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Lawsuits Block Thousands of Seattle Homes, $39M for Affordable Housing
- steponlego 4y agoNot everybody wants new tenements in their nice neighborhood.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- idiotsecant 4y agoClassy. At some point that 'nice neighborhood' was low-density farmland or widely spaced residential that no doubt didn't want to see new packed urban housing in their nice neighborhood. If you live in a city housing around you will steadily increase in density. You need to live with that, you own your property - you don't own everyone else's.
- steponlego 4y agoThese lawsuits are an excellent refutation of your premise. I don’t want tenements anywhere near where I live. And I will work as hard as necessary to prevent their installation.
- mixmastamyk 4y agoThese are million dollar condos, you insensitive clod.
- steponlego 4y agoOnly on the top floors. They’re Section 8 below that.
- notch898a 4y agoThis is a tongue in cheek explanation for destruction of the urban middle class. Lowest class gets free rent, the rich buy the luxury condos, meanwhile middle class bread and butter workers flushed out of the city.
- steponlego 4y agoI have a condition that makes me unable to understand Internet sarcasm unless it is preceded by an upside-down exclamation mark.
- mixmastamyk 4y agoYes, only the top 90%.
- p0pcult 4y agoNot everyone wants wealthy assholes either, but unfortunately they tend to be able to pay more lawyer fees.
- steponlego 4y ago[flagged]
- pwinnski 4y agoI'm not sure whether your replies here are more stupid, or more nasty. The two attributes are neck-in-neck thus far. Not everyone is as selfish as you are. I'm a happy YIMBY, disappointed that the houses they're building on the corner are $900k+, hoping they build cheaper on the giant lot across the street from them.
- steponlego 4y agoI just oppose whatever the astroturfed trends are, usually. It's never backfired on me. I don't mind the pleas, projection, and wheedling, either. I've been doing this a LOT longer than you.
- pwinnski 4y agoTo justify the upper-case "LOT" you'll need to be a centenarian. I'm not young.
- sjf 4y agoYou can choose to have affordable housing, or you can choose have a homeless encampment. The poor people don't just disappear.
- steponlego 4y ago[flagged]
- vkou 4y agoI think a better solution would be to see the NIMBYs get a bus ticket to Portland.
- steponlego 4y agoEverybody who lives here is a NIMBY. Can’t fight that. Why not make a walkable city for the homeless? A fresh one from scratch.
- vkou 4y ago> Everybody who lives here is a NIMBY. Can’t fight that. State-level laws will end your fight to stop development, as just happened in California, and is working its way through state legislatures in Washington.
- steponlego 4y agoDon't worry - people are fighting these tooth and nail. There isn't enough WEF money in the world to bribe people who have to live in the communities they represent.
- rootusrootus 4y agoBetween Republicans wanting to use the state to overpower cities, and Democrats now wanting the same, maybe we ought to just eliminate cities altogether and centralize all the authority.
- vkou 4y agoNot everyone wants NIMBYs in their nice neighborhood, but we end up having to tolerate them. The way state-level political winds are going, it looks like you'll have to tolerate things you dislike, as well.
- steponlego 4y agoNo I won’t. Lawsuits like this are the proof. I don’t want bus lines, walkable cities, or section 8 in my nice quiet community and neither does anybody else who lives here. Democracy has spoken.
- cmh89 4y agoThe lawsuits exist because democracy spoke and the NIMBYs didn't like what it had to say. The builders are operating under the laws of the community. The NIMBYs are abusing the legal system in an attempt to subvert the will of the people.
- steponlego 4y agoSorry, the nature of local, county, state, and federal jurisdictions won't tolerate some inevitable voter takeover even if most people in a state seem to vote for some socialist WEF policy or another. It's one of the differences between federalization and what other countries have. You can fool the voters but they're getting sharper and they're becoming conspiracy theorists too now, for good reason.
- pwinnski 4y agoIt seems you've been posting every two minutes for too long to have noticed how wrong you are. Calm down with the nonsense labels and conspiracy foolishness, maybe take a break from posting to touch nature. The State of California recently revoked the rights of quite a few smaller jurisdictions to set their own zoning laws because they abdicated that right by refusing to set zoning laws that allowed for new development. So... Voters at every level pretty consistently vote for more development, seeing clearly that development beats homeless encampments, and that a rising tide lifts all boats. The obstructionist lawsuits come from sub-jurisdictional groups like the residents of one particular building in this case. Federalism doesn't apply here any more than "socialism" does. Appeals to imaginary international conspiracies aside, this is pretty simple: in many areas we have, and will continue to have, more people who need places to live than we have places for them to live. Either we build more places, or we deal with the consequences of failure. People abusing the legal system to stick their fingers in their ears until the problem moves a few blocks or a city or a state away are running out of time, because the tricks are seen clearly. Every selfish NIMBY is saying much the same thing: any and all development that led to the point where I could move here and buy my place is well and good and the natural order of things, and every bit of construction that happens after I close on my property is horrible and evil and will irreparably damage the character of the neighborhood. Of course, anyone who has lived in the area just a few years more could say the same thing about the freshly-minted NIMBY, all the way back to those who lived here 500 years ago. It's obvious nonsense.
- pwinnski 4y agoAnd yet the Escala was built with 269 units anyway. Tear it down, I guess? Or stop the YIMBY nonsense and let's build enough places to live for people who need to live somewhere.
- steponlego 4y agoMigration is about to stop completely very soon. We won't need new urban housing.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- GalenErso 4y agoRelated article. The build nothing country: https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/the-build-nothing-country https://noahpinion.substack.com/p/the-build-nothing-country "We no longer have the luxury of giving our people a shadow subsidy by freezing their neighborhoods and cities in amber. Spiraling housing costs in any city with real economic opportunity, a floundering energy transition, and the inexorable migration of manufacturing to more development-friendly countries have become so severe that we must dispense with our collective illusion that America will always look like it looked in 1975. Slashing the thicket of red tape that prevent development, and subordinating local interests to the needs of the nation itself, are no longer idle dreams — they are immediate necessities. If we insist on continuing to be the Build-Nothing Country, our once-mighty middle class will sink into a genteel poverty, and someone else will build the future on the bones of our civilization." And the top comment in this Reddit thread: https://old.reddit.com/r/Economics/comments/11deckj/maybe_treating_housing_as_an_investment_was_a/ https://old.reddit.com/r/Economics/comments/11deckj/maybe_tr... "Consider how much of our modelling is based on the assumption of voluntary transactions. We say that all have a right to life and liberty, but is that really true? Every single space on planet Earth is owned by someone. In order to exist, one must occupy space. You can't exist outside the legal boundaries that those owners have every interest in upholding. As recently as a century ago, you could and two centuries ago it was actively encouraged. Any land you could occupy was yours to claim (risky as it may be). But now... From the very moment of birth you must find a landlord who is willing to let you exist. If that landlord demands a lifetime of labor in exchange, what choice do you really have? If no landlord voluntarily chooses, despite incentives to the contrary, to charge much less, what are you but a slave? There isn't an easy solution, we all share this world and it is impossible to live truly independently... But the solution is certainly not to demand a lifetime of toil at the whim of a handful of owning families in exchange for the right to exist. All the while creating profits that help them sustain their power over you."
- gretch 4y agoI don't think this is true. The actual raw amount of land on plant earth is abundant, it's just that much of it is unattractive to modern humans due to not being hooked up to internet/electricity and not near interesting things like shopping or concerts. I did a quick search and found many articles where states are encouraging people to homestead in unoccupied land as a form of development. (I will grant that this article was last updated 2014 and probably some things have changed, but it's hard for me to believe that it went from 100% to 0% over that time.) https://www.cnbc.com/2010/11/16/7-Towns-Where-Land-is-Free.html https://www.cnbc.com/2010/11/16/7-Towns-Where-Land-is-Free.h... I think it's actually really easy to go out into the middle of nowhere, have no master and claim some land, but this isn't really attractive as a way to live (actually homeless people do it downtown and even then it's kind of tolerated). People from 200 years ago didn't have a problem with it though...
- rcpt 4y agoWhy don't the people who care about their view simply build a taller tower?
- toomuchtodo 4y agoThis is no different than people in HOAs who try to block solar on the rooftops of their neighbors, or those blocking utility scale solar in their community on land they don’t own, out of aesthetics or their feelings. You can’t negotiate with them, you can only persevere (and hopefully you’re resourced to do so).
- lazyasciiart 4y agoWashington addressed this by passing a law that solar panels cannot be prevented by a HOA.
- toomuchtodo 4y agoThey can put restrictions on the install: https://artisanelectricinc.com/solar_and_homeowners_association/ https://artisanelectricinc.com/solar_and_homeowners_associat... https://apps.leg.wa.gov/rcw/default.aspx?cite=64.38.055 https://apps.leg.wa.gov/rcw/default.aspx?cite=64.38.055
- yellow_postit 4y agoDuring the South Lake building boom I recall seeing many “construct additional pylons” posters as a tongue in cheek advocacy for the condo buildings complaining about losing space needle views. As an alternative there’s things like the protected views framework [1] which in London has enshrined which vantage points can see St Paul’s leading to some of the odder skyline architecture like the Walkie Talkie building. [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_view https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Protected_view
- bobthepanda 4y agoIn Seattle if you want to put your money where your mouth is, you can legally purchase a parcel’s unused “air rights” (the unused development capacity). It’s most commonly used in single family areas, where homes buy them from other lots to preserve their views.
- yellow_postit 4y agoDoes any city have a well functioning design review process or are they all captured by incumbents to slow down development?
- pclmulqdq 4y agoI think a common feature of places I have seen with reasonable construction processes is that they do not have control of construction approval at the city level.
- jackmott42 4y agoIt is amazing how one person can have a view that developers have all the power and can never be stopped. Others have the view that NIMBY's have all the power and nothing can get developed. Yet somehow everything ends up paved over with a high rise on it eventually, like it or not.
- erulabs 4y agoBut that's exactly the point - not everything ends up with a high rise on it. Clearly, not enough of a percent of "everything" has a high rise, or there would be no housing shortage! You feel there are too many, but if there was no desire for high rises, no one would build them!
- myroon5 4y ago~3/4 of Seattle land doesn't really allow new housing: https://www.seattletimes.com/business/real-estate/city-report-widespread-single-family-zoning-is-damaging-seattle-and-needs-changing https://www.seattletimes.com/business/real-estate/city-repor...
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]
- ryukafalz 4y ago> Yet somehow everything ends up paved over with a high rise on it eventually, like it or not. I'd like to know what definition you're using for "everything" here because the vast majority of residential land is zoned exclusively for single-family homes and indeed that's mostly what gets built.
- AlexandrB 4y ago> Arguing against the project, Escala’s attorneys claimed that shadows from the new buildings would result in “cancers, cardiovascular disease, metabolic disorders and mental health [sic].” In a world with an ironic sense of justice the court would accept their argument and extend it to then requiring Escala's demolition so that their neighbours would not be affected by shadows.
- nayuki 4y ago> shadows result in cancers So all basement rental units are going to be banned, right? /s
- 8f2ab37a-ed6c 4y agoDon't give SF NIMBYs any ideas.
- nradov 4y agoSF government does already cancel housing developments over shadows. https://sf.curbed.com/2019/4/10/18304717/shadow-housing-sf-park-supervisors-vote-reject-nimby https://sf.curbed.com/2019/4/10/18304717/shadow-housing-sf-p...
- JumpCrisscross 4y ago> one of the most active opponents to these new apartment projects is the association of condominium owners at Escala Sounds like a good target for peaceful extrajudicial activism. (Protests. Preferably loud.)
- deanCommie 4y agoIrrespective of any economic or legal incentives or factors here, this comes down fundamentally to a lack of social trust in north america. It doesn't happen the same way anywhere else in the world like it does in US&Canada. People don't care about other people. "I got mine, ** yours." It's a problem without an easy solution.
- conqrr 4y agoThis rings so true. Simplistic but can explain most things that are wrong in the US. For an immigrant I see this pattern everywhere from Corporates, Housing, Immigration, Homelessness making friends. Selfishness is in the fabric of society here.
- newaccount2021 4y ago[dead]
- Kharvok 4y agoHow can you build social trust when there is no commonality with your neighbor? Without some commonality of principles how can I trust that any social contract would be recognized or understood. How do people flourish in that environment?
- tialaramex 4y agoHow can there be "no commonality" when you're both human? Like oh no, these people have different arbitrary preferences to me and so we've got nothing in common?
- kevin_b_er 4y agoAnd what is this "commonality" supposed to be?
- jimbob45 4y agoAffordable housing is little better than the drinking fountains for colored people from years past. You don't build affordable housing. You build housing and then prices decrease from the increase in supply. If you're feeling extra bold, you build dense housing to massively increase the supply.
- cwkoss 4y agoI think the idea is that the margins are better on luxury houses/apts/condos (less plumbing per sq ft, etc), so developers are incentivized to build at lower-density than is optimal for alleviating housing supply issues.
- hackerlight 4y agoThe concept of a "luxury apartment" is an oxymoron. It's a rhetorical tool used by NIMBYs. Those apartments that get labelled this way are barely sufficient to fit a family and cost less than the median house, yet the median house would never be labelled a "luxury house".
- noirbot 4y agoHow does that not make sense? It's totally possible to have an apartment that's luxurious. Luxury doesn't mean "large" - look at luxury cars, or watches. Most other major luxury products are almost defined by how expensive they are and how they're not meant for families. Luxury is defined by it being more expensive and presumably nicer to be in than the average thing it's competing with. A luxury apartment isn't trying to be a house, any more than a luxury house is trying to be a hotel. That's not to say that most "luxury" apartments would actually qualify as "luxury" in the sense of most other luxury goods, but they are generally nicer than other apartments in the area, or at least newer.
- hackerlight 4y ago> Luxury is defined by it being more expensive and presumably nicer to be in than the average thing it's competing with. It's an intentional decision (one often done with malice where the objective is rhetorical persuasion) to run this comparison only with other apartments and not with general housing stock which is the real comparison that should be made. NIMBYs, in a stroke of genius, have managed to brand apartments that can barely fit a family as "luxury", yet the median house which costs more is just the "modest family home" that is being oppressed by the ghastly shadows imposed by said luxury apartments filled with, presumably, the rich elite, because who other than the rich elite could afford to live in "luxurious" dwellings? It is rhetorical trickery top to bottom with the objective of worsening the housing crisis and therefore adding to the suffering in the world.
- lvl102 4y agoI am just curious why we are allowing foreigners to buy homes in the US when we have a housing crisis. Here in New England, Chinese/Russians came in and started buying homes in the past two decades. Not only that, we end up educating their children for free in our public schools. Why? They don’t even let our companies operate in their country. Edit: they should not be able to invest in real estate in the US if US citizens are not afforded the same rights in their county. Reciprocity. It’s not asking for much.
- hackerlight 4y agoYou could just choose to not have a housing crisis, you know? It's not the foreigners fault that you insist on outlawing construction.
- moomoo11 4y agoI’m against parking money in other countries that result in empty homes. Home ownership should be only for people who are permanent residents (they can own up to 10 years or until they receive citizenship, to cut down on loophole abusers) or citizens. Why should any country let mega rich people from other countries (let’s be honest if you have money in 3rd world country you’re most likely doing something sketchy.. otherwise you’d move here to work as a swe or something) who have no intention of living here. Source: I’m a naturalized US citizen originally from 3rd world, grew up poor and I know income inequality there it’s far worse than what exists in US. I’m against dirt bag tier rich people from taking advantage of our system. We have plenty people doing that here already lol.
- lvl102 4y agoI would not say anything if they allowed US citizens to do the same in their country.
- jjtheblunt 4y agothey don't pay taxes for the school systems?
- deleted 4y ago
- Kharvok 4y agoThis is an important check to developer greed. You have to be able to maintain quality of life with new development.
- tersers 4y agoThis is a bad-faith argument. I have heard it throughout council hearings on housing in my city. NIMBYism itself is a prime example of greed and I don't see how it's any different.
- pessimizer 4y ago> This is a bad-faith argument. You can't just declare this, you have to say why. > I have heard it throughout council hearings on housing in my city. The fact that you hear it all the time might mean that a lot of people actually believe it.
- doom2 4y agoShouldn't Escala then be torn down for the very reasons they're arguing against the new construction?
- pwinnski 4y agoWhy do you have to be able to "maintain quality of life?" How do you define "quality of life?" For whom must this be maintained? The quality of life for the people who currently have no place in the city to live is pretty bad, building 3000 more units will dramatically improve QoL for them, so a net gain regardless of the negative impact on the 269 existing tenants of Escala, right? The federal government no longer allows "those solar panels are unsightly" to be considered for quality of life, so there's some progress. This shadow nonsense sounds like it's being rejected, too. Bring on the developer greed, so long as they don't cut corners.
- imperfect_light 4y agoSeattle notes: Escala condos were the model for the protagonist's apartment in 50 Shades of Grey https://www.mansionglobal.com/articles/fifty-shades-seattle-penthouse-lists-for-11-5m-107126 https://www.mansionglobal.com/articles/fifty-shades-seattle-... Also across the street from Lola's, where Bezos often has breakfast.
- iForgotMyPW 4y ago[flagged]
- gameman144 4y agoI'm a big fan of the work some cities have done in zoning "urban villages", and as a homeowner who's also aware of the need for more housing, these strike a pretty reasonable compromise in my mind. Essentially, pick some areas that are in-demand, have reasonable transit amenities, and are underbuilt. Zone them to be able to build slightly more dense housing. Then as those villages grow more, expand the radius outward and allow more density in the core areas. I think it's reasonable to not want a highrise next to your house, but a two-story apartment building is easier to digest. Likewise, if you buy a house in one of these urban villages, you're pricing in the reality that something big might be built right next to you. The radius-outward approach lets buyers put their money where their mouth is: if they never want any increases in density near them, then they can pay to be far from these existing villages. If in the future different locations become desirable for density, the slow radial-out buildup of zoned villages lets homeowners adapt reasonably well.
- Karrot_Kream 4y agoUrban villages are a nice concept and they offer a doable, gradual way to upzone American cities along existing arterials. I've been a big fan of them on paper. The problem is often the implementation. Urban village zoning can place tough restrictions on market-rate development (they usually have carve-outs for BMR or affordable housing with fewer requirements) which discourage development. Urban villages aren't immune from NIMBY pressure either, especially if they're being built in an area that was previously only zoned for commercial or light industrial uses. [1] talks about San Jose's urban villages which are often built in formerly light industrial zones and some of the issues with getting them off the ground. It's a shame because I feel like urban villages satisfy the need for upzoning in a way that doesn't completely jar the urban fabric of an area. [1]: https://www.mercurynews.com/2021/09/13/why-some-say-san-joses-urban-village-strategy-for-growth-is-driving-development-away/ https://www.mercurynews.com/2021/09/13/why-some-say-san-jose...
- vel0city 4y agoI'm reminded of a recent housing development that was planned in the city where I live. They wanted to build a few hundred near zero-lot-line single family homes and townhouses. It was on land that was previously zoned industrial, so it required a pretty lengthy approval process. The neighborhood next to it fought the proposed zoning changes. Too many houses near by, increasing traffic, too close to the creek, etc. Probably more likely they were worried about property valuations changing. Ultimately they got their way, and they never got past the planning stages for that neighborhood. However, it didn't stop development on the property from continuing. Since it was already industrial, they went ahead and started building an ugly. massive, tilt wall warehouse on the property. It didn't need many reviews and got approvals very quickly. So now instead of some nice houses, a park, and a few small retail spots to help increase the massively supply constrained housing stock in the area we're going to have a probably busy warehouse with large trucks coming and going constantly deep in the heart of what is otherwise a largely residential area. Nice going, NIMBYs. I bet that warehouse is going to help your property values quite a bit.
- panny 4y agoLow income housing is associated with more crime, but warehouses are not. The residents were probably satisfied with the result.
- vel0city 4y agoThe houses planned in the example I gave started at $400k at the time of planning, with the nicest units going for probably close to $700k especially if you took all the builder options.
- firsttimebigboy 4y agocorrelation != causation. Also, the residents were probably interested in increased property values, just like all home owners are.
- gotoeleven 4y ago[flagged]
- legitster 4y agoSo, the title here is a bit misleading. It sounds like the particular lawsuits in question are all being flatly thrown out - the delays are normal parts of the design review process or self-imposed. > He said Mayor Harrell and Councilmember Dan Strauss are awaiting those findings before introducing legislation that would reform the design review process, including exempting design review from affordable housing projects or projects that contribute to the MHA fund If the point of the design review process is to prevent architectural oversights or zoning mistakes, then surely it wouldn't matter if the building project payed into the city council's pet fund? They should either admit it's a dumb process that doesn't actually do anything and get rid of it for all projects, or stop having zoning laws all together if following the letter of the law is still going to put you into a 4-year backseat driving session anyway.
- imperfect_light 4y agoThe title might lead some to believe these planned buildings have affordable housing, I don't believe that's accurate. Instead they will pay the city for the right not to have any affordable units, hence the $39 million.
- Rediscover 4y agoIf I'm correct, it appears that all but three of the properties (listed in the table early on) are in Belltown. Anyone else notice that? Damn, that's embarassing.
- deleted 4y ago[deleted]