An event was held on November 13, 2019, in a fairly large auditorium at Berkeley City College, with the somewhat glib title of “How to Save the World with Local Politics.” That the hall was less than half full may be sign that most people think it is too late. Or it may be that those losing their world knew something these attendees didn’t know. Whatever the case, it raised the question, “which world?”
The event sported a panel of four speakers, who presented in three different directions. One spoke about greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and the carbon footprint of the Bay Area. He used a map strangely and counter-intuitively reminiscent of the one about recent fire danger. A second spoke about the difficulties faced by people trying to rent housing in this area. She didn’t ask why no one from among the homeless communities of Berkeley had been invited to be a panelist. A third gave a brief outline of housing economics, and why it was appropriate to advocate building more market rate rental units. And the fourth kind of filled in gaps in the other three. She had a big job.
Two of the speakers were elected officials, one from the state Senate, and the other from the state Assembly. In an election year (even one with a candidate glut), one would have expected heavy hitters like that to be a greater draw. But neither had changed the world yet, nor gotten us back on track to stop global warming (the real name of our future). Two organizations, “South Berkeley Now,” and “North Berkeley Now,” were listed as sponsors. But the real sponsor, the power behind the panel, was the Berkeley Democratic Club, which ran the panel as an in-house affair. Questions were only taken on 3x5 cards and filtered by the MC before being handed to a speaker for response. Thus, it was a purely informational gathering.
Here’s their housing program in a nutshell (I won’t tell you what kind of nut it is:
The reason there is a housing crisis is not because there are runaway rent increases or on-going displacement of people who can’t afford housing anymore. It is because there is a housing shortage. No substantial housing had been built for 40 years in Berkeley. Admittedly, rent gouging and displacement have been problems, but a new bill passed in Sacramento that places a cap on rent increases, and tightens the rules against eviction should (belatedly) resolve those problems. Therefore, building more units (both market rate and affordable) becomes a viable program.
But this is old news. Pro-developer organizations, many pretending to represent neighborhoods, have been saying the same thing for years. And having their way, to the point where there is already a glut of market rate housing in Berkeley. We see “For Rent” and “Now Leasing” signs on new apartment buildings all over town. Yet people are still having to leave their homes because they are getting priced out of the area.
Left unquestioned was the assumption that rent-increase caps could be a substitute for repealing the Costa-Hawkins Act. That is the act that gives landlords arbitrary control over rents. It is the act that has allowed rent-gouging to proceed unchecked for decades now. Which is a major reason there is no affordable housing being built.
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