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grendel-khan

i'm sorry, but it's more complicated than that

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joined 2022 September 04 22:05:51 UTC

Housing Poster. Series index here.

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grendel-khan


								

								

								
								
								

								
							
					
 
				


				
i'm sorry, but it's more complicated than that

				
				
				

				

					2 followers  

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					joined 2022 September 04 22:05:51 UTC
				


				
					

					
Housing Poster. Series index here.



				

				

				

				

				

					

					

					
					
					

					
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				Culture War Roundup for the week of April 3, 2023
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
It's Morning in California. Rather, it's Morning in the legislative season, a time when big ideas seem possible, before they disappear into a swamp of obscure pitfalls and shenaniganry. Here's my understanding of the current roster of big housing bills this year, and the threats and potential involved. See also Alfred Twu's very detailed writeup (PDF).


(Part of an ongoing series on housing, mostly in California, also at theschism.)


Some common themes:


    

  • CEQA, the California version of NEPA, is a problem, and though it's right up there with Prop 13 as a Third Rail in California politics, many of the housing bills this year center around exempting projects from CEQA, especially after a particularly egregious use to block student housing because the students themselves would constitute an environmental impact. (I'm reminded of SourceWatch's very cursed Precautionary Principle chart.)
    • 

  • Last year's AB 2011 was a particularly big deal, not because of its contents, but because Assemblymember Wicks (previously seen here) managed to get the carpenters' union on board. The Building Trades have been adamant in their demands (basically, require that workers on streamlined projects attended a particular union training program), which the YIMBYs consider a dealbreaker. The compromise in AB 2011 was to provide various benefits to any worker on those projects, and to give preferences to graduates of union apprenticeship programs. There's a huge difference in California politics between "the unions oppose" and "the unions are divided". This mainly applies to SB 423, but the model will likely be tried in plenty of other bills.
    • 



The major bills:


    

  • AB 68 (CA YIMBY), the Housing and Climate Solutions Act. (Not to be confused with 2019's AB 68, part of the push to legalize ADUs). This will likely be a two-year bill, but it's a mass upzoning in the vein of SB 827 and SB 50. Those bills failed, so the YIMBYs are taking a different tack: this is a collaboration between California YIMBY and the Nature Conservancy, as it would not only make it easier to build in cities, it would make it harder to build in the wilderness, under the Gain/Maintain/Sustain rubric outlined here. Details are still in flux, but Livable California is furious. Much of how this goes will depend on how labor gets on board.
    • 

  • SB 423 (CA YIMBY), an extension of 2017's SB 35 (previously seen here). The original SB 35 streamlined approvals (including CEQA exemptions) for general plan-compliant projects in cities behind on their housing goals. It was a compromise, which got the Building Trades on board: all-subsidized projects could pay prevailing wage, but market-rate projects had to use "Skilled and Trained" labor, which is extremely scarce. As a result, the only SB 35 projects completed as of this point are subsidized. SB 423 would apply AB 2011-style labor standards to all projects and indefinitely extend the streamlining. The intra-labor fight has been intense. The carpenters are supporting in droves; the remaining trades are stopping just shy of calling them scabs.
    • 

  • SB 4, a revival of 2020's SB 899, which would allow churches and nonprofit schools to build housing on their land. This is enormously popular, and was killed for unclear reasons last time. There's been some remarkable cross-pollination with SB 423 at the Capitol, with religious leaders supporting SB 423 and the carpenters supporting SB 4.
    • 

  • AB 309 (CA YIMBY), a revival of AB 2053, which would take the first steps in establishing a statewide social housing agency.
    • 

  • AB 1630 would exempt student housing within a thousand feet of a school from CEQA, as well as from a variety of building standards such as floor-area ratios, parking minimums, density limits, and height limits under forty feet. This is a direct response to the Berkeley ruling earlier this year.
    • 



These bills will of course change going forward, and some will certainly fail to advance, but this is the state of things at the top of the year.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Quality Contributions Report for September 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Hey, cool! I'm flattered; thanks, everyone. A few updates on this year's housing bills, as a thank-you.


    

  • 

    AB 2097 (Parking reform) was signed by the Governor, and will take effect at the beginning of 2023. Governor's statement here.
    

      

    • I attended some developer conferences, and was surprised that financiers will now be requiring parking, though at a considerably lower ratio than cities have been. (0.75-1.2 stalls per unit for market-rate developers; 0.5-0.75 for subsidized; contrast with 2.5-4.5 for cities' requirements.)
      • 

    

    • 

  • 

    AB 2011 (Affordable Housing and High Road Jobs Act), SB 6 (Middle Class Housing Act), SB 886 (CEQA exemption for student housing) were all signed on Housing Bill Day; around forty bills in total. Every California YIMBY priority bill that made it through policy committees was signed by the Governor.
    

      

    • SB 922 (CEQA exemptions for non-car transportation), on the subject of CEQA reform, extended and expanded CEQA exemptions for pedestrian, bike, and transit infrastructure.
      • 

    

    • 



Here's Alfred Twu's annual infographic. It's definitely the biggest year so far for the YIMBYs in California.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for September 16, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I found some magnificent explorables; I don't remember where I got the link from, but this is a breakdown of a how a mechanical watch works, and it is amazing.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Friday Fun Thread for September 16, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Are folks here familiar with Scary Pockets? They do a lot of funkified covers, e.g., "Crazy", "I Want It That Way", "Toxic", and many, many others.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 5, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Thanks! I'm glad folks are interested.




(even if only to keep more Californians in California and not dragging their policies to me)




Now I'm going to be a humorless scold about this; the problems that California has are due to a combination of its policies and its luck. The housing crisis that came to California was a slow burn caused by gradually-applied restrictions on growth which made it so when boom times came, the market couldn't respond. The boom time, in scale and duration, is unique to California, but the policies aren't, which is why Austin is going through the same thing that various California cities do where the rent rises, homelessness surges, and the main response of the city is to obey the very angry citizens and chase homeless people from place to place, trashing their belongings as they go.


The policies are already there. To the extent that California is responsible, it's by displacing people out of the state. Just as in California, the homeless are demonized as outsiders, when they're mostly just people who used to be housed there, but can no longer afford the rent.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 5, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I think it's worth trying to empathize with these people. Consider this previous discussion on some comments by Matthew Cortland, where he vociferously argues against the concept of QALYs, because as a disabled person, QALYs value his life less than that of someone who isn't disabled.


On the one hand, it is devastating to be told that you're not an entire person, even in an accounting sense.


On the other, when you're doing a utilitarianism, either you're going to count disabled people less than non-disabled ones, or you're going to see nothing wrong with deafening someone, or blinding them, and so on.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 5, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Doesn't this prove too much? Attempting to destroy gay or lesbian communities seems bad in the same way; aren't they also "(largely) voluntarily sterile"?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 5, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
See also, previous discussion about more/better police. (This was mid-2020, when the issue was particularly salient.) Another thing that came up was Jill Leovy's Ghettoside (review/summary here), which argues that black Americans are particularly subject to simultaneous over- and under-policing, where the cops hassle and intimidate them for minor infractions but allow murders to go unsolved.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 5, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Great question! The movement in California has tended to focus on more immediate reforms, which is one of the things that sets them apart from the After the Revolution types. But Prop 13 produces a sort of anti-Georgism, where more valuable land is cheaper to sit on. The YIMBYs were very keen on enacting "split roll", which would have repealed Prop 13 for large commercial (non-agricultural) landowners. (Prop 13 itself benefits from stunningly durable popularity.)


You can see Laura Foote (Executive Director for YIMBY Action) regularly mentioning LVT; there's a Stanford-based podcast/radio show not exactly aligned with the YIMBY movement called The Henry George Program; they've interviewed Lars Doucet (author of this ACX review-contest entry) as well as Sonja Trauss (Executive Director of YIMBY Law).


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 5, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Darrell Owens in The Discourse Lounge, "YIMBYs Triumph In California". (Part of a migratory series on housing, mostly in California, also at theschism.)


This wasn't supposed to be a big year in the Legislature. It's an election year, which means excuses and cowardice and small-c conservatism. It's why there was no SB 827 or SB 50, no mass-upzoning bill. But it was a surprisingly successful year in the Legislature for the YIMBYs, maybe even more so than last year. The governor has yet to sign these, but he's expected to. California has no pocket veto, so if he takes no action, they become law at the end of September.


First, the bills that didn't make it.


    

  • 

    AB 2053 (California Social Housing Act) would have established a state agency to "produce and preserve mixed-income homes that are union built, sustainable, collectively owned, affordable for all income levels, and are financially self-sustaining". It would also have provided a mechanism for the state to engage in counter-cyclical construction when it's cheap and jobs are scarce. It made it through the Assembly, but failed to advance from Senate Governance and Finance by one vote. More here from Alex Lee, the author.
    

    • 

  • 

    AB 2656, which isn't exactly major, but would have outlawed CEQA shenanigans as seen in the 469 Stevenson case in San Francisco by interpreting them as a denial under the Housing Accountability Act. It passed its committees and the Assembly, but disappeared in the Senate Appropriations black hole. This indicates just how much of a third-rail any sort of CEQA reform is.
    

    • 

  • 

    SB 917 (Seamless Transit Transformation Act) passed its votes with near unanimity, but Assembly Appropriations spiked it for unclear reasons. It would have placed a timeline on the harmonization of the more than twenty transit agencies in the Bay Area, covering wayfinding and real-time transit data, establishing free transfers, multi-agency passes, and planning a unified regional network. Streetsblog opines that it will still have a significant impact.
    

    • 



And the major bills that did.


    

  • 

    AB 2011 (Affordable Housing and High Road Jobs Act) allows residential development on commercial sites; as a compromise, it doesn't require union labor, but it does require preference be given to apprenticeship programs. This got the Carpenters' Union on board, though not the broader Trades Union. It requires a certain proportion of subsidized units, and comes with minsterial approval, which means its projects are exempt from CEQA. It could make 1.6-2.4 million more units feasible statewide.
    

    • 

  • 

    SB 6 (Middle Class Housing Act), similar to AB 2011, also allows housing in commercial zones without specific subsidized percentages, but requires union labor and does not provide ministerial approval. Here's a comparison of the two bills.
    

    • 

  • 

    AB 2097 (Parking reform), a reboot of last year's AB 1401, which was lost in Appropriations. There have been some amendments; cities can argue (using a "preponderance of evidence") that they really need parking, unless twenty percent of the housing is set aside for low-income, elderly, or disabled people, or students, or the project is twenty units or smaller.
    

    • 

  • 

    SB 886 (CEQA exemption for student housing) is a CEQA reform that actually did pass; it exempts (certain) student housing projects. This doesn't directly address the UC Berkeley enrollment mess, but it does address one of the underlying causes, which was the city of Berkeley's blocking of student housing.
    

    • 



Matt Yglesias is very excited:




I think it’s possible that California is going to substantially improve its housing situation over the next decade / The key isn’t any one of the bills that’s passed or any specific action taken by the governor or the AG, it’s that they now seem to have a durable political coalition in place that wants to see more homes built and keeps taking new swings at it.




This is something that Owens covers as well. Until now, the Trades have blocked any housing reform which didn't require union labor. But AB 2011 passed without the Trades' approval; the Carpenters' unions (along with public employee unions, teacher unions, and the SEIU) showed up and advocated for the bill. There is now a path to major reform that doesn't require the Trades. Much is possible that previously wasn't.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 5, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
I don't understand; do you think that the existence of people with bad ideas who voted blue means that we shouldn't point out when someone is reasoning badly? Do you think that I'm backing that particular conspiracy theory? (I'm not; I only faintly remember hearing it years ago.) Aren't we supposed to sharpen each other, as iron sharpens iron?


"Someone who you remind me of reasoned badly, so you shouldn't complain about me reasoning badly" is a poor approach.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 5, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Okay, but why do you think that "poll watchers were removed", since the only claims to that effect came from incompetent Trump followers who then recanted?


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 5, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					
Generally speaking, it would be a strange coincidence if the Biden campaign's malfeasance matched up so impressively well with the media's red-mirage predictions, and had the opposite effect you'd expect on the eventual results, which were much better for Trump than pre-election polling would indicate.


More specifically, this doesn't appear to have happened; the Trump campaign fundraised on that idea, but didn't appear willing to make the same bold claims in actual court.


				

				

						

							

								
							

						


						
					

				
			


			

	


			
			
				

			
		

	






		

			
			
				Culture War Roundup for the week of September 5, 2022
			
		

	

	

	

		
			

			

				

			

		

			


				

					


Even in 2020 we can see how the election became very close at one point during the night, until Biden's mysterious surge.




This is not, and was not, mysterious. It was heavily predicted before the election (Reuters, CNN, NBC, Fox), the explanation (Democrats are more likely to vote by mail, mail-in ballots are counted later) was straightforward, and the only reason this is even a thing is that it was one in a series of Trump's attempts to avoid facing up to his loss.