McMansions>Fourplexes?

It's not enough to be not-NIMBY. Be YIMBY.

More thoughts on housing

A couple of weeks ago Episode 49 of The Op-Ed Page podcast featured two of my local heroes who are working on preventing families from becoming homelessin the first place. The cost is lower than providing services to that family should it become homeless. (And isn’t that always the way? Preventive healthcare is lower cost than treating disease too.)

The housing crisis in my area if a big complex issue, I know, but it seems clearly problematic that more than 90% of the housing in a city of 1 million people is zoned for single family housing. In neighborhoods that have a legacy, even if decades old, of redlining and racist covenants in deeds no less. On my block alone there is more than one house that is home to a second and third generation living in it…so preventing one generation from acquiring home ownership has an exclusionary follow-on effect.

There is currently an initiative being explored for San Jose called Opportunity Housing. The idea is that it will “up-zone” single family zoned neighborhoods so that duplexes, triplexes and even potentially fourplexes can be built on a lot that currently holds one single family home. This is on top of the city already making it easier to put an ADU (accessory dwelling unit) in your backyard and convert your garage into an apartment too

All of these options are being explored because we have a housing crisis. Both inventory and affordability. And countless people who serve the city can’t live in the city.

Predictably there are many many cries of NIMBY by folks who are already lucky enough to own their single family home in this city. (A city with extremely high property values.) And one of the most insidious coded points of opposition is that such multi-family dwellings will “change the character” of the neighborhood.

Here’s the thing: My neighborhood has been around for almost a century; there are many adorable Victorians and bungalows and Eichlers and other houses from different eras. The front of my house dates back to 1937 and is charming as can be.

You know what’s changing the character of the neighborhood? McMansions. Every house that gets sold ends up getting torn down and replaced with massive, generic houses that take up entire lots, look down into the houses and yards of their neighbors, and generally do. not. fit. The last one I went and looked at when it had an open house had four, count ‘em four, ensuite bedrooms (in other words all the bedrooms had their own en suite bathroom). We theorized that it was going to be sold to an engineer at a nearby tech company and that they’d rent out at least a couple of the rooms to other engineers and have a sweet nerdy pad.

So I keep saying to people who fret over the “character of the neighborhood” when it comes to the very idea of xx-plexes that if they’re bothered by the xx-plex, but not the McMansion, they might want to sit and think about what they’ve done. Sounds more like they’re more worried about the cast of characters moving in.

Last week, I attended a Zoom evening presented by CatalyzeSV (video) featuring city planning representatives from Sacramento, Portland, and Minneapolis about what happened when they passed similar measures as the one being considered here. And what happened was not much like the doomsday scenario-ing being done by NIMBY folks. It’s still complex to build. It’s still expensive to build. There are still permits to be gotten and other guidelines from the city to follow. And people still have the right to decide what to do with their properties. And many choose to retain a single family home.

It’s a slow evolution. And neighborhoods evolve. The people complaining about the “character” of their neighborhood being degraded don’t seem concerned by McMansions, and they probably aren’t concerned about gentrification of other neighborhoods either.

So, I’ve been following the issue. I‘ve been reading about it and attended Zooms and asked my local electeds their thoughts, and I’m decided: I’m more than not-NIMBY.

I’m YIMBY.

Is this going on where you are? And what do you think?

Last week-ish

Last week’s episode of The Op-Ed Page podcast featured some whinging about why I’ve been feeling a malaise the last few weeks…yes, I’ve hit that #oneyearwall. I can’t be the only one, right? Anyone?

I also spend some time talking about conversations I observed in the last couple of weeks that seem really unevolved because they start with the assumption that the status quo is good, “normal,” baseline…and everything else is considered in the context of that status quo. I don’t use this example in the episode, but it reminds me of all the male politicians who have some kind of awakening about sexism because they have daughters. Like. Come on. You shouldn’t require daughters to know sexism=bad.

I’d like to propose we start requiring folks to justify why the status quo is good, normal or baseline at all. Let’s default to knowing that every system or institutional structure in this country could use updating and improving…unless someone can prove, can show the data, to prove otherwise.

As the trial of Derek Chauvin, the disgraced police officer who killed George Floyd gets underway, as Republican legislatures across the country try to pass literally hundreds of laws to take voting rights backwards, as the cost of higher education has risen at an astronomically higher rate than the potential increased earnings a degree from that institution would garner its graduates, as the media hammers President Biden for not holding a press conference soon enough and then proceeds not to ask a SINGLE QUESTION about the state of the COVD pandemic and our efforts to push back on its twin health and economic catastrophes, as all of this goes down around us, as all of these institutions fail us, let’s prove what needs to stay, not what needs to go.

Last week I also recorded an interview with my friend Jenee Darden from KALW, one of San Francisco’s public radio stations, and I contributed to KALW’s Sights and Sounds series, which Jenee hosts. Now my interview and my Sights and Sounds recommendations won’t go live for another month or so, but if you’re not already familiar with the series, it’s all about talking to local artists and creators about what’s going on in the Bay Area that they’re looking forward to being an audience for…all COVID-friendly of course. Check it out.

Coming this week-ish

This week I’m recording an interview for Episode 51 of the podcast with Charlie Grosso, founder of Hello Future. Hello Future aims to transform the experience of refugee youth through education. Delivering continuity of educational development and opportunity even as they live in circumstances many of us have never imagined, let alone experienced. Charlie has an interesting theory, that we have more in common through stories of alienation than we do through stories of belonging. I’m looking forward to exploring how we find that belonging in alientation, oxymoronic as it sounds!

I’m also attending a few interesting events this week, including an event hosted by my representative on our county’s board of supervisors, Susan Ellenberg, on Thursday morning. The guest speaker is Jennifer Carroll Foy, who’s running to become the first Black woman governor in the entire country in Virginia. She will focus on inequitable health outcomes for black moms and babies and will share her own harrowing story of medical complications that, disregarded by the medical establishment following the birth of her twin sons, nearly cost her her life. I’ve heard her speak before, and she’s so impressive. Super affordable, if you want to join…tickets available here.

Leave a comment and let me know your thoughts on all of the above. And as always I appreciate a share of this newsletter or my podcast. 

And if you think I can help you break through the things that are keeping you stuck, you can always set up your first introductory 30-minute consult for free by booking it in my Calendly.

Have a great week-ish!