Is more urban sprawl the solution to California’s housing crisis?

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Is more urban sprawl the solution to California’s housing crisis? Chapman fellow says yes, others say no

In a state where vacant homes and apartments are scarce and where rents and house prices are out of control, state leaders and experts have proposed a host of solutions. Build more homes, build them in higher-density developments and build them in existing cities and suburbs, closer to jobs, buses and commuter rail line. (Jeff Gritchen, Orange County Register)

By JEFF COLLINS | JeffCollins@scng.com | Orange County Register
PUBLISHED: May 3, 2017 at 12:01 am | UPDATED: May 3, 2017 at 8:27 am


In a state where vacant homes and apartments are scarce and where rents and house prices are out of control, state leaders and experts have proposed a host of solutions.

Build more homes, build them in higher-density developments and build them in existing cities and suburbs, closer to jobs and transit to reduce pollution and congestion, they say.

On Tuesday, however, a Chapman University fellow offered a more traditional solution: urban sprawl.

Rather than limit new construction to apartments and condos in “infill” development, California needs to build more houses, using vacant land in interior communities like the Inland Empire and the Central Valley, said Joel Kotkin, Chapman’s RC Hobbs Presidential Fellow in urban futures and co-author of a new report on millennials’ housing needs.

Kotkin was a guest speaker Tuesday at a California Association of Realtors forum in Sacramento streamed over FaceBook.

“Millennials contemplate unaffordable housing that could compel them to leave California,” said the report, “Fading Promise: Millennial Prospects in the Golden State.”

“Nothing,” the report states, “could improve housing affordability than to restore the competitive market for land by permitting greenfield development.”

For decades, California homebuilding has failed to keep up with growth, resulting in some of the highest rents and home prices in the nation. The problem is worse for millennials — people aged 20 to 36, Kotkin’s report said.

While homeownership rates for California baby boomers are close to the national average, only one in four Californians aged 25 to 34 own a home, the third-worst homeownership rate among states, the report said.

But converting vacant land into housing runs contrary to the prevailing view.

A recent UC Berkeley report that denser, “infill” residential housing near jobs and public transit would allow California to meet its housing needs and emission-reduction goals. The study’s authors issued a response to Kotkin saying he ignores other costs of urban sprawl.

“Encouraging more sprawl will only result in more driving, higher transportation costs, and increased pollution,” the statement said. “We need housing solutions that take into account all costs – not just the full cost of living for a resident but the full cost to our environment and to our state’s mandated greenhouse gas reduction targets.”

A 2015 study sponsored by the nonprofit California Housing Partnership found that locating affordable housing in close proximity to jobs and services causes a significant decrease in pollution as people switch to walking, bicycling or taking public transportation.

“I don’t see how you can solve the housing crisis by sprawling unless you decide that climate change is not important,” Matt Schwartz, the California Housing Partnership’s president and chief executive, said in response to Kotkin’s report.

But Kotkin argued that such an approach won’t work because millennials don’t want to live in expensive apartments in high-density environments.

“What we’re seeing is an attempt to re-engineer Southern California into something that it’s not,” Kotkin said in an interview before Tuesday’s presentation. “High-density housing is not a substitute for building houses. The vast majority of people … want a house.”

Kotkin maintains high-density construction costs as much as 7.5 times more than the cost of building houses. Few places in the nation, and certainly not Southern California, have New York-type amenities and transit to make high-density living desirable, he said.

Congestion can be reduced by moving jobs inland, closer to where new housing is developed or by allowing people to work from home. To increase supply in existing communities, “redundant” retail space should be redeveloped into small-lot houses or townhomes, he said. Prefab construction techniques also could help keep housing costs down.

Authors of the Berkeley study disputed Kotkin’s claim that millennials want houses, saying recent surveys show they want to live in walkable, mixed-use communities and in neighborhoods where they don’t have to use a car often. Millennials, the authors said, were split almost evenly between single-family vs. multi-family preference.

Meanwhile, new data released Monday shows that California inched closer to meeting housing goals, but still is falling short.

The state had a net increase of 88,562 housing units last year, 41,155 of them in Orange, Los Angeles, Riverside and San Bernardino counties, the state Department of Finance reported. While the statewide total is up 31 percent from 2015, it’s still less than half the 180,000 new housing units state housing officials say California needs annually to keep up with population growth.

Suburban Sprawl Myths

Suburban Garden in unregulated Houston,TX "sprawl"

 

Urban Growth Means Lower Taxes -- and Other Myths

by Donella H. Meadows

We need to bring in business to bring down taxes. This development will give us jobs. Environmental protection will hurt the economy. Growth is good for us.

If we've heard those arguments once, we've heard them a thousand times, stated with utmost certainty and without the slightest evidence. That's because there is no evidence. Or rather, there is plenty of evidence, most of which disproves these deeply held pro-growth beliefs.

Here is a short summary of some of the evidence. For more, see Eben Fodor's new book "Better, Not Bigger," which lists and debunks the following "Twelve Big Myths of Growth."

Myth 1: Growth provides needed tax revenues. Check out the tax rates of cities larger than yours. There are a few exceptions but the general rule is: the larger the city, the higher the taxes. That's because development requires water, sewage treatment, road maintenance, police and fire protection, garbage pickup -- a host of public services. Almost never do the new taxes cover the new costs. Fodor says, "the bottom line on urban growth is that it rarely pays its own way."

Myth 2: We have to grow to provide jobs. But there's no guarantee that new jobs will go to local folks. In fact they rarely do. If you compare the 25 fastest growing cities in the U.S. to the 25 slowest growing, you find no significant difference in unemployment rates. Says Fodor: "Creating more local jobs ends up attracting more people, who require more jobs."

Myth 3: We must stimulate and subsidize business growth to have good jobs. A "good business climate" is one with little regulation, low business taxes, and various public subsidies to business. A study of areas with good and bad business climates (as ranked by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce and the business press) showed that states with the best business ratings actually have lower growth in per capita incomes than those with the worst. Fodor: "This surprising outcome may be due to the emphasis placed by good-business-climate states on investing resources in businesses rather  rather than directly in people."  [ Editor's note: I disagree with this statement. Obviously, creating more opportunity will create greater income for the local economy]

Myth 4: If we try to limit growth, housing prices will shoot up. Sounds logical, but it isn't so. A 1992 study of 14 California cities, half with strong growth controls, half with none, showed no difference in average housing prices. Some of the cities with strong growth controls had the most affordable housing, because they had active low-cost housing programs. Fodor says the important factor in housing affordability is not so much house cost as income level, so development that provides mainly low-paying retail jobs makes housing unaffordable.

Myth 5: Environmental protection hurts the economy. According to a Bank of America study the economies of states with high environmental standards grew consistently faster than those with weak regulations. The Institute of Southern Studies ranked all states according to 20 indicators of economic prosperity (gold) and environmental health (green) and found that they rise and fall together. Vermont ranked 3rd on the gold scale and first on the green, while Louisiana ranked 50th on both.

Myth 6: Growth is inevitable. There are constitutional limits to the ability of any community to put walls around itself. But dozens of municipalities have capped their population size or rate of growth by legal regulations based on real environmental limits and the real costs of growth to the community.

Myth 7: If you don't like growth, you're a NIMBY (Not In My Backyard) or an ANTI (against everything) or a gangplank-puller (right after you get aboard). These accusations are meant more to shut people up than to examine their real motives. Says Fodor, "A NIMBY is more likely to be someone who cares enough about the future of his or her community to get out and protect it."

Myth 8: Most people don't support environmental protection. Polls and surveys have disproved this belief for decades; Fodor cites examples from Oregon, Los Angeles, Colorado, and the U.S. as a whole. The fraction of respondents who say environmental quality is more important than further economic growth almost always tops 70 percent.

Myth 9: We have to grow or die. This statement is tossed around lightly and often, but if you hold it still and look at it, you wonder what it means. Fodor points out, quoting several economic studies, that many kinds of growth cost more than the benefits they bring. So the more growth, the poorer we get. That kind of growth will kill us.

Myth 10: Vacant land is just going to waste. Studies from all over show that open land pays far more -- often twice as much -- in property taxes than it costs in services. Cows don't put their kids in school; trees don't put potholes in the roads. Open land absorbs floods, recharges aquifers, cleans the air, harbors wildlife, and measurably increases the value of property nearby. We should pay it for to be there.

Myth 11: Beauty is no basis for policy. One of the saddest things about municipal meetings is their tendency to trivialize people who complain that a proposed development will be ugly. Dollars are not necessarily more real or important than beauty. In fact beauty can translate directly into dollars. For starters, undeveloped surroundings can add $100,000 to the price of a home.

Myth 12: Environmentalists are just another special interest. A developer who will directly profit from a project is a special interest. A citizen with no financial stake is fighting for the public interest, the long term, the good of the whole community.

Maybe one reason these myths are proclaimed so often and loudly is that they are so obviously doubtful. The only reason to keep repeating something over and over is to keep others from thinking about it. You don't have to keep telling people that the sun rises in the east.

There are reasons why some of us want others of us to believe the myths of urban growth.

Donella H. Meadows is director of the Sustainability Institute and an adjunct professor of environmental studies at Dartmouth College.

[Editor's Note:  I'll add another myth:  Suburbs are wasteful and unsustainable.  Many suburban homes, especially in Marin, maintain organic gardens, harvest rainwater, have low-water plantings and come with their very own greenscape  buffer to recapture carbon for the atmosphere.  The illusion that Smart Growth developers, planners and politicians want you to believe is that stacking people together is better for the environment.  This is actually opposite of the truth.  High density housing creates high density urban problems, and pollution.]

The Death of St Vincents Plans circa 2002

St. Vincent's Chapel in Marinwood/Lucas Valley St. Vincents Plans Could Be On Hold

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By Richard Halstead Recent developments could spell double trouble for Shapell Industries' controversial plan to develop the 836-acre site owned by the St. Vincent's School for Boys between Highway 101 and San Pablo Bay. At the request of San Rafael Mayor Al Boro, San Rafael is re-evaluating its support for annexation of the county land. Without the services that annexation to San Rafael would provide, the project cannot be built. At the same time, representatives of four key environmental groups - the Marin Conservation League, the local chapter of the Sierra Club, the Marin Audubon Society, and Citizen Advocates for Preservation of St. Vincent's/Silveira - are meeting with county supervisors behind the scenes, urging them to take a more prominent role in determining the property's fate. Shapell's proposal calls for construction of a 766-unit residential subdivision and 124,000 square feet of commercial and retail space. Critics worry that the project would aggravate the county's traffic woes, while proponents stress it would supply crucial housing. Boro said recent developments, such as Susan Adams' upset election to the Board of Supervisors, have called into question whether or not the Marin Local Agency Formation Commission would approve annexation, even if San Rafael approves the project. "I'm getting the very strong impression that it's not annexed to the city yet, and it may never be," Boro said. "I don't want to waste a lot of time and effort." Acting with the support of the San Rafael City Council, Boro has directed San Rafael's city manager, community development director and city attorney to prepare a report outlining the city's options. City Manager Rod Gould said he expects to present the report sometime next month, perhaps in a special meeting. Following Adams' dramatic upset victory, local environmentalists signaled they would make the future of the St. Vincent's property an issue in the elections of three San Rafael City Council members next year. The terms of Boro and Councilmen Paul Cohen and Gary Phillips expire next November. Boro said his decision to re-evaluate had nothing to do with politics. The mayor's surprising move elicited a variety of reactions from local officials. "I don't know what it means yet; I think he wanted to get something on the table so we could talk about it," said Cohen, who lost last month's run-off election to Adams. During the campaign Adams opposed the Shapell proposal while Cohen said he would wait for the completion of an environmental report before taking a position on the plan. "I don't know if we'll change our position or whether we'll just simply accept the report," said San Rafael Councilwoman Barbara Heller. "But I think it is prudent to get all the information you can." Supervisor Steve Kinsey, however, believes the development proposal is headed to the deep freeze for a long period of hibernation. "I think San Rafael is coming to the realization that it will be expensive and ultimately unsuccessful in being able to meet the very legitimate goals it has for workforce housing, baylands protection and support for the School for Boys," Kinsey said, "and as such is on the verge of walking away from the project, which means it will probably lie dormant for as least as long as it takes to get free-flowing traffic on Highway 101."  "I'm very excited about this turn of events," said Adams, who begins her term next month. "I believe the planning of these properties reverting to the county jurisdiction would more fully represent what voters in the district would like to see happen." Practically speaking, however, Kinsey said that if the project went to the county now it would face a "certain and swift demise," because the property's current zoning prohibits such development there. Until now, San Rafael has taken the lead because the St. Vincent's land is within its sphere of influence. If the county assumes that role, it could place the on-going updating of the Countywide Plan at center stage. "It will put us in the position of needing to pay a lot more attention to what the site could be," Kinsey said. San Rafael's deliberations have resulted in yet another delay in approving a contract to perform a costly environmental impact report on Shapell's proposal. The council was scheduled to review the contract on Dec. 16 - after previous dates in October and November were postponed. No new date has been set for considering the contract, Gould said. Shapell vice president Tom Koch said Friday that he had not been notified of the new developments. Koch said there has been no change in Shapell's desire to move ahead with the project. "None at all," Koch said. "It has always been clear to us that dealing with the hyperbole and political rhetoric - that is easy to promulgate and difficult to counteract - would be a major challenge. But we're certainly prepared to move forward." If San Rafael does reverse course on the development proposal, it could render academic the recent efforts of local environmental groups to lobby supervisors. "I think in effect that San Rafael is on the verge of beating the environmentalists to the punch," Kinsey said. "Instead of them saying, 'County take it back' San Rafael is saying, 'County here it is.'" "I don't really know what it means," said Marge Macris, who serves on the executive committee of the Sierra Club's Marin group. She was a member of a contingent that met with Supervisor Annette Rose last week. "At this point, it is just a very general request," Macris said. "We would like for the board to look at what their options are regarding the St. Vincent's project." She acknowledged the 1998 memorandum of understanding between the county and San Rafael, which designated San Rafael as the lead agency for processing development applications related to the site. "Our position is the county ought to take another look at that," Macris said. "The land is of countywide importance and therefore the whole county should have an interest in doing the planning." Rose said, "I honestly don't know if it is possible for the county to reconsider its position that San Rafael is the lead agency here. But we will investigate that." See Related Stories: Does Supervisor Adams still care about Marinwood-Lucas Valley? St Vincents Then and Now