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CA's local governments have basically reached crippling levels of stupidity. I live in Mountain View, the home town of Google, but every city around here has ma
by oppositelock 7y ago
CA's local governments have basically reached crippling levels of stupidity. I live in Mountain View, the home town of Google, but every city around here has made building so difficult, that it barely happens. What we do build are expansive planned "communities", where a developer managed to navigate the web of red tape and got it approved, and the amount of red tape involved is so huge that it's not worth trying to build small developments, like duplexes or triplexes, which would help a lot here!
To give you some concrete examples; in Mountain View, adding a new unit of housing requires about $80k in impact fees and permit fees from the city, and the permits require bending over backward, since they're sometimes self conflicting. We've now banned natural gas, so homes have to be electric. The only way to heat electrically efficiently is heat pumps, but those are affected by noise ordinances, so it's tricky to place them. Solar panels are mandatory, but you need to pay for a permit to install them. Electric car chargers are mandatory. The fire code, city code, and state building codes conflict at times, so you sometimes have the fire inspection, then change stuff around for the city inspector, etc.
Everybody knows how broken it is, so everyone cheats, and inspectors sign off on temporary kludges, knowing full well they'll be changed right after inspection, but the i's must be dotted, and the t's must be crossed. But hey, "we're" doing something!
Sheesh. I wish tar and feathering of politicians made a return to modern political discourse.
- l1g2d5 7y agoOne of the achilles heals of democracy. When the many or the older vote for their self-interest, sometimes those self-interests don't align with the well being of the younger generation or society at large. You can't blame the older generation for voting in the interest of maximizing their home values and low taxes for themselves. But you also have to admit how unfair that is to the younger generation who have difficulty finding affordable housing and have to take on a greater property tax burden. > Sheesh. I wish tar and feathering of politicians made a return to modern political discourse. Why blame the politicians for doing what their voters wanted? Why not tar and feather the voters?
- oppositelock 7y agoPoliticians simply can't reflect the will of the voters, because voters aren't a homogenous blob. Here, they represent the wishes of a very slim majority, and go against the will of the greater majority quite frequently, since this is a representative democracy, not a direct one. What we should think about is whether it's a legitimate use of power to limit what an entire city can do with its property. The nice, dense areas of the world didn't start out that way, they grew over time as new replaced old. We've stopped that cycle here, and the politicians are trying to freeze things as they are. We do indeed have a lot of home owners resistant to all change, but those aren't the majority. I'm a grey haired home owner here, and I go to council meetings to support increased density, increased property rights, etc.
- closeparen 7y agoThese governments aren’t stupid; they’re correctly representing the interests of the majority of their voters who a) are homeowners and b) strongly prefer suburbia. Renters and people who appreciate density need to show up if we’re going to counteract that.
- toomuchtodo 7y agoIf renters and those who appreciate density are never close to the majority of constituents, how does showing up help?
- DataWorker 7y agoThat’s democracy. The residents get to choose what happens in their community. If they don’t want to fill the Bay Area with slums and housing projects, they can make that choice and keep people out.
- toomuchtodo 7y agoAgreed about democracy. Can’t force upzoning and density if existing population doesn’t want it and votes against it.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- oppositelock 7y agoRenters are a voting majority here, and successfully passed rent control, at the same time, the city council down-zoned the city, and NIMBYs are able to stop developments via California's crazy environmental review process. So, we have a shortage and rent control, which means Mountain View is becoming more unaffordable to every newcomer, but some renters will have some protection. The local residents show up in droves to oppose housing, particularly the home owners, with the arguments being "the infrastructure can't take any more". They never hold the city to its responsibility or providing infrastructure, instead, use the bad infrastructure as an excuse to stifle development. It's a backwards, topsy turvy world here. City governments are meant to serve people, not rule over them.
- ohazi 7y ago> We've now banned natural gas Wait, really? Just for heat or also in the kitchen? Electric stove tops fucking suck. Ugh.
- t34543 7y agoYes, natural gas is being banned. California has gone crazy. Inductive cooktops are pretty good - I’ve grown to prefer it over gas.
- zaphoyd 7y agoInduction cooktops are fantastic. Wish it was possible to find them in rental housing instead of gas!
- codyb 7y agoAs someone who loves to cook and much prefers gas I’m genuinely curious about why you and parent like inductive so much? One neat thing at my girlfriend’s place was that there was an inductive circle with two possible diameters of heat which seems neat for a gigantic stock pot. But switching quickly between heats seems like it’d require you to have two “burners” going at once. At the end of the day I’m not sure if it’d really affect my cooking which I love to do but probably isn’t three Michelin stars or anything, but it’s the first I’ve heard of a preference for electric.
- toomuchtodo 7y agoInductive cooktops allow for more granular control of heat applied. Can’t compare it to resistive electric cooking.
- toomuchtodo 7y agoNatural gas is a greenhouse gas, and contributes to climate change when leaking out of the distribution network or burned in your home. Not crazy at all to ban it. Remember when doctors used to smoke during your exam? That’s how future generations are going to look back at our fossil fuel use. https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2019/11/10/climate-change-solutions-more-cities-banning-natural-gas-homes/4008346002/ https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/2019/11/10/climate-chang...
- watwut 7y agoThe question maybe is why google won't move away.