Why encouraging more private development won’t solve the housing crisis
By Michael Friedrich/ The New Republic / March 15, 2024
Sonja Trauss, the charismatic founder of the YIMBY movement, recently spoke at a conference of fellow travelers about the importance of supporting small home builders. “Most neighborhoods are still zoned low-density, and so if you’re seeing new housing, it’s going to be small projects,” she said at Austin’s YIMBYtown 2024, a gathering of people who believe that saying “yes in my backyard” to private development will fix America’s housing crisis.
Trauss bemoaned the onerous regulations, fees, and paperwork—not to mention meddling homeowners—that make it so hard for small firms to build. Her organization, YIMBY Law, sues cities that create barriers to new construction. “What we’re doing, a lot of it is really for the small developers,” she said, quickly adding, “I mean, and the future residents, of course, guys.” The audience laughed.
So the YIMBY story goes: What’s good for the industry is good for the tenant. In recent years, this viewpoint has become enormously influential. Some adherents are unsurprising, like the Koch-backed Mercatus Center and industry titans like Airbnb, both of which funded the conference. But the idea is politically bipartisan. YIMBYtown featured both Julián Castro, President Obama’s secretary of housing and urban development, and Montana Governor Greg Gianforte, a Republican who appeared virtually at the conference to advocate “red-state YIMBYism.” Young, progressive-minded activists are also in on the action, and the conference held panels not just on wonky stuff like minimum lot size and parking reform but also anti-racism and ending homelessness.
The policy that unites YIMBYs—from orthodox free-marketeers to grassroots social housing boosters—is “upzoning,” in which cities reform local land-use policy to allow for more, and bigger, development. This change, YIMBYs argue, drives developers to fill cities with “abundant housing,” spurring competition and putting “downward pressure” on prices. The appeal is obvious: a “one weird trick” to solve the housing crisis—without upsetting the market.
If only it worked. A decade since the YIMBY movement launched, there’s little serious evidence that its policies are the magic supply-increasing bullet that proponents claim, nor that they meaningfully decrease rents for working families. The YIMBY agenda can’t solve the housing crisis. But there are solutions: ones that provide the homes we need without ceding power to the profiteers who rigged the system.
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Great article, everyone should read this one to the end.
Yeah the world is evil, dominated by real estate despots. Hope more housing does not prevent us permanent residents from enjoying our strolls to fine shops and restaurants, exquisite entertainment and of course, the beautiful Pacific Ocean.
This puts an end to the YIMBYs’ claim that they represent the “progressive” side of the housing debate. They don’t and their links to right-wing think-tanks and politicians are becoming more clear.
How many of you know that you or your neighbor(s), can now open a takeout or almost full service sit down restaurant -sorry I mean a Microenterprise Home Kitchen Operation- in your neighborhood house due to California Assembly Bill 626 (AB 626) and the San Diego County Board of Supervisors. According to the State Bill, if a CA county votes to allow restaurants in neighborhoods then all the cities in the county must allow them too. In December 2023, SD County voted to make the MEHKO program permanent.
In July 2023 Governor Newsom signed bill Ab 1325 which greatly expanded the program.
See “ Popular Bill To Expand California’s At-Home Kitchen Business Program becomes Law” Institute for Justice, July 25, 2023 by Don King:
“SACRAMENTO — On Friday, Gov. Gavin Newsom signed AB 1325—a bill that expands California’s Microenterprise Home Kitchen Operations (MEHKO) program—into law. AB 1325, which was sponsored by the Institute for Justice (IJ) and the COOK Alliance, and authored by Assembly Members Marie Waldron and Eduardo Garcia, will open doors and ease arbitrary restrictions for homemade food entrepreneurs.”
According to Wiki, “The Institute for Justice (IJ) is a libertarian non-profit public interest law firm in the United States.”
The Libertarians want to deregulate residential neighborhoods by pushing for laws that ignore zoning laws and then turn neighborhoods into free market commercial zones. The theme of course is “The government can’t tell me what I can and can’t do with my home” Also known as “Economic Liberty”
If you or someone you know wants to turn your residential home, apartment, condo or perhaps your ADU into a neighborhood freindly restaurant
Start here:
https://www.sandiegocounty.gov/content/sdc/deh/fhd/food/homekitchenoperations.html
Please note condo or apartment restaurants might not be allowed because of a HOA or rental agreement. ADU’s who knows? The City will have to answer that question.
In OB, some of us living in a van or a tent would prefer to live in a house or an apartment. But OB currently has housing gridlock, which gives us something to organize around.
Some neighbors of mine in OB put a heavy weight on the expectations of property owners about the built form of our neighborhood, embracing regulatory authority. What about the hopes of non-property owners who live here in OB, some of whom view changes in development as an opportunity for growth?