6 ms·

There was a great article about this a couple weeks back: https://darrellowens.substack.com/p/ca-cities-to-lose-all-zoning-powers https://darrellowens.substack

There was a great article about this a couple weeks back: https://darrellowens.substack.com/p/ca-cities-to-lose-all-zoning-powers https://darrellowens.substack.com/p/ca-cities-to-lose-all-zo... Basically, until these cities get a housing plan validated with the state, who is apparently sick of their crap like zoning in the middle of an active mall that will not be torn down, builder’s remedy is in place.

davidw 4y ago
Congrats to https://cayimby.org/ https://cayimby.org/ and https://yimbyaction.org/ https://yimbyaction.org/ for all their work on this! Great organizations to get involved with if you care about other people being able to afford a place to live.
- encoderer 4y ago
  [flagged]
  - shuckles 4y ago
    Why is it nonsense for the state to fund shelter programs by buying out non-viable businesses (empty motels at the height of the pandemic), bailing out both business owners and building shelter capacity at much lower cost than building it new?
    - encoderer 4y ago
      Suppose you buy every hotel in the sfba and move in every homeless person, totally clearing the streets. What happens next? Just no more homeless? No, more homeless will appear. They will fill the same corners and tents that you just cleared the month before. This is not a solution. This is a grift.
      - davidw 4y ago
        > No, more homeless will appear It's not like they magically respawn or something. There are people who have studied the root cause of homelessness, and: it's housing. Sure, other factors make things worse, but there's more homelessness where housing is expensive. Which stands to reason: when a thing is expensive, fewer people can afford it. https://homelessnesshousingproblem.com/ https://homelessnesshousingproblem.com/ That's why, ultimately, the biggest YIMBY win is going to be not helping out people currently homeless, but stopping the pipeline in the first place by having enough housing.
        encoderer 4y ago
        They really do re-spawn if being homeless now means being given a nice, new, clean place to live. Why wouldn’t they?
        Larrikin 4y ago
        Do you really think people with housing would become homeless in hopes of getting a new place?
        encoderer 4y ago
        I think there are a lot of people actually living with relatives and friends who would “become homeless”
        celestialcheese 4y ago
        No, but people are mobile, and the houseless are also people who communicate through the internet and share where assistance is available. If free, safe lodging is available without restrictions, demand will quickly outstrip supply with folks moving from other cities (LA, Seattle, Portland, etc) to fill the available rooms. It's a $50 bus ticket, city officials will likely fund these tickets for them to get to SF to take advantage of this. SF had programs for this exact thing to get homeless out of SF [1] 1 - https://www.vice.com/en/article/bvg7ba/instead-of-helping-homeless-people-cities-are-bussing-them-out-of-town https://www.vice.com/en/article/bvg7ba/instead-of-helping-ho...
  - davidw 4y ago
    Once someone has a home, they're no longer homeless, so it's a good strategy in some circumstances. Even where that person has other 'issues', it's a lot easier to deal with those once they're in a stable location. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/14/headway/houston-homeless-people.html https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/14/headway/houston-homeless-... https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2023/01/homelessness-affordable-housing-crisis-democrats-causes/672224/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2023/01/homeles...
    - Vaslo 4y ago
      [flagged]
      - femiagbabiaka 4y ago
        Citing an article or publication in rebuttal would be a more productive way to make this critique..
        seattle_spring 4y ago
        Which ironically would be from something like the Daily Wire or Zero Hedge.
        jojobas 4y ago
        You can help yourself to the info on what happened when homeless people were put in hotels during covid. Most of them are homeless for because they can't live in a home.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
  - frosted-flakes 4y ago
    Seems like a decent short-term plan, if it were to be properly funded and actually run like a hotel, minus the profits.
  - mikestew 4y ago
    Other than calling "nonsense", you haven't really made the case against for something that has precedent. Care to take another whack at it?
    - encoderer 4y ago
      $550,000 a unit. Come on. You can’t be serious that this is a solution. https://apnews.com/article/lifestyle-business-health-california-coronavirus-pandemic-835c2091c63c199d397346a497e7ae49 https://apnews.com/article/lifestyle-business-health-califor...
      - lapetitejort 4y ago
        > CEO John Maceri said the state has set up local governments for success, but it will take a combined effort of politicians and service providers to sustain the program. He estimates conversion costs will be far less than $550,000 per unit, the going rate for building from the ground up. I assume this is where you got your number? Why skip the "far less" part?
        encoderer 4y ago
        Just fast googling. Here’s another source at $300k - still insane. https://www.ktvu.com/news/oakland-san-francisco-awarded-grants-to-covert-hotels-into-housing-for-homeless-residents.amp https://www.ktvu.com/news/oakland-san-francisco-awarded-gran...
      - sterlind 4y ago
        The only to solve homelessness in a city, definitionally, are getting the homeless to move out, or getting them housing. Given the insane real estate prices in the area, $550K seems accurate to buy them housing. Unless you plan to round them up and ship them to camps, or find a way to get them jobs that pay well enough to lease a $550K unit, you're sort of out of options.
        encoderer 4y ago
  - Fauntleroy 4y ago
    Can you elaborate on how this is "nonsense"?
GalenErso 4y ago
> until these cities get a housing plan validated with the state I could see the cities just refusing to submit any plans at all. The state should then make its own housing plans with the developers directly. Cities should be cut out of the loop.
- astrange 4y ago
  If they don't submit a housing element they don't get to have zoning (as they currently don't) and then what's the point?
  - shuckles 4y ago
    There are many reasons it would be good for there to be a fallback zoning set by the state if a city is missing a housing element. For example, in that case builders could propose zoning compliance projects which have less legal ambiguity, are consistent with a general plan (and therefore already have environmental impacts studied for CEQA), and perhaps don’t have the same inclusionary zoning requirements of Builders’ Remedy projects.
- more_corn 4y ago
  SGTM
- MarkMarine 4y ago
  They seem to be trying any trick they can think of to avoid submitting a valid plan: https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/bay-area-towns-mull-plan-to-avoid-new-housing-17767526.php https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/bay-area-towns-mull-pla...
  - avidiax 4y ago
    I don't know if Mr. Bean would be considered developmentally disabled, but I can't get the image of him being driven around while flipping off all the affluent people that support this out of my mind :)

davidw 4y ago

Congrats to https://cayimby.org/ https://cayimby.org/ and https://yimbyaction.org/ https://yimbyaction.org/ for all their work on this! Great organizations to get involved with if you care about other people being able to afford a place to live.

encoderer 4y ago
[flagged]
- shuckles 4y ago
  Why is it nonsense for the state to fund shelter programs by buying out non-viable businesses (empty motels at the height of the pandemic), bailing out both business owners and building shelter capacity at much lower cost than building it new?
  - encoderer 4y ago
    Suppose you buy every hotel in the sfba and move in every homeless person, totally clearing the streets. What happens next? Just no more homeless? No, more homeless will appear. They will fill the same corners and tents that you just cleared the month before. This is not a solution. This is a grift.
    - davidw 4y ago
      > No, more homeless will appear It's not like they magically respawn or something. There are people who have studied the root cause of homelessness, and: it's housing. Sure, other factors make things worse, but there's more homelessness where housing is expensive. Which stands to reason: when a thing is expensive, fewer people can afford it. https://homelessnesshousingproblem.com/ https://homelessnesshousingproblem.com/ That's why, ultimately, the biggest YIMBY win is going to be not helping out people currently homeless, but stopping the pipeline in the first place by having enough housing.
      - encoderer 4y ago
        They really do re-spawn if being homeless now means being given a nice, new, clean place to live. Why wouldn’t they?
        Larrikin 4y ago
        Do you really think people with housing would become homeless in hopes of getting a new place?
        encoderer 4y ago
        I think there are a lot of people actually living with relatives and friends who would “become homeless”
        celestialcheese 4y ago
        No, but people are mobile, and the houseless are also people who communicate through the internet and share where assistance is available. If free, safe lodging is available without restrictions, demand will quickly outstrip supply with folks moving from other cities (LA, Seattle, Portland, etc) to fill the available rooms. It's a $50 bus ticket, city officials will likely fund these tickets for them to get to SF to take advantage of this. SF had programs for this exact thing to get homeless out of SF [1] 1 - https://www.vice.com/en/article/bvg7ba/instead-of-helping-homeless-people-cities-are-bussing-them-out-of-town https://www.vice.com/en/article/bvg7ba/instead-of-helping-ho...
- davidw 4y ago
  Once someone has a home, they're no longer homeless, so it's a good strategy in some circumstances. Even where that person has other 'issues', it's a lot easier to deal with those once they're in a stable location. https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/14/headway/houston-homeless-people.html https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/14/headway/houston-homeless-... https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2023/01/homelessness-affordable-housing-crisis-democrats-causes/672224/ https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2023/01/homeles...
  - Vaslo 4y ago
    [flagged]
    - femiagbabiaka 4y ago
      Citing an article or publication in rebuttal would be a more productive way to make this critique..
      - seattle_spring 4y ago
        Which ironically would be from something like the Daily Wire or Zero Hedge.
      - jojobas 4y ago
        You can help yourself to the info on what happened when homeless people were put in hotels during covid. Most of them are homeless for because they can't live in a home.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- frosted-flakes 4y ago
  Seems like a decent short-term plan, if it were to be properly funded and actually run like a hotel, minus the profits.
- mikestew 4y ago
  Other than calling "nonsense", you haven't really made the case against for something that has precedent. Care to take another whack at it?
  - encoderer 4y ago
    $550,000 a unit. Come on. You can’t be serious that this is a solution. https://apnews.com/article/lifestyle-business-health-california-coronavirus-pandemic-835c2091c63c199d397346a497e7ae49 https://apnews.com/article/lifestyle-business-health-califor...
    - lapetitejort 4y ago
      > CEO John Maceri said the state has set up local governments for success, but it will take a combined effort of politicians and service providers to sustain the program. He estimates conversion costs will be far less than $550,000 per unit, the going rate for building from the ground up. I assume this is where you got your number? Why skip the "far less" part?
      - encoderer 4y ago
        Just fast googling. Here’s another source at $300k - still insane. https://www.ktvu.com/news/oakland-san-francisco-awarded-grants-to-covert-hotels-into-housing-for-homeless-residents.amp https://www.ktvu.com/news/oakland-san-francisco-awarded-gran...
    - sterlind 4y ago
      The only to solve homelessness in a city, definitionally, are getting the homeless to move out, or getting them housing. Given the insane real estate prices in the area, $550K seems accurate to buy them housing. Unless you plan to round them up and ship them to camps, or find a way to get them jobs that pay well enough to lease a $550K unit, you're sort of out of options.
      - encoderer 4y ago
- Fauntleroy 4y ago
  Can you elaborate on how this is "nonsense"?

GalenErso 4y ago

> until these cities get a housing plan validated with the state I could see the cities just refusing to submit any plans at all. The state should then make its own housing plans with the developers directly. Cities should be cut out of the loop.

astrange 4y ago
If they don't submit a housing element they don't get to have zoning (as they currently don't) and then what's the point?
- shuckles 4y ago
  There are many reasons it would be good for there to be a fallback zoning set by the state if a city is missing a housing element. For example, in that case builders could propose zoning compliance projects which have less legal ambiguity, are consistent with a general plan (and therefore already have environmental impacts studied for CEQA), and perhaps don’t have the same inclusionary zoning requirements of Builders’ Remedy projects.
more_corn 4y ago
SGTM
MarkMarine 4y ago
They seem to be trying any trick they can think of to avoid submitting a valid plan: https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/bay-area-towns-mull-plan-to-avoid-new-housing-17767526.php https://www.sfgate.com/local/article/bay-area-towns-mull-pla...
- avidiax 4y ago
  I don't know if Mr. Bean would be considered developmentally disabled, but I can't get the image of him being driven around while flipping off all the affluent people that support this out of my mind :)