Santa Cruz is a Housing Nightmare

Post by michaelwww » Tue, Sep 27, 2022, 7:10 PM UTC

rcpt wrote: post #23

michaelwww wrote: post #16

Santa Cruz native here: I can understand the author's frustrations coming to Santa Cruz from the outside but there's more to it. He's describing a UCSC problem because the university is expanding without building enough dormitories and relying on development in the city instead. This is causing unrest among the natives who resent 5 story huge San Jose style apartment blocks going up in their beautiful city. The secon…

> very environmentally conscious no-growth city > growth would ruin the city So I take it you'll be doing your part and packing your bags?

Post by millimeterman » Tue, Sep 27, 2022, 7:13 PM UTC

uup wrote: post #26

There really is a lot of truth in Mark Twain's old adage: "Buy land, they're not making it anymore." I think there is a certain amount of delusion in expecting any static resource to meet monotonically increasing amounts of demand.

Post by newaccount2021 » Tue, Sep 27, 2022, 7:13 PM UTC

michaelwww wrote: post #16

Santa Cruz native here: I can understand the author's frustrations coming to Santa Cruz from the outside but there's more to it. He's describing a UCSC problem because the university is expanding without building enough dormitories and relying on development in the city instead. This is causing unrest among the natives who resent 5 story huge San Jose style apartment blocks going up in their beautiful city. The secon…

Post by seahorserocker » Tue, Sep 27, 2022, 7:14 PM UTC

michaelwww wrote: post #34

paxys wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"We like our city as it is and don't want it to grow." Soon followed by "We can't afford to live in our city because rich people are outbidding us for the very limited housing." Same story as everywhere else. You make your bed, you sleep in it. And this part is hilarious but telling: > Homeless is a problem but Santa Cruz tries to handle it a progressive way, for example, by setting up the homeless camp next to the c…

> Setting up slum cities is now the standard of progressiveness in America The alternative was to continue to let people live in the surrounding forests while shooting up heroin with dirty needles, trashing the woods and causing lengthy service calls for police and ambulance. This way they are all in one spot and are serviced by clean needle program, etc... What's your solution?

Post by boringg » Tue, Sep 27, 2022, 7:17 PM UTC

joe_the_user wrote: post #17

boringg wrote: post #5

The thing I read in there that was disappointing was the administration response. However it is a state school so I imagine they don't have the same funding for development of housing on site / not to mention they are located between the SC mountains / protected forest and the ocean. It's a small area without much development space and that land is at a premium. Feel for the students though.

For a long time now, the UC system's spirit has been "hey, our total lack of concern about our students' well-being is feature, not a bug. If you graduate here, you've shown you're a survivor (or that you have money to soften the blows)". I felt that ethos at UC Berkeley forty years ago. And sure, if UC solved the housing problem for their students, it might solve things for non-students, which might reduce house val…