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Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

darrellowens.substack.com

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Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#421

Post by zbrozek »

oreoftw wrote: post #359
arcticbull wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is America, land of the free, home of the property rights. It's a weird imposition to say that I can't build exactly what I want on my property (assuming it's safe). It's a totally fair thing to say that if you want full control over what can be built adjacent to your house buy a ranch in Montana . Don't want a skyscraper in downtown SF? Buy the plot. Can't afford it? Sorry, you're getting neighbors. You shouldn…

What’s wrong with the alternative of sane zoning instead of “just buy the plot”? All people want is to live in a quiet and a nice place after all. Why someone who doesn’t even live there but has a bigger buck should decide?

If you don't own stock in a company, you don't vote in its governance decisions.

If you don't own a car, you don't determine when to wash it.

If you don't own a property, you totally still get to determine what to do with it by being a whiny neighbor. Why is this OK?

I'm very-much onboard with the "put up or shut up" model of zoning. If you want the place to be empty, you should own it and keep it empty.

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#422

Post by maxsilver »

gumby wrote: post #107

This is a great article about great news (except for the first sentence calling it "A little known law" -- it's been quite contentious). Palo Alto has fought these rules and I'm glad they will be enforced. When I first moved to Palo Alto in the early 80s it had a very progressive climate: a couple of SRO buildings, lower average income than some of the neighboring towns, a lot of social support programs, and decidedl…

> With no constraints on construction will there be a small boom in new development, tearing down virgin forest in order to make empty developments?

Probably? I live in Michigan, which (with the exception of two spots) has no meaningful limits on construction. Even the cities that technically have-and-enforce zoning, waive all the rules constantly anytime a developer asks.

And yes -- it means developers can build almost anything they want, almost anywhere they want. (Truly anything, I live next to a 15-story concrete castle apartment building that a developer built on what was once a trailer park).

Unfortunately, it does not mean you get lower cost of housing (prices here are still astronomical, and while they look cheaper in comparison to California, is only because of the severely reduced income locals make -- prices are still at record-all-time highs)

But it does mean, developers routinely cut down entire forests or farmland for new suburbs anytime they'd like. If you want a house made of sticks and cardboard, we have loads and loads of them for 'just' $450k. Years worth of 'inventory' here.

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#423

Post by raldi »

cinericius wrote: post #388
raldi wrote: post #327

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you were to stop 100 people on the street and ask if they'd heard of the law, how many do you think it would be?

You could refer to Java as a "little known programming language" and use this as a defence.

I would wager money that members of the general public are at least five times as likely to have heard of the Java programming language as the Housing Accountability Act.

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#424

Post by outworlder »

xyzelement wrote: post #361

I am not an expert in California but I don't love this concept in general. Here in New York, the Governor is attempting to drive higher housing density in certain places regardless of what the local people think and want. I think this is a sort of obvious effort at a form of gerrymandering - if the assumption is that the residents of higher-density dwellings are more likely to vote Democrat on average vs the current…

> regardless of what the local people think and want.

NIMBY has caused so many issues that I'm not sure the people who already live in a place should have this much power. They bought the land their property sits on and nothing else.

> if the assumption is that the residents of higher-density dwellings are more likely to vote Democrat on average vs the current home owners

Citation needed.

> There are obvious concerns being raised about - traffic

You know the great thing about higher density areas? You can have effective public transportation. Low density zoning connected by highways is the main driving force for traffic.

> ability of utilities to handle the extra density

It's much cheaper to do that versus low density.

> school capacity

Might require more schools. Or larger schools since one can serve more people. Certainly easier to do than having many schools spread across a large area.

> not to mention wishes of those (like me) who explicitly chose a suburban lifestyle for our family

You should book a trip with your family and visit an european country, with their walkable cities. And then come back and let us know if a suburb – which you can only reach via car and people are mostly inside their houses because there's nothing to do outside – is really preferable to a city where you can actually walk around (and, for kids, actually socialize)

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#425

Post by robertlagrant »

nemo44x wrote: post #181
jedberg wrote: post #127

There is a developer in Cupertino who has been fighting with the city for years, who got awfully quiet lately. Now I know why. I suspect they have a plan for an absolutely massive high rise behind my house that they will be submitting at 8am tomorrow morning. My neighbors are going to be pissed .

Yes, people here celebrating this don't understand at all that all this does is give developers more power over communities they have no interest in but money. And of course, the politicians that they will fund/bribe to make this happen. We just went from democracy to oligarchy in this case.

> give developers more power over communities they have no interest in but money

They make something that people would like. Calling that "power" is extremely unhelpful.

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#426

Post by kevinburke »

robertlagrant wrote: post #400
kevinburke wrote: post #387

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People are looking for any scapegoat for the problems in their community so they don't have to look in the mirror. This is the same reason why there's a persistent myth that homeless are bused in from other states or whatever (when in reality, 70-90% of them were in homes in San Francisco before going on the street). It absolves people of blame

> 70-90% of them were in homes in San Francisco before going on the street Do you have a citation for that? I could do with a decent source.

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/06/us/homeless-population.ht...

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#427

Post by jldugger »

jedberg wrote: post #127

There is a developer in Cupertino who has been fighting with the city for years, who got awfully quiet lately. Now I know why. I suspect they have a plan for an absolutely massive high rise behind my house that they will be submitting at 8am tomorrow morning. My neighbors are going to be pissed .

Interest rates are super high right now, so you might get some reprieve in the short term. They'll probably slow play Vallco until rates come down, doing just enough to keep their zoning exemption?

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#428

Post by hemloc_io »

xyzelement wrote: post #361

I am not an expert in California but I don't love this concept in general. Here in New York, the Governor is attempting to drive higher housing density in certain places regardless of what the local people think and want. I think this is a sort of obvious effort at a form of gerrymandering - if the assumption is that the residents of higher-density dwellings are more likely to vote Democrat on average vs the current…

The deadlock in the bay area is much worse than than NYC, not sure about new york state. E.g. NYC has a maximum amount of time you're allowed to argue about some new development, the bay area doesn't.

Generally speaking in the Northeast there's way more inbuilt density so this is less of an issue imo.

Things are so spread out over here that trains literally don't exist.

Re: Builder's Remedy goes into effect in many California cities tomorrow

#430

Post by CydeWeys »

RangerScience wrote: post #383
gumby wrote: post #107

This is a great article about great news (except for the first sentence calling it "A little known law" -- it's been quite contentious). Palo Alto has fought these rules and I'm glad they will be enforced. When I first moved to Palo Alto in the early 80s it had a very progressive climate: a couple of SRO buildings, lower average income than some of the neighboring towns, a lot of social support programs, and decidedl…

The article doesn’t mention it, but it’s my understanding that this auto-approval only happens within a certain distance of public transit as well. I know that’s been a part of prior laws by Wiener, but I could totes be wrong that it’s a part of this one as well. The developers still have to abide by construction laws - safety, and I think environmental impact. All that’s released (AFAIK?) is the zoning-based “no” fr…

> The article doesn’t mention it, but it’s my understanding that this auto-approval only happens within a certain distance of public transit as well.

That article doesn't mention it because that's not correct. It's not tied to transit.

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