California's "ABAG Ghettos"

     Much of what you hear about California's leading edge environmental legislation deals with the impact of the new-in-2013 "cap and trade" levies on manufacturing and utilities, the refusal to exploit the Monterrey shale and off shore oil and gas deposits, the rush toward electric cars and solar power, and the relation to fleeing employers. This posting will deal with the emerging picture of what it will do to people living in the San Francisco Bay Area.

A brief background:

   - The nine counties of the Bay Area (which include San Francisco, San Jose, Oakland, and about 100 smaller municipalities) have two primary regional planning agencies with professional bureaucracies and Boards of Directors comprised primarily of locally elected officials.

        -- The Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG) which serves as the primary conduit for federal and state housing money; and

        -- The Metropolitan Transportation Commission (MTC), which collects the tolls from seven bridges, recently purchased a $180 million office building in San Francisco, and also serves as the primary conduit for federal and state transportation money.   

    - California Assembly Bill 32, passed in 2006 and signed by Governor Schwarzenegger mandated the reduction of greenhouse gases to 1990 levels by 2020 and the initiation of a "cap and trade" structure which ratchets down the availability of permits while ratcheting up their price. (Schwarzenegger also set an objective of reducing these emissions to 80% below 1990 levels by 2050.) A ballot initiative to delay implementation of AB 32 was defeated 62% to 38% in 2010. The people want to be the global leaders on "climate change" - at least in the abstract.   

    - Senate Bill 375 in 2008 mandated integrated planning for land use, housing, transportation, and "social equity" in 18 state regions to implement AB32. Regional planning moved from a peripheral role to center stage with enforcement leverage.   

The ABAG/MTC Plan

    - The ABAG/MTC plan, Plan Bay Area,  which has been under development for the past two years envisions a population increase by 2020 from the current 7 million residents to some 9 million by 2040; no development outside of current "habitation zones" (currently about 5 % of the land area); and Preferred Development Areas (PDAs) where the predominant development would take place.

    - The guiding vision of the plan is "stack and pack" apartment development with a density of 25 to 50 units per acre along an expanded bus and rail structure with relocation of some 35% of the residents currenly living in the PDAs. Virtually no money will be spent on highway construction and there will be virtually no construction of single family homes.  In the interest of social justice, many smaller communities will be required to accept similar developments.

    - Underlying assumptions include the premise that people will want to live in dense, heavily urbanized settings, the recent downward trend in use of mass transit will be reversed, and people will not commute from counties adjacent to the Bay Area in order to live in single family homes in more traditional suburban settings. There is no recognition that federal automobile mileage and emission standards mandate virtual achievement of the greenhouse gas standards required by AB32 without any social engineering.       

 The implications:

    - Housing costs in the Bay Area are currently among the highest in the country. If no single family housing is built, the American dream will be priced out of reach of millions of new residents, the great majority of whom will be Latinos.

    - Highways, already among the most congested in the country, will become impassable.

    - Zoning decisions will be transferred from local governments to the regional planners. Local governments will be subjected to developer lawsuits if they do not comply with the plans of ABAG.

The status:

    -  Despite a series of meetings in the planning community there has been little press coverage and few Bay Area residents are aware of the plan which is expected to receive approval at an ABAG meeting on July 18. In California where there are ballot initiatives on everything from preschool funding to use of plastic bags there will be no vote of the people.  

    - A disparate coalition of local property rights advocates, libertarians, and advocates for the lower income impacted groups has been protesting with little affect on the decision makers. The Republican Party, which has limited local influence, is providing the only organized political opposition.

    - Advocates include ideological environmentalists and a network of planners, companies receiving mass transit and housing development funding, and allied unions - the core of the Democratic coalition. Promises are made for hundreds of millions of dollars in funding for "affordable housing" - which neither the US Congress nor the California governor seems willing to commit.  

    -  In the near term there will probably be a lawsuit or two on the basis that ABAG's analysis of the environmental impact is faulty and the constitutional rights of property owners are being violated. Over the next few years the voters will exact their revenge on the locally elected officials who have sold out their communities for the ABAG vision of mass transit ghettos.      

    Like many meetings where the public is allowed to speak, some of the most stirring testimony has come from recent immigrants, particularly a few from the former Soviet Union who came to America to escape the arbitrary central planning bureaucracy of the communist commisars only to be met by the ABAG Board of Directors.   

                                                -----

    This week's video is Vladimir Putin's response to President Obama's proposal to reduce nuclear arsenals. Nyet!!! He is still giving lots of speeches, but none of the world's leaders seem to be listening.  

bill bowen - 6/21/2013

 

Comments

[bill McCormick]

CONGRATULATIONS to Bill Bowen on his new position as Secretary at SF GOP!

[bill McCormick]

GDP revised down again to 1.8% for the first quarter. Of biggest concern to those of us trying to run companies is the revised Business investment index at .4% indicating that companies are barely investing in growth at all. Now the FED is trotting out their members to try and convince the markets that it is misinterpreting their Chairman's message. Kind of like closing the barn door after the horse is out. Markets rarely wait for data instead they speculate on where the data is going. So now the FED announcement has led to a nearly 40% increase in mortgage rates. Whatever housing recovery there is will likely get a short term surge out of fear of higher rates followed by another slowdown due to them. 30 Year rate is now 4.4%. Apartment anyone? Meanwhile the banks are increasing their foreclosures trying to get rid of the assets at higher prices.

[bill McCormick]

Ecuador,Cuba,Venzuela,China and Russia all want our NSA leaker. I suppose North Korea,Iran and Syria would probably welcome him as well.China sent him to Russia who claims he is staying at the Moscow Airport. The IRS was used to harrass political rivals. An American business leader is held hostage in China. Keystone pipeline is on hold. Coal is under attack. 30% of Chinese real estate buyer's in NYC are late with their payments. 9% of NY city's real estate purchases are from Brazil's wealthy while 12% of Miami's real estate purchases are from Brazil. 20 Million American's are unemployed. China is now in the business of subsidizing their weakening banking system after building hundreds of houses and office buildings remaining empty. Analysts cannot understand why the money has not moved from Bonds to stocks, ignoring the fact that bond money found the real estate market instead driving prices crazy while the population continues to move into apartments and rented properties. Healthcare costs continue to increase for small businesses. And, the President is still talking about more taxes, more infrastructure and more regulation on American energy producers. All the while claiming he is making us the greatest oik producer in the world. All is well on the home front.

[Al B.]

Pelosiland is providing an example of social planning that much of the country is following with interest. Those believing in government management and manipulation of the economy for the "greater good" are mesmerized by the social engineering. On the other hand, many other states are actively recruiting the soon to be ex-pat businesses of the Bay area. Maybe the Planners for the Bay area should be recruited from universities other than those advocated central govt economic planning? South Carolina is happy to provide refuge for those from California who question the wisdom of PC govt economic policy.