Council member Koretz: SB-50 is back. Don't be fooled by the amendments.
This post is a reprint from Paul Koretz’s newsletter. To subscribe to CD5’s newsletter, click here.
SB-50 Is Back. Don’t Be Fooled By The Amendments
In April, the Los Angeles City Council voted unanimously to support Councilmember Koretz’s Resolution to oppose SB 50 and that position will stand throughout 2020. SB 50 is an attempt for the State to override local zoning restrictions to allow for multi-family housing in single family residential neighborhoods. The City of San Francisco also voted to oppose the bill. Then the bill was stalled in the State Senate.
Now the bill is back and Senator Scott Weiner, the bill’s author, has been on a publicity campaign pleading that new amendments should assuage all of its opponents’ apprehensions. But don’t be fooled. The amendments don’t actually address any of the original concerns except for a time extension to give cities a bit more time to comply. Moreover, the Senate President has pulled the bill from the Appropriations Committee and into the Rules Committee allowing for a vote on the Senate Floor as early as Tuesday, right after the MLK holiday, so there is little time to call your legislators.
Many are calling SB 50 a development version of “trickle down economics” because, even though the bill is being marketed by its supporters as a solution for more affordable housing, most analysis shows that while there would be a sharp increase in multifamily building, the vast majority of the new units would have to be offered at luxury rates. Therefore, it would actually drive up rents of nearby buildings, in turn driving middle class families out of the neighborhoods where they currently live, work and play.
Click here to watch Councilmember’s entire speech delivered ahead of City Council’s unanimous vote that supported his Resolution to Oppose SB 50. The transcript of that speech follows:.
“First, I should point out that this is not an affordable housing bill. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. SB 50 is really just a handout for developers. SB 50 takes away all of our power over zoning. It’s based on trickle-down economics in housing. For those of you who don’t remember, trickle-down economics was originally articulated during the Reagan Administration. The idea was that if you gave huge tax breaks to the ultra-rich, that would eventually trickle-down to the rest of us. Of course, that didn’t work, and Donald Trump is trying the exact same thing and having the exact same result.
“This is trickle-down in housing: you build incredibly dense housing in places where it doesn’t belong and allow 85-foot-tall and 5-story buildings in single-family neighborhoods, with the goal of destroying those neighborhoods — as the author Scott Wiener has articulated, where he said, ‘I believe single-family housing is immoral’ and tree-lined neighborhoods and back yards, as he’s described it. This also would destroy HPOZs [historic preservation districts] and not take HPOZs into account. We’ve spent years and years and years historically preserving homes in these HPOZs and then we will be demo-ing the homes in these neighborhoods and putting up 5-story buildings.
“There is no sign that building luxury housing, even in large numbers, will reduce rents. In fact, studies have shown in all likelihood the opposite is true. Certainly, in my neighborhood, where I’m seeing it anecdotally, where we’re building new luxury housing and the rents in the surrounding apartment buildings go up because those are ‘the comps,’ as realtors will tell you. So SB 50 is actually likely to increase the cost of housing.
“Some new studies have shown, as I have said for the last 10 years, if you build a lot of luxury housing all it will do is allow more companies to say, ‘Well, we have the room now in L.A., and move the jobs and move their people and just become a larger and larger city — and not make it any easier for the young people who are supporting this, because they think it will reduce the rents and give them an opportunity. I believe it will do the exact opposite.
“And, in Los Angeles, we already have densified and we already have TOCs [transit-oriented communities] and, I believe, we have 100,000 units approved and not built, already. So, there doesn’t seem to be much of a point, and where we’ve done something that most cities haven’t done, this legislation doesn’t acknowledge that.
Again, I almost don’t know where to start. There are so many arguments. But, I believe, Seattle did a substantial amount of luxury development in one year. And I think they had a year — and they’re a much smaller city than us — where they built 24,000 units. And, if in theory this would have dramatically dropped the rents, then it would have dropped the rents. Twenty-four thousand housing units. I don’t know what the equivalent would be here — (maybe) to build 100,000 in a year? The rent did go down in Seattle. By $2. So, all that building had no impact whatsoever. I’d be surprised if the $2 sustains itself, and I’d be surprised if it doesn’t wind up actually going up.
SB 50 will set a floor of luxury prices rather than a ceiling. This doesn’t do anything for our real problem, which is affordable housing. Even in San Francisco, his (Scott Wiener’s) home area, where I thought he would get support, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors voted 9-2 to oppose SB 50.
So, if he can’t even get any support in his home city, why does he think this would work here? And why would he think we would support it?
The Senate floor vote will happen as early as Tuesday - ACT NOW - STOP SB 50.
Contact your local Senator and Senate President Pro Tempore Toni G. Atkins (San Diego) and tell them to Oppose SB 50 by phone at (916) 651-4039 or by email at senator.atkins@senate.ca.gov.
Senator Ben Allen, (916) 651-4026, Email: senator.allen@senate.ca.gov
Senator Robert Hertzberg, (916) 651-4018, Email: senator.hertzberg@senate.ca.gov
Senator Holly Mitchell, (916) 651-4030, Email: senator.mitchell@senate.ca.gov
Senator Henry Stern, (916) 651-4027, Email: senator.stern@senate.ca.gov