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Bills before the California Legislature would crack down on NIMBYs

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Re: Bills before the California Legislature would crack down on NIMBYs

#271

Post by eli_gottlieb »

muninn_ wrote: post #161
closeparen wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand this mentality where everybody thinks they are entitled to prevent others (from the same country, no less!) from moving in to their community. It's not "supply and demand" until the supply caps come off. It's just policy set by the entrenched.

No different than any other prevention, or rule. Why shouldn't they be able to? If you moving to my community and doing whatever causes damage to the value of my property that's no different than doing damage to anything else. It's their community they set the rules. Why have communities or governments, or even countries for that matter? Fundamentally they do the same things. Why should I not be able to just come liv…

>It's their community they set the rules. Why have communities or governments, or even countries for that matter? Fundamentally they do the same things.

Let's try changing this up. "It's my community, so I set the rules. We're seizing the means of production, and any bourgeois scum who don't want to give them up can be put against the wall and shot."

Chances are you suddenly developed an objection. Maybe "we'll set the rules we want in our town" tends to get overridden from above for a valid reason? I dunno.

Re: Bills before the California Legislature would crack down on NIMBYs

#272

Post by almost_usual »

timr wrote: post #138
skewart wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> which is 99% developed. Not really. There's plenty of room to build a ton more in San Francisco. Just because there's already, say, a parking lot or a Burger King with a drive-through on a block in the city doesn't mean that it wouldn't be possible to build apartments there instead. Geography and existing land use do not prevent building more housing in SF. Anti-building regulations are the only meaningful reason w…

"Not really. There's plenty of room to build a ton more in San Francisco." "Anti-building regulations are the only meaningful reason why the housing supply is so restricted." Prove your claim. The GP is right that there is essentially no undeveloped land in SF; a huge part of the housing moratorium debate centered on the fact that there are only a half-dozen or so vacant parcels in the Mission. This is true across th…

If eviction regulations and tenant laws were less strict in San Francisco there would be more property for rent. I've met quite a few home owners who don't rent because it's either a "headache" or it actually decreases the value of their home.

Re: Bills before the California Legislature would crack down on NIMBYs

#273

Post by TheCoelacanth »

kevin_b_er wrote: post #261
_archon_ wrote: post #250

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This seems like the sort of behavior which can be disincentivized with steep fines. You, a developer, built a large building not to code? You have to pay to have it re-worked, and in addition you pay the local town $1000 per domicile affected per day it's delayed. Made-up example, but you get the idea.

Shell corporations can be made to funnel money around to the right people then die. As it is incredibly difficult to pierce the veil due to corporation protections being more important than human health and safety, all the "law" will find is a dead corporation with no assets. The developers will have already stripped it clean and started 10 more in the same way.

What if the owners were required to sign the affidavit personally and the affidavit included an assumption of personal liability for the damages if anything in the affidavit is found to be false?

Re: Bills before the California Legislature would crack down on NIMBYs

#274

Post by tryitnow »

_archon_ wrote: post #250
mabbo wrote: post #233

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> you give us an affidavit saying that your plan meets the specified rules, and you get a permit to build the same day, and if stuff gets falsified on the affidavit we go after you after-the-fact". My wife used to work as an engineer approving (or demanding changes) to plans for Toronto. The biggest problem is that developers will cut every-single-corner and later plead ignorance when they build the 'wrong' (cheaper)…

This seems like the sort of behavior which can be disincentivized with steep fines. You, a developer, built a large building not to code? You have to pay to have it re-worked, and in addition you pay the local town $1000 per domicile affected per day it's delayed. Made-up example, but you get the idea.

Yes, it can be disincentivized with steep fines. But then you just end up back where we are now. Developers would not build if they face the future prospect of such steep fines. What happens if the code is unclear or ambiguous (and when big money is involved everything magically becomes ambiguous).

This is why a balanced regulatory approach is needed - one that is more proactive than reactive. By the time we're reacting way too much damage has been done.

Re: Bills before the California Legislature would crack down on NIMBYs

#275

Post by eli_gottlieb »

muninn_ wrote: post #257
closeparen wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have laws and governments to protect public safety (from hazards such as violence, unsafe driving, unsafe building design, fire, communicable disease, environmental toxicity, etc.), to enforce property rights over what people actually own , to provide essential services such as water, sewer, police, firefighting, and education, and to look after the interests of those who can't get their needs met in the market. T…

K so I'll buy the houses surrounding yours and build some huge barbwire walls, then on the outside of the walls I'll just paint them with horrific images, just gross stuff that anybody would find disgusting to look at. You spent 1.5mm on that house, and now because it's surrounded with these walls the property value is cut to basically nothing. House appraised as worthless, financial ruin for you. But hey fuck you ri…

Neither views nor neighborhoods are considered to be property under real-estate law. Basically, no. Just no. Other people do get to spend their own money on property near yours and use it as they please. That's a free economy. If you don't like it, try some form of central planning. I think feudalism might really suit you.

Re: Bills before the California Legislature would crack down on NIMBYs

#276

Post by closeparen »

muninn_ wrote: post #257
closeparen wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We have laws and governments to protect public safety (from hazards such as violence, unsafe driving, unsafe building design, fire, communicable disease, environmental toxicity, etc.), to enforce property rights over what people actually own , to provide essential services such as water, sewer, police, firefighting, and education, and to look after the interests of those who can't get their needs met in the market. T…

K so I'll buy the houses surrounding yours and build some huge barbwire walls, then on the outside of the walls I'll just paint them with horrific images, just gross stuff that anybody would find disgusting to look at. You spent 1.5mm on that house, and now because it's surrounded with these walls the property value is cut to basically nothing. House appraised as worthless, financial ruin for you. But hey fuck you ri…

You're asserting an entitlement to control property you which is literally titled to not-you. You don't get to call other people entitled. Good day.

Re: Bills before the California Legislature would crack down on NIMBYs

#277

Post by closeparen »

muninn_ wrote: post #253
closeparen wrote: post #249

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We move in anyway. We cram into existing bedrooms, increasing the number of incomes needed to afford a single unit. We mega-commute, taking up resources like train seats and roadway space for ridiculous lengths of time, consuming energy and releasing pollutants along the way. We crowd out parking, particularly when the room for us is far from transit and walkable areas. People we displace become desperate, which has…

> Because how the fuck can your view, the uncrowdedness of your street, be worth more than everyone else's pursuit of happiness? You're ruining their pursuit of happiness. They want to live in an uncrowded neighborhood that was how it was when they bought their home. If you don't like the home prices then don't live there. It's quite simple. I choose not to live there when I could because I believe the prices are too…

So we can impose unlimited costs on others to keep things the way they were in the mid 20th century?

Great! I pay ~$1500/mo extra to protect the uncrowdedness of Berkeley. You'll pay $1500/mo to restore the Rust Belt to economic greatness?

Re: Bills before the California Legislature would crack down on NIMBYs

#278

Post by deathanatos »

muninn_ wrote: post #235
Zach_the_Lizard wrote: post #181

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Houses are for sale, of course, but suppose I passed a law requiring all new houses to be mansions. I'm talking palace of Versailles level amenities, out of reach for all but the most wealthy. It's true that anyone is legally allowed to live here. It's also true I've excluded, by legal fiat, almost all Americans. I've declared my lifestyle superior to all others and no one else can live here except those who enjoy th…

Again, why shouldn't the be allowed to do that? I want to live on Harvard/MITs campus and live next to the smartest people in the world (at least some of them) and have a nice little 3 br house on a half acre. These high home prices keep me out it's not fair!! This simply cannot work. The most desirable areas in the world are going to have high prices that exclude "normal people" period. > Houses are for sale, of cou…

If everyone adopted this attitude, there'd be nowhere to live. All of the reasons you enumerate are people wanting to live in an area that makes it valuable for them; I think there's a fair number of people in the Bay Area that don't really care to live here particularly, but this is where the tech industry has decided to concentrate a ridiculous amount of its jobs. Job markets in other metropolises like Boston are a tenth the size of the Bay Area's. Not only is moving across a continent incredibly non-trivial, but finding a job at the other end is as well. And that's for populous areas like Boston or NYC where the land is cheaper, but not by much; you move to somewhere actually cheap and the job prospects are just simply not there. California also has better employment laws than other places. Not everyone here is here because we want to be "next to the Louvre": some of us just want to make a living.

Re: Bills before the California Legislature would crack down on NIMBYs

#279

Post by rplst8 »

CuriouslyC wrote: post #197
rplst8 wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> That unearned rise in the property value should be taxed away. That is so wrongheaded I don't know where to start. Increasing property taxes is the exact reason you have older folks be forced out of their homes after having lived there most of their life. No one should have a continuously growing tax burden over time.

Why should society subsidize someone using a piece of land, when another potential tenant will pay taxes on its true value? The government has to fund itself, so a reduction in property taxes means increases in other taxes. If the replacement taxes apply to everyone equally, that means wealth is effectively being transferred from average people (who are likely in debt with little savings) to people who completely own…

> Why should society subsidize someone using a piece of land, when another potential tenant will pay taxes on its true value?

Subsidize? I think your concept of private property rights is under developed.

Re: Bills before the California Legislature would crack down on NIMBYs

#280

Post by [deleted] »

asveikau wrote: post #234
azernik wrote: post #128

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They really are. At least in California. One of many ways in which local government here is fucked up.

More like a common gripe for people who don't understand the role of government or the fungibility of money. My first political season spent in California I was shocked at how in the discourse some people used the phrase "general fund" as shorthand for political wrongdoing without any further elaboration. Ok, they pool the money, so what? If they spend the money for something else, we the people are still receiving g…

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