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This is a fantastic step towards affordable housing. We need more state-level interventions like these to remove the hurdles that impede building new housing. I

This is a fantastic step towards affordable housing. We need more state-level interventions like these to remove the hurdles that impede building new housing. I hope that government officials in California follow a similar path. The only sustainable way to affordable housing is to make market rates affordable.

geezerjay 7y ago
Why haven't they simply rezoned some areas to allow higher density housing? This sort of blanket change doesn't grant much control on which zone should increase density.
- barry-cotter 7y ago
  That’s the point. Granting control on which zone should improve density has worked very well for land owners, not so much for anyone else. They haven’t set duplexes as a ceiling but as a floor on density.
  - sokoloff 7y ago
    In what way does this provide a floor on density? It seems that building single-family residences is still legal in areas where it was before.
- cycrutchfield 7y ago
  Because leaving it up to local governments to decide which areas to upzone will result in perverse outcomes, as entrenched interests will simply seek to protect their assets instead of provide the most good for the most people. Removing the element of control prevents this from happening.
  - geezerjay 7y ago
    Local government have insight on the capacity of services currently available in some regions, and also which growth strategy they could follow to avoid very expensive investments with very negative externalities (i.e., congestioned freeways whose capacity can't be extended). Allowing high-density residential construction near public transportation hubs creates more value than allowing urbam sprawl to grow indefinitely. The single most important reason why people are forced to waste their lives in long commutes is allowing residential neighborhoods to spring up in the middle of nowhere in places where their only way in and out of their homes is through a long congestioned road served by no public transportation service.
    - jasonwatkinspdx 7y ago
      You've got the wrong end on this one. Oregon law prescribes urban growth boundaries, so there's already a mechanism to counter sprawl. HB 2001 is in no way a "build more sprawl" bill. The bill also allocates funds to local governments in order to help them understand how their infrastructure needs may change under the bill. "Appropriates moneys to Department of Land Conservation and Development to provide technical assistance to local governments in implementing middle housing regulations and to plan improvement of urban services supporting middle housing."
    - bluGill 7y ago
      We know from experience that one lane roads are enough to support a city of all two story buildings. There are plenty of examples of such cities more than 500 years old that are still going strong.
- podunkPDX 7y ago
  They have! Problem is that our zoning is about detached single family homes. When we bought our current home (2015) it was zoned R2.5 (residential, min. 2500sqft lot). We are now zoned as R2. All that means is shrinking the required lot size for a single family home. This bill changes a lot of that. Also, Oregon (esp. Multnomah county) is kinda different.
noobermin 7y ago
Is there a chance some local municipality will sue? Single family zoning went to the supreme court where it won and created the situation we have today.
- jquery 7y ago
  Then how was this law passed? Did they ignore the ruling?
  - noobermin 7y ago
    If I'm not mistaken, there's nothing to stop one from passing a law, see AL and the recent abortion laws. Whether a law is unconstitutional/against precedent or not is decided once it goes to the courts. IANAL
    - sjg007 7y ago
      You can but it’ll get taken out by an injunction in Federal court. These laws are “passed” to court favor with voters. In the end the state govt will end up paying millions in legal fees etc... for basically marketing.
  - dvdbloc 7y ago
    They can do whatever they want until someone stops them.
  - djur 7y ago
    There's no ruling forbidding this. The SCOTUS case in question was a developer suing a town over zoning ordinances, claiming that they violated the 14th Amendment. That was resolved a long time ago. The hypothetical lawsuit here would be a town suing the state, claiming that the state doesn't have the power to control local zoning regulations. But I don't know where you'd even begin to argue that -- local land-use regulations are considered a delegation of the state's police power. Under current SCOTUS precedent, it would be totally legal for a state to outlaw all local zoning ordinances and mandate their own.
gingabriska 7y ago
I believe California will be the last state on the list to do something similar to this.
scarface74 7y ago
Housing is affordable in large swaths of the country. It’s only a relatively few cities where it isn’t.
- 0815test 7y ago
  And we care about these "relatively few cities" because by now these are some of the most productive areas in the nation. Low density and unaffordability in these places makes the problem of income inequality even worse, while not even letting these areas be as productive as they could be via increased density combined with great quality of life.
  - scarface74 7y ago
    Productive for who? To think that “quality of life” for everyone means living on top of each other is also myopic. True, people may earn less in smaller areas but the cost of living is much lower.
    - magduf 7y ago
      The cost of living isn't that much lower, only housing costs are. There's more to cost-of-living than housing, and you aren't going to get food, cars, etc. significantly cheaper in low-cost areas, and in fact, many things can cost more because of the added transportation costs. Finally, those smaller areas with very low CoL usually don't have many jobs or opportunities. There's a reason people are flocking to cities, and have been for well over a century.
      - scarface74 7y ago
        You’re minimizing housing cost as both how large of a percentage of budget item it is for most people and how drastically different housing costs are in most of the country compared to the west coast. I live in metro Atlanta - not exactly a small town with a lack of opportunity. You can buy a 2800 square foot house for less than $200K not to far out from the city center. But there are a lot of people who go years without ever going into the actual city of Atlanta and live and work in the burbs. My wife and I just bought a house two years ago in the northern burbs - a brand new build, 3100 square feet, 5-3-1/2 with a large office and all of the trimmings for less than $350K - 5% down because that’s what the builder asked for. A similar house the large west coast tech hubs would go for well over a $1.25 million. As far as jobs, I’ve lived here for two decades and have never had a problem finding a software development job. Despite what people on HN seem to think, the rest of the country is not some vast wasteland where people live in poverty.
drderidder 7y ago
I'm genuinely curious: in the mid / long term will this lead to more affordable housing, or just more densification? If duplexes are the new norm, wouldn't standalone single-family houses just become more expensive? Are there any case studies to show how densification relates to housing prices? I've been reading that in places like Vancouver for example, factors such as speculative real-estate investment and money laundering have been found to be driving up housing prices and are having to be addressed with other specifically targeted measures that go beyond simply allowing more units to be built. If densification is one part of the solution, are there others, and what are they?

geezerjay 7y ago

Why haven't they simply rezoned some areas to allow higher density housing? This sort of blanket change doesn't grant much control on which zone should increase density.

barry-cotter 7y ago
That’s the point. Granting control on which zone should improve density has worked very well for land owners, not so much for anyone else. They haven’t set duplexes as a ceiling but as a floor on density.
- sokoloff 7y ago
  In what way does this provide a floor on density? It seems that building single-family residences is still legal in areas where it was before.
cycrutchfield 7y ago
Because leaving it up to local governments to decide which areas to upzone will result in perverse outcomes, as entrenched interests will simply seek to protect their assets instead of provide the most good for the most people. Removing the element of control prevents this from happening.
- geezerjay 7y ago
  Local government have insight on the capacity of services currently available in some regions, and also which growth strategy they could follow to avoid very expensive investments with very negative externalities (i.e., congestioned freeways whose capacity can't be extended). Allowing high-density residential construction near public transportation hubs creates more value than allowing urbam sprawl to grow indefinitely. The single most important reason why people are forced to waste their lives in long commutes is allowing residential neighborhoods to spring up in the middle of nowhere in places where their only way in and out of their homes is through a long congestioned road served by no public transportation service.
  - jasonwatkinspdx 7y ago
    You've got the wrong end on this one. Oregon law prescribes urban growth boundaries, so there's already a mechanism to counter sprawl. HB 2001 is in no way a "build more sprawl" bill. The bill also allocates funds to local governments in order to help them understand how their infrastructure needs may change under the bill. "Appropriates moneys to Department of Land Conservation and Development to provide technical assistance to local governments in implementing middle housing regulations and to plan improvement of urban services supporting middle housing."
  - bluGill 7y ago
    We know from experience that one lane roads are enough to support a city of all two story buildings. There are plenty of examples of such cities more than 500 years old that are still going strong.
podunkPDX 7y ago
They have! Problem is that our zoning is about detached single family homes. When we bought our current home (2015) it was zoned R2.5 (residential, min. 2500sqft lot). We are now zoned as R2. All that means is shrinking the required lot size for a single family home. This bill changes a lot of that. Also, Oregon (esp. Multnomah county) is kinda different.

noobermin 7y ago

Is there a chance some local municipality will sue? Single family zoning went to the supreme court where it won and created the situation we have today.

jquery 7y ago
Then how was this law passed? Did they ignore the ruling?
- noobermin 7y ago
  If I'm not mistaken, there's nothing to stop one from passing a law, see AL and the recent abortion laws. Whether a law is unconstitutional/against precedent or not is decided once it goes to the courts. IANAL
  - sjg007 7y ago
    You can but it’ll get taken out by an injunction in Federal court. These laws are “passed” to court favor with voters. In the end the state govt will end up paying millions in legal fees etc... for basically marketing.
- dvdbloc 7y ago
  They can do whatever they want until someone stops them.
- djur 7y ago
  There's no ruling forbidding this. The SCOTUS case in question was a developer suing a town over zoning ordinances, claiming that they violated the 14th Amendment. That was resolved a long time ago. The hypothetical lawsuit here would be a town suing the state, claiming that the state doesn't have the power to control local zoning regulations. But I don't know where you'd even begin to argue that -- local land-use regulations are considered a delegation of the state's police power. Under current SCOTUS precedent, it would be totally legal for a state to outlaw all local zoning ordinances and mandate their own.

gingabriska 7y ago

I believe California will be the last state on the list to do something similar to this.

scarface74 7y ago

Housing is affordable in large swaths of the country. It’s only a relatively few cities where it isn’t.

0815test 7y ago
And we care about these "relatively few cities" because by now these are some of the most productive areas in the nation. Low density and unaffordability in these places makes the problem of income inequality even worse, while not even letting these areas be as productive as they could be via increased density combined with great quality of life.
- scarface74 7y ago
  Productive for who? To think that “quality of life” for everyone means living on top of each other is also myopic. True, people may earn less in smaller areas but the cost of living is much lower.
  - magduf 7y ago
    The cost of living isn't that much lower, only housing costs are. There's more to cost-of-living than housing, and you aren't going to get food, cars, etc. significantly cheaper in low-cost areas, and in fact, many things can cost more because of the added transportation costs. Finally, those smaller areas with very low CoL usually don't have many jobs or opportunities. There's a reason people are flocking to cities, and have been for well over a century.
    - scarface74 7y ago
      You’re minimizing housing cost as both how large of a percentage of budget item it is for most people and how drastically different housing costs are in most of the country compared to the west coast. I live in metro Atlanta - not exactly a small town with a lack of opportunity. You can buy a 2800 square foot house for less than $200K not to far out from the city center. But there are a lot of people who go years without ever going into the actual city of Atlanta and live and work in the burbs. My wife and I just bought a house two years ago in the northern burbs - a brand new build, 3100 square feet, 5-3-1/2 with a large office and all of the trimmings for less than $350K - 5% down because that’s what the builder asked for. A similar house the large west coast tech hubs would go for well over a $1.25 million. As far as jobs, I’ve lived here for two decades and have never had a problem finding a software development job. Despite what people on HN seem to think, the rest of the country is not some vast wasteland where people live in poverty.

drderidder 7y ago

I'm genuinely curious: in the mid / long term will this lead to more affordable housing, or just more densification? If duplexes are the new norm, wouldn't standalone single-family houses just become more expensive? Are there any case studies to show how densification relates to housing prices? I've been reading that in places like Vancouver for example, factors such as speculative real-estate investment and money laundering have been found to be driving up housing prices and are having to be addressed with other specifically targeted measures that go beyond simply allowing more units to be built. If densification is one part of the solution, are there others, and what are they?