I hope you're right on permitting reform. We really
really need the new transmission.
Would be stoked to hear you interview some of the people with familiarity there. (One of them, Jesse Jenkins, has really been doing the rounds recently lol)
Recently I took a look at the last few YIMBY-supported bills that passed in California since 2020 and I was struck by how few Republican votes they had. It's good that this one is different, but given Trump's comments about taking away suburbs and Tucker Carlson's rants I was worried that the pro-development stance was becoming less popular among conservatives even as it became more so among liberals.
Mr. Barro, I just spent six dollars so I could post a reply to this piece. I am going to confine my comments to your intro paragraphs on UC Berkeley and SB 886. First where we agree:
1) About Gov Newsom. The kindest thing I've ever said about him is that he is a "loathsome narcissist."
2) I think CEQA has outlived its usefulness.
3) The Berkeley campus should have built housing at the People's Park site long ago. At the time of the original protests, the serious anti-war leaders thought People's Park was a cynical attempt to keep the protest movement going. See the great (but hard to find) documentary film, "Berkeley in the '60s." However, the issues you discuss also involve another site, a current parking garage on the north side of campus.
Here's where we disagree:
1) I despise Sen. Scott Wiener even more than Newsom.
2) As the CalMatters link you posted points out (did you read it?), "Is CEQA the bogeyman it’s made out to be? Opponents of this bill point to research showing that only 2% of housing development projects face CEQA lawsuits."
3) SB 886 doesn't do what you think it does. It's complicated. You could have read the final senate floor bill analysis, available here:
4) You don't understand how voting works in the California Assembly and Senate. Bills are only passed if a majority of the body vote yes. There are 40 members in the state senate. It takes 21 votes to pass a bill. SB 886 passed with 33 votes, far more than needed, but the vote was not 33-1, it was 33-7. That's because legislators often vote NVR (no vote recorded). But when it comes to passing a bill, an NVR functions the same way as a no vote. The seven senators who voted against SB 886 are an interesting mix. The one senator who voted no was John Laird (D-Santa Cruz) who previously served as a local govt. official as well as a member of the State Assembly. He's a good guy, thoughtful and moderate, and has been out of the closet for years, at least since he was a founding member of the Santa Cruz AIDS Project. You might want to show him a little more respect.
Now as for your opinions on the University of California, an institution I have been involved with, either as a student or staff member, since about 1990. This is a big, messy complicated organization, and when it comes to UC, you don't have the slightest f**king idea what you are talking about. Jesus, where to start?
First of all, let's just state that town/gown problems are nothing new. Often they stem from the problem that universities are exempt from local taxes. Also, most state legislatures, including California's, started underfunding enrollment growth back in the '90s. At UC, the state stopped subsidizing capital projects, including building new dormitories, about a decade later. Essential reading here: https://www.berkeleyside.org/2022/05/08/uc-berkeley-student-housing-building
Building anything on campus now, including research buildings and dorms, is really difficult. The campuses have to scrounge for the money to back the bonds to build. Yet at the same time, the legislature keeps insisting campuses agree to enrollment growth. This leaves new students (at least after their first year) with no good place to live. And so they spill out into the community, raising rents and displacing low-income tenants (often tenants of color). The irony here that the Berkeley sites in question are off-campus, but owned by UC. Meanwhile, on campus, for earthquake safely and aesthetic reasons, the neo-brutalist Evans Hall is being torn down to be replaced, not with campus housing, but with open space.
The narrow legal issue was that UC Berkeley had a long run development plan (LRDP) that required an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) and included student enrollment plans. When the campus blew through those goals, a neighborhood group sued under CEQA. Some campus attorneys dropped the ball and didn't file necessary papers on time. A judge then ruled in favor of the neighborhood group and blocked UC Berkeley's large enrollment increases. Campuses administrators should have been paying attention, but instead they were "shocked, shocked" and used the suddenly disenrolled students as hostages. I talked with some staffers I know who just rolled their eyes at the senior administration's incompetence and cynicism.
Enter Sen. Scott Wiener, an attention-grubbing, real-estate-industry bootlicking bag of sleaze. He promoted SB 886 as some sort of solution to these problems, but by the time the bill passed through committees in the Senate, then the Assembly and back to the Senate for reconciliation and a floor vote, it was a different beast.
But apparently all this is over the heads of journalists like you. You could have done a modicum of homework, but you didn't.
Thank you for your six dollars! One thing I often say to people who ask about the business model here is that nobody pays to hate-read, but it’s nice to occasionally be proved wrong about that. You are right that I mixed up the lawsuits and we've revised the second paragraph to fix that. The bill did pass 37-1 as revised by the Assembly; the 33-1 vote was on an earlier version of the bill.
Thank you for the corrections. The 33-1-6 vote was on the bill that passed the Senate and then was handed off to the Assembly. The 37-1-2 vote was on the final concurrence bill after it has returned from the Assembly. It's interesting to note that only two senators stuck to their guns. Laird (D-Santa Cruz) voted no both times, while Limon (D-Goleta) voted NVR both times. Another coastal UC campus, UC Santa Barbara, is in Limon's district and she may share Laird's concerns about excessive campus enrollment growth. The campus is not located in tony Santa Barbara, but down the road in Isla Vista, where rowdy and destructive student behavior (and one mass shooting) has been a problem for years. The other item to note is that Kamlager (D-Los Angeles) switched from yes to NVR. Her district does contain the USC campus, and borders on Westwood (where UCLA is located), but I'm not sure what motivated her switch.
You see Mr Barro, It's not that Michael Barnes opposes all housing it's just that this particular housing is bad because of some complicated process issue.
This is not what I said. I clearly stated that I think the People's Park site should have already been housing. I disagree with the community group plaintiffs on that one. The other site, now a parking lot on the north side of campus, is designated for graduate student and faculty housing. I don't have any objections to that one, either. It should also be pointed out that UC Berkeley has been talking out long-term leases on newly constructed private apartment buildings in Berkeley, essentially turned them into dormitories. The city and the campus have reached an agreement that the campus will longer do that. I suspect that's because group quarters (dormitories, prisons, etc) generally cannot be counted as housing under the state's Regional Housing Needs Assessment (RHNA) goals. You can hear the plantiffs' arguments here:
As I stated in my original commentary, I am not a fan of the way the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) is abused. IMHO, It was well intended, but has outlived its usefulness. Many people would disagree with me. CEQA survives mostly because powerful labor unions in Sacramento (the state capital) use threats of CEQA lawsuits to enforce PLAs (project labor agreements). The state doesn't enforce CEQA, it leaves it up to private attorneys to sue under the law. This arrangement is not unique. The state of California also requires cities to move to district-based elections for city councils is there is "voter dilution" of minority representation. But the state leaves it up to private attorneys to sue cities to force them to move to district elections. At federal level the Americans with Disabilities Act is also enforced by lawsuits by private attorneys.
You can find the final bill analysis which states near the beginning:
Assembly Amendments require the project be consistent with the most recent long
range development plan (LRDP) or master plan environmental impact report (EIR)
and any applicable tiered environmental analysis, as specified; require an
independent third-party to evaluate if the project results in net additional emission
of greenhouse gases, instead of the California Air Resources Board; prohibit a
certificate of occupancy be issued unless the lead agency receives certification of
LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) platinum and determines
that the construction impacts have been fully mitigated; and limit the exemption to
projects with 2,000 units or less or 4,000 beds or less.
Like many bills, this one was modified as it passed through various State Senate and Assembly committees. There is a tab in the link above that allows you to compare the various changes made along the way.
I’m an environmentalist who gets paid good money to work on EISs and I desperately hope that you’re right about this. Our current “environmental” laws are a terrible fit for our actual environmental problems.
I hope you're right on permitting reform. We really
really need the new transmission.
Would be stoked to hear you interview some of the people with familiarity there. (One of them, Jesse Jenkins, has really been doing the rounds recently lol)
Recently I took a look at the last few YIMBY-supported bills that passed in California since 2020 and I was struck by how few Republican votes they had. It's good that this one is different, but given Trump's comments about taking away suburbs and Tucker Carlson's rants I was worried that the pro-development stance was becoming less popular among conservatives even as it became more so among liberals.
Mr. Barro, I just spent six dollars so I could post a reply to this piece. I am going to confine my comments to your intro paragraphs on UC Berkeley and SB 886. First where we agree:
1) About Gov Newsom. The kindest thing I've ever said about him is that he is a "loathsome narcissist."
2) I think CEQA has outlived its usefulness.
3) The Berkeley campus should have built housing at the People's Park site long ago. At the time of the original protests, the serious anti-war leaders thought People's Park was a cynical attempt to keep the protest movement going. See the great (but hard to find) documentary film, "Berkeley in the '60s." However, the issues you discuss also involve another site, a current parking garage on the north side of campus.
Here's where we disagree:
1) I despise Sen. Scott Wiener even more than Newsom.
2) As the CalMatters link you posted points out (did you read it?), "Is CEQA the bogeyman it’s made out to be? Opponents of this bill point to research showing that only 2% of housing development projects face CEQA lawsuits."
3) SB 886 doesn't do what you think it does. It's complicated. You could have read the final senate floor bill analysis, available here:
https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billAnalysisClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220SB886
4) You don't understand how voting works in the California Assembly and Senate. Bills are only passed if a majority of the body vote yes. There are 40 members in the state senate. It takes 21 votes to pass a bill. SB 886 passed with 33 votes, far more than needed, but the vote was not 33-1, it was 33-7. That's because legislators often vote NVR (no vote recorded). But when it comes to passing a bill, an NVR functions the same way as a no vote. The seven senators who voted against SB 886 are an interesting mix. The one senator who voted no was John Laird (D-Santa Cruz) who previously served as a local govt. official as well as a member of the State Assembly. He's a good guy, thoughtful and moderate, and has been out of the closet for years, at least since he was a founding member of the Santa Cruz AIDS Project. You might want to show him a little more respect.
Now as for your opinions on the University of California, an institution I have been involved with, either as a student or staff member, since about 1990. This is a big, messy complicated organization, and when it comes to UC, you don't have the slightest f**king idea what you are talking about. Jesus, where to start?
First of all, let's just state that town/gown problems are nothing new. Often they stem from the problem that universities are exempt from local taxes. Also, most state legislatures, including California's, started underfunding enrollment growth back in the '90s. At UC, the state stopped subsidizing capital projects, including building new dormitories, about a decade later. Essential reading here: https://www.berkeleyside.org/2022/05/08/uc-berkeley-student-housing-building
Building anything on campus now, including research buildings and dorms, is really difficult. The campuses have to scrounge for the money to back the bonds to build. Yet at the same time, the legislature keeps insisting campuses agree to enrollment growth. This leaves new students (at least after their first year) with no good place to live. And so they spill out into the community, raising rents and displacing low-income tenants (often tenants of color). The irony here that the Berkeley sites in question are off-campus, but owned by UC. Meanwhile, on campus, for earthquake safely and aesthetic reasons, the neo-brutalist Evans Hall is being torn down to be replaced, not with campus housing, but with open space.
The narrow legal issue was that UC Berkeley had a long run development plan (LRDP) that required an Environmental Impact Report (EIR) and included student enrollment plans. When the campus blew through those goals, a neighborhood group sued under CEQA. Some campus attorneys dropped the ball and didn't file necessary papers on time. A judge then ruled in favor of the neighborhood group and blocked UC Berkeley's large enrollment increases. Campuses administrators should have been paying attention, but instead they were "shocked, shocked" and used the suddenly disenrolled students as hostages. I talked with some staffers I know who just rolled their eyes at the senior administration's incompetence and cynicism.
Enter Sen. Scott Wiener, an attention-grubbing, real-estate-industry bootlicking bag of sleaze. He promoted SB 886 as some sort of solution to these problems, but by the time the bill passed through committees in the Senate, then the Assembly and back to the Senate for reconciliation and a floor vote, it was a different beast.
But apparently all this is over the heads of journalists like you. You could have done a modicum of homework, but you didn't.
Michael Barnes
Thank you for your six dollars! One thing I often say to people who ask about the business model here is that nobody pays to hate-read, but it’s nice to occasionally be proved wrong about that. You are right that I mixed up the lawsuits and we've revised the second paragraph to fix that. The bill did pass 37-1 as revised by the Assembly; the 33-1 vote was on an earlier version of the bill.
Thank you for the corrections. The 33-1-6 vote was on the bill that passed the Senate and then was handed off to the Assembly. The 37-1-2 vote was on the final concurrence bill after it has returned from the Assembly. It's interesting to note that only two senators stuck to their guns. Laird (D-Santa Cruz) voted no both times, while Limon (D-Goleta) voted NVR both times. Another coastal UC campus, UC Santa Barbara, is in Limon's district and she may share Laird's concerns about excessive campus enrollment growth. The campus is not located in tony Santa Barbara, but down the road in Isla Vista, where rowdy and destructive student behavior (and one mass shooting) has been a problem for years. The other item to note is that Kamlager (D-Los Angeles) switched from yes to NVR. Her district does contain the USC campus, and borders on Westwood (where UCLA is located), but I'm not sure what motivated her switch.
You see Mr Barro, It's not that Michael Barnes opposes all housing it's just that this particular housing is bad because of some complicated process issue.
This is not what I said. I clearly stated that I think the People's Park site should have already been housing. I disagree with the community group plaintiffs on that one. The other site, now a parking lot on the north side of campus, is designated for graduate student and faculty housing. I don't have any objections to that one, either. It should also be pointed out that UC Berkeley has been talking out long-term leases on newly constructed private apartment buildings in Berkeley, essentially turned them into dormitories. The city and the campus have reached an agreement that the campus will longer do that. I suspect that's because group quarters (dormitories, prisons, etc) generally cannot be counted as housing under the state's Regional Housing Needs Assessment (RHNA) goals. You can hear the plantiffs' arguments here:
https://calmatters.org/housing/2022/03/california-housing-crisis-college-podcast/
Counterpoint, Scott Wiener is good and does good things.
Why should a random Berkeley resident be even able to sue under ceqa to block dense housing? It doesn’t make any sense as a regulation.
As I stated in my original commentary, I am not a fan of the way the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) is abused. IMHO, It was well intended, but has outlived its usefulness. Many people would disagree with me. CEQA survives mostly because powerful labor unions in Sacramento (the state capital) use threats of CEQA lawsuits to enforce PLAs (project labor agreements). The state doesn't enforce CEQA, it leaves it up to private attorneys to sue under the law. This arrangement is not unique. The state of California also requires cities to move to district-based elections for city councils is there is "voter dilution" of minority representation. But the state leaves it up to private attorneys to sue cities to force them to move to district elections. At federal level the Americans with Disabilities Act is also enforced by lawsuits by private attorneys.
Also what exactly is different about sb 886 than the original proposal?
If yous go to the link I mentioned:
https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billVersionsCompareClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220SB886
You can find the final bill analysis which states near the beginning:
Assembly Amendments require the project be consistent with the most recent long
range development plan (LRDP) or master plan environmental impact report (EIR)
and any applicable tiered environmental analysis, as specified; require an
independent third-party to evaluate if the project results in net additional emission
of greenhouse gases, instead of the California Air Resources Board; prohibit a
certificate of occupancy be issued unless the lead agency receives certification of
LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) platinum and determines
that the construction impacts have been fully mitigated; and limit the exemption to
projects with 2,000 units or less or 4,000 beds or less.
Like many bills, this one was modified as it passed through various State Senate and Assembly committees. There is a tab in the link above that allows you to compare the various changes made along the way.
these all seem fine? I can't seem to understand your objection sorry
I’m an environmentalist who gets paid good money to work on EISs and I desperately hope that you’re right about this. Our current “environmental” laws are a terrible fit for our actual environmental problems.