By Kate Callen / June 4, 2025
San Diegans who feel the strain of overdevelopment in older neighborhoods won’t recognize the halcyon city in Wesley Morgan’s May 31 Times of San Diego commentary, “Opinion: Privileged Homeowners Like Me Shouldn’t Resist New Housing.”
Morgan, treasurer of YIMBY Democrats of San Diego, describes how he and his wife bought a Mission Hills home 11 years ago where they “raised our daughters surrounded by great schools, walkable streets, and reliable city services.”
Over time, Morgan writes, “it became painfully clear how few others had that chance and how little our neighborhoods were doing to welcome others.”
The rest is a story of virtue and meanness. Virtuous people like Morgan want to see a lot of new housing bring a lot of new residents into their flourishing communities. Mean people want to keep new residents out because they are selfish and they hate strangers.
Morgan’s essay reads like a fairy tale because it is. Let’s look closely at some of his assertions and see how they square with reality.
“If our communities have the parks, schools, libraries, and transit that make them great, why should only a shrinking group of homeowners get access to them?”
Community infrastructure in San Diego isn’t “great.” It is a crumbling mess.
Our sidewalks are cracked. Our streets are rutted. Our parks and libraries are eroding from growing demand and poor maintenance. Our transit system is anything but reliable. Transit commuters typically take two buses and over an hour to get to work.
As for the “shrinking group of homeowners”: Fewer young people today can buy homes as the Morgan family did because properties that once were affordable are being snapped up by speculators and corporate builders.
“The proposed supportive housing at the former Mission Hills Library, H-Barracks, and Hope @ Vine were rejected.”
Weren’t those projects intended to house the homeless? Why do YIMBYs insist that the affordable housing crisis and the homelessness crisis have the same solution? The first is governed by the market (which, of course, produces market-rate housing). The second can only be addressed through multi-faceted public-private enterprise. (Note: H Barracks is moving forward,)
“Parking is tight. Infrastructure feels stretched. But these are solvable problems when we allow growth in the right places.”
How exactly are these problems solvable? We can’t create more curb space. We don’t have the money to maintain infrastructure. If we “allow more growth in the right places,” we add more residents with more cars clogging surface streets and polluting neighborhood air. And then these “solvable” problems will become even more “unsolvable.” (Question: Where precisely are “the right places”?)
“This isn’t about blame. It’s about fairness and about choosing a better future. … Welcoming new neighbors doesn’t mean losing what we love.”
This is really about the democratic process that we love and the need to hold elected officials accountable to their constituents.
The true villains in the story of predatory development aren’t the YIMBYs (who belittle anyone who disagrees with them) or the builders (who are increasingly national conglomerates). The true villains are the politicians who serve monied interests instead of the public interest.
We have a request for Mr. Morgan. If you haven’t seen it yet, take a look at the “winners” of the OB Rag’s “Worst ADU in San Diego” contest. Then tell us if you would like to live next to any of them. Those monstrosities represent the ugly reality that neighborhoods across San Diego are fighting – and will keep fighting.
That is a great op ed I hadn’t seen. He makes a lot of great points that are compelling. I’m glad to be educated and shift my view. A bit more housing here and there is beneficial for all.
I think Wesley Morgan opinion piece has “hit the mark”. Otherwise Kate Callen wouldn’t have felt the need to write her own opinion piece full of personal rancor expressed in shrill tones. Wesley Morgan should feel very satisfied.
Kate Callen says:
May 23, 2025 at 4:38 pm
When people respond to my posts with personal rancor expressed in shrill tones, I feel a sense of satisfaction, because it means I hit the mark.
Karen, I honestly am flattered. Writers don’t expect people to remember what we’ve written an hour after they’ve read it. And here you are citing a comment I posted two weeks ago. I would rather someone respond sharply as you have than shrug and say “Meh.” It’s good for us to connect even if we don’t agree — and maybe _because_ we don’t agree. So thank you for writing.
I thought I’d address a couple points here:
If our community infrastructure is “a mess”, you know what would improve it? Having the cost of maintenance spread across more taxpayers. One city block in SD is about 300x600ft or about 4 acres. That’s 32 1/8 acre lots for single family homes or take the “Denizen”, a 151 unit complex covering just 1/2 an acre just built in Hillcrest. Let’s put 4 of those in 2 acres and reserve the rest for a 2 acre park. Now you have 600 units of taxpayers maintaining the same road, water, and sewer infrastructure vs 32. It’s also way more cost effective to have a bus stop servicing these 600 units than one servicing just 32. A big win for those watching our dollars!
“Why do YIMBYs insist that the affordable housing crisis and the homelessness crisis have the same solution?” – because those two problems are the same problem. Supply more housing, costs go down, restrict housing while demand rises, costs go up. When more housing is built, particularly while increasing density, the value of one unit of land can still increase while the value of one housing unit decreases. Raising the tax-base of the city while lowering costs for it’s citizens.
Parking being an issue is a negative feedback loop. The more you prioritize parking the more land you need for roads, parking lots, gas stations, etc. this in turn moves homes further away from trips like the grocery store, work, the dentist, etc. by building dense, walkable neighborhoods folks can have the freedom to choose not to have to drive to get to their desired destination.
In the end, the point is that cities and neighborhoods are not meant to be fossilized in amber once built. They are meant to grow and change with the people and community who live there. As for city finances, the number one most valuable asset the city has is it’s land and by maximizing land use a city can function better for all its citizens. I highly encourage you to read and learn about “Strong Towns” for guidance on how cities can efficiently use resources to minimize the tax burden on citizens and maximize what we get out of our local government.
Nice try.
However these ADU apartment buildings are exempt from DIF fees that would otherwise fund those infrastructure improvements. This is one thing the “NIMBYs” are trying to address where allowed by state law.
These ADU apartments aren’t building pocket parks next to them. That’s something you only get from planned communities. We have these things called community plans that lay that out. The bonus ADU law is the precise opposite of planning… “how much can we cram into this residential lot without any consideration for the surrounding community?”
Let’s talk about bus stops… Thee bus stops that density is being built around are imaginary and may never be built. Imaginary bus-stops don’t serve anyone. Again, something else “NIMBYs” want to change. Build the density around transit that actually exists.