely accurate. The city did not deny the developer from developing the land. After years of public planning meetings the owner of the land decided to work with the city after overwhelming public opposition against the development.

SonjaKT 11y ago
The argument is that the city "approved the project conditional on lower density." Which is in violation of the HAA. Here's more info about it: http://www.trauss.com/HAA_Lafayette.pdf http://www.trauss.com/HAA_Lafayette.pdf pg 6 is where the Lafayette thing starts. What do you think would have happened if instead of relenting, the developer had gone forward with the 315 unit version? Do you think it would have been approved?

rajacombinator 11y ago

Just too many burnt out brainless hippies/commies in California.

lindenksv1 11y ago

On "why can't those people move to___?" https://medium.com/b-copy-com-longform-content/why-can-t-those-people-move-to-be7f70e8ff91 https://medium.com/b-copy-com-longform-content/why-can-t-tho...