Housing Policy and the Slow death of California
Author: Ryland Chase
Home ownership has long been a staple of the “American Dream” as it offers a stable pathway to financial security for young people and those hoping to start a family. The current housing market in California affords no such opportunities. I grew up in the golden state, and I’ve always viewed it as a bastion of environmentalism and inclusivity — A place where people of all colors and creeds can flourish together in the sunshine. The current affordable housing crisis presents a stark contrast with this idyllic utopia, where all but the wealthy are pushed to the margins of society, and the state is home to an ever-expanding community of unhoused and economically disenfranchised people.
Over the last 50 years a trend has emerged- local governments, homeowner’s associations, and environmental rights groups have used their fiscal and political capital to suppress home building, and in doing so, erected a significant barrier to building an economically and environmentally sustainable future for California. It is driving away jobs and talent, contributing to air pollution, and putting our most vulnerable citizens on the street.
The acronym NIMBY (NOT IN MY BACKYARD) refers to the phenomenon wherein well-meaning citizens’ support for causes wanes when their own interests are threatened. People support renewable energy, until a wind farm is proposed that will encumber their ocean views. People worry over climate change, and then balk when a new highspeed rail will need to run through a local park. For this paper, the NIMBYs of interest are those who espouse all the progressive ideals that California stands for but refuse to support development near their homes. In California, these NIMBYs have placed their own needs above those of their neighbors and the environment and prioritized personal property values over the urgent need for fair and equitable housing. In opposing urban infill, low-income, and multifamily housing, these special interests have pushed development to the margins, depressed housing stock, and created the current housing affordability crisis.
In 2013, PhD candidate Greg Morrow conducted a study on land use and zoning trends in the Los Angeles Metropolitan Region. Morrow’s research draws some troubling conclusions about the relationship between what he calls “bottom up” land use policy and the ability of cities to plan sustainably.
Morrow’s research suggests that by prioritizing the concerns of local homeowners, and land conservationists, local governments placed the interests of a few affluent and politically influential parties over the broader economic and environmental wellbeing of the region. This disproportionate distribution of power has given rise to a phenomenon Morrow calls “planning by least resistance”, wherein communities possessing money, resources, and free time resist necessary development, and the burden of growth falls largely upon communities who are least able to refuse. Because these areas are also less well-off, they are likely poorly positioned to enact policies that encourage environmentally responsible building practices.
During the 1950s and 60s, influence over land use policy was increasingly controlled by local homeowners’ associations, and development shifted towards low-density suburbs and satellite cities. These cities were environmentally problematic and at the same time exacerbated socio-spatial disparities. Eventually modern-day Los Angeles was born. A mosaic of wealthy, low-density, predominantly white communities amongst high density, low income, majority non-white communities. A city dominated by automobile space, offering few opportunities for citizens to choose another mode of transportation. This model, characterized by a bottom-up push for single-family zoning, has not only reduced social equity in California but has increased reliance on resource hungry automobiles, and overlooked alternatives for more sustainable forms of urban planning.
The results have been disastrous for the environment, housing, and human wellbeing.
Last month, Los Angeles, Riverside, Orange, and San Bernardino Counties all earned their 25th consecutive F in air quality from the American Lung Association. They Rank 1, 2, 3, and 4 in terms of U.S. counties with the worst air quality. Transportation remains the largest source of air pollution in Southern California.
How is it possible that as California passes laws to restrict vehicle emissions (leading to the nation’s highest gasoline prices) we also have the worst air quality? It happens because millionaires and billionaires, on sprawling multi-acre Bel Air and Malibu estates, still want people to clean their houses, pour their coffee, shake their martinis, and pick up their dry cleaning, but they don’t want these people to live nearby. They have time and time again, used their significant political and capital resources to push low- and middle-income development to the margins, increasing vehicle miles driven and worsening air quality.
This summer, three million Southern California Children will be faced with the following choice during the peak season for air pollution. Play outside: risking inflamed lungs, asthma attacks, and stunted development — or — stay inside: watch TV, play video games, and scroll social-media. This choice speaks for itself.
I recently had a conversation with an elderly neighbor in my apartment complex that highlights just how different the current housing landscape is from that of earlier generations. My wife is pregnant, and as we passed in the hallway, she remarked on how wonderful it was to finally have some children in the building. Besides us, a family with children recently moved in, and another set of neighbors down the hall recently welcomed a baby daughter. As we chatted, I came to understand that in the thirty odd years she’s lived in her apartment, there had never been any children or babies in the building. This makes sense. Our apartment is fine — for young professionals, or retirees — but it is far too small to raise a family in. The lack of housing, and the supply and demand crisis this creates, has forced people who would normally be living in 2-bedroom starter homes into 1-bedroom apartments. This can’t but have a ripple effect down the ladder, until eventually the most vulnerable have nowhere to go but to the streets.
A recent study of U.S. census bureau data found that the current number of homes with three or more bedrooms owned by people ages 60–78 is at the highest percentage in our nation’s history. 28% of these houses are owned by elderly baby boomers with no children living in the home. In contrast, millennials — the generation currently raising children, own 14% of these homes, the lowest percentage in our nation’s history. Out of touch baby boomers, unaware that their current monopoly on home ownership and wealth is not the product of their own iron clad work ethic, singular ingenuity, and striking good looks, but a combination of good demographic timing and economic luck, are using their wealth to hang onto their homes and ensure that no new homes are built nearby. They then wonder why their kids are struggling and why there are so many homeless people on the streets. Classic NIMBYism.
The result is that California is losing Californian’s. For the first time in its history the state’s population is shrinking. Those leaving are generally young and productive 25–40-year-olds, the necessary energetic engine of any functioning society.
California relies on this vibrant and talented young workforce as a bargaining chip when persuading wealthy multinational companies to bring their high paying jobs to the state despite its high taxes. No longer. The best public higher education system in the world is training hundreds of thousands of intelligent young people each year, only to see them move elsewhere when their education is finished because they cannot afford to live in the state on an entry level income. As young people increasingly chase opportunities elsewhere, companies like Tesla and Hewlett-Packard have set sails for low tax states, taking with them high paying jobs and considerable tax revenue.
My wife and I can serve as an example. She works as a clinical speech pathologist. She has a master’s degree and does inpatient rehab for brain injured patients at Cedars Saini hospital in Beverly Hills. I work part-time as a highway engineer and am my finishing degree in civil engineering. As we project into the future, it is difficult for us to see a path to the life we envision for our family. The numbers just don’t compute. Even at the top end of our prospective career salaries, if the trends of the last half century persist, the odds of us owning a home in costal California will always be marginal at best. I don’t want to be self-aggrandizing, but California needs people like us. We work hard. We provide valuable and scarce services. We love California and all the good things it stands for, but we don’t want to raise a family in an apartment. While I’m glad that my elderly neighbor will finally have some cute cheeks to pinch, there are reasons this building has never been a place that families have chosen to raise their kids.
Recent California legislation provides reason for optimism. Passage of CA SB 9 and SB 10 from the “Building opportunities for all” Senate Housing Package, marks an acknowledgement by state government that the paradigms of the last half century are untenable. They shift towards faster growth by easing zoning restrictions to boost housing availability and affordability and give hope to lifelong Californians like me that the state has not abandoned them. In line with suggestions put forward by Morrow, SB 10 encourages small, low-cost housing development in transit-rich areas, while SB 9, a non-voluntary measure, significantly impacts housing density by allowing property division for up to four homes on single lots, bypassing extensive reviews and mitigating local opposition. Unlike SB 10, SB 9 mandates only ministerial approval, streamlining the process and aligning with Morrow’s research on balancing planning procedure to overcome development delays caused by NIMBYism. Passage of these bills marks a first step in a rebalancing of the scales. Not only do they decrease the power of the privileged and influential to derail local development, but they also ensure that the new housing will be environmentally conscious and economically accessible. Rational Californians need to support these bills and demand more like them because HOA’s and special interests are bound to push back.
The consummate optimist that I am, I feel a shift in the way Californians view housing development is beginning to take hold, one in which we acknowledge our previous development model of “planning by least resistance” as untenable and antithetical to the goal of building an environmentally sustainable, socially equitable, and economically inclusive state. A place where residents acknowledge their own stake in ensuring a diverse and affordable stock of housing for their fellow Californians; where residents like my wife and I are again able to dream of home ownership and the financial stability it affords; where saying “not in my back yard” is seen for what it is, a desperate and ethically indefensible effort to cling to what’s perceived as ours at the expense of our neighbors. If the state can build on this momentum and remain steadfast in the face of inevitable NIMBY misgivings, it can re-emerge as the vibrant progressive cornerstone of American democracy.
References
1. Atkins, Tony G. 2020. Senate Introduces ‘Building Opportunities for All’ Housing Package to Address California’s Ongoing Crisis. ca.senate.gov. https://sd39.senate.ca.gov/news/20201216-senate-introduces-%E2%80%98building-opportunities-all%E2%80%99-housing-package-address-california%E2%80%99s
2. Morrow, G. D. 2013. The Homeowner Revolution: Democracy, Land Use and the Los Angeles Slow-Growth Movement, 1965–1992. UCLA. ProQuest ID: Morrow_ucla_0031D_11873. Merritt ID: ark:/13030/m50k3gnp. Retrieved from https://escholarship.org/uc/item/6k64g20f
3. Briscoe, Tony. “Los Angeles Makes Progress but Earns 25th-Straight F in Air Quality.” Los Angeles Times, April 24, 2024. https://www.latimes.com/environment/story/2024-04-24/los-angeles-makes-progress-but-earns-25th-straight-f-in-air-quality.
