4 ms·

Giant towers full of low-income housing is actually something we've tried before. Over and over. https://newsone.com/1555245/most-infamous-public-housing-projec

Giant towers full of low-income housing is actually something we've tried before. Over and over. https://newsone.com/1555245/most-infamous-public-housing-projects/ https://newsone.com/1555245/most-infamous-public-housing-pro...

jdavis703 5y ago
And they are certainly better than forcing people to live in homeless camps (I write this as someone who’s neighborhood had both public housing and tents).
kevinburke 5y ago
A lot of issues here, and the historic placement of public housing was often set up to fail (cut off from the rest of the city by freeways, for example, and then underfunded), but I'll just note that housing is so expensive now that a family making $74,000 qualifies as "low income" in Yolo County. https://www.yolocounty.org/home/showdocument?id=66968 https://www.yolocounty.org/home/showdocument?id=66968 There's no requirement that the developer is a public agency and only 20% of the apartments must be made available to families making $74,000 or less. This is far into the salary scale for Davis School District educators, for example. https://resources.finalsite.net/images/v1593632639/davisk12utus/glo6umaefzurq2y7ggdl/Table12020-2021.pdf https://resources.finalsite.net/images/v1593632639/davisk12u...
- epistasis 5y ago
  Using the 30% requirement for below-market-rate rents, that's $1850/month for an apartment, which could go pay for nearly $400,000 of construction costs. Which could be a fairly large apartment, actually! Time to start working through some pro-formas, this might have a lot of potential. Prop 13 typically makes it really really hard for new landlords to compete, since long-time landlords pay nearly zero in taxes, but this might actually pencil.
gyc 5y ago
20% low income housing (and we're not talking about dirt poor people but people with solid middle class jobs)is hardly giant towers full of low income housing.
twblalock 5y ago
Davis is a college town and the majority of the housing would go to students if something like that got built. These would not be like inner-city projects, they would be like giant dorms.
- jujube3 5y ago
  Students don't qualify for Section 8.
KingMachiavelli 5y ago
Crime in inner cities was really high in general at the same time most of those projects were built so there's a large number of confounding factors. It's likely many of the residents would have otherwise been homeless and still living in violence. Plus modern design philosophy solves many of the issues by making the common/public areas more visible rather than less. Also cameras/CCTV are so cheap now there's little chance of serious violent crime occurring.
TulliusCicero 5y ago
Public housing has worked in Singapore and Vienna. Instead of declaring our surrender, why don't we learn from the places that got it right?

jdavis703 5y ago

And they are certainly better than forcing people to live in homeless camps (I write this as someone who’s neighborhood had both public housing and tents).

kevinburke 5y ago

A lot of issues here, and the historic placement of public housing was often set up to fail (cut off from the rest of the city by freeways, for example, and then underfunded), but I'll just note that housing is so expensive now that a family making $74,000 qualifies as "low income" in Yolo County. https://www.yolocounty.org/home/showdocument?id=66968 https://www.yolocounty.org/home/showdocument?id=66968 There's no requirement that the developer is a public agency and only 20% of the apartments must be made available to families making $74,000 or less. This is far into the salary scale for Davis School District educators, for example. https://resources.finalsite.net/images/v1593632639/davisk12utus/glo6umaefzurq2y7ggdl/Table12020-2021.pdf https://resources.finalsite.net/images/v1593632639/davisk12u...

epistasis 5y ago
Using the 30% requirement for below-market-rate rents, that's $1850/month for an apartment, which could go pay for nearly $400,000 of construction costs. Which could be a fairly large apartment, actually! Time to start working through some pro-formas, this might have a lot of potential. Prop 13 typically makes it really really hard for new landlords to compete, since long-time landlords pay nearly zero in taxes, but this might actually pencil.

gyc 5y ago

20% low income housing (and we're not talking about dirt poor people but people with solid middle class jobs)is hardly giant towers full of low income housing.

twblalock 5y ago

Davis is a college town and the majority of the housing would go to students if something like that got built. These would not be like inner-city projects, they would be like giant dorms.

jujube3 5y ago
Students don't qualify for Section 8.

KingMachiavelli 5y ago

Crime in inner cities was really high in general at the same time most of those projects were built so there's a large number of confounding factors. It's likely many of the residents would have otherwise been homeless and still living in violence. Plus modern design philosophy solves many of the issues by making the common/public areas more visible rather than less. Also cameras/CCTV are so cheap now there's little chance of serious violent crime occurring.

TulliusCicero 5y ago

Public housing has worked in Singapore and Vienna. Instead of declaring our surrender, why don't we learn from the places that got it right?