California housing policy divides state demi

From Ben ChristopherCalmness

This story was originally published by CalmattersS Register about their ballots.

One of the most controversial housing bills of the year has lived to be voted on another day, but only by the survival of the legislative equivalent of two vacations at the rear prison.

Last week, the Senate Bill 79, a Bill of San Francisco Democratic Senator Scott Wiener, to strengthen the apartment and commercial construction around major public transport centers, adopted the Senate Housing Committee over The President’s tense objectionSenator Aisha Wahab, a colleague Democrat from Fremont.

It was a remarkable development in itself. Committee chairmen tend to make their way to the bills passing through their committees. When the bigger part of the commission members decide to press legislative decor and tradition and to be ignited by the chairman of this committee, this is often considered as a sign that the dominant Democrats in California are unusually divided by a given issue; that the problem is particularly controversial; that legislators either do not receive clear guidance from the legislative management or are ready to ignore this council; Or some combination of everything above.

Quickly forward to this week and that happened again.

In the Senate of the Local Self -Government Committee, Senator Maria Elena Durazo, a Democrat from Los Angeles, called on a vote on Wiener’s bill.

She didn’t make her way. The bill was supported by all other Democrats in the Commission. Durazo voted no with the two Republicans.

The chairman who “winds” is an unusual performance in Sacramento. In the typically mysterious and perfect production of the legislature, this part of the human drama pops up once or twice a year. In order to happen twice in a row for the same bill, it is without an obvious precedent.

Extra Unique is how Chris Michelli, a longtime lobbyist of California and a public commentator on the legislative process, described the situation. “Beyond the particular bill that can indicate that there is a philosophical split in a cause.”

Until now, Senate President Mike McGuire, Democrat from Santa Rosa, declined to comment publicly where he was at the division within his Caucot, whether the two presidents were talking about him, and whether he plans to intervene to smooth things.

For some defenders, the silence of McGuire is deafening.

“The Assembly seems to recognize the urgency of this moment, and governor Newsom has regularly signed with great enthusiasm even the most difficult home bills to reach his desk, but the Senate seems more isolated than the rest of California in the home, John’s Judho, President of the Board of the Board Wunderman, President of the Bay District Council, which has been sponsored in recent years, “Jim Wunderman, President of the Bay District Council, who sponsored SB 79 wrote to McGuire late last weekS “As a” one of ours, “a member of the cause of the Bay area and President Pro Tem of the Senate, we feel forced to write to you to share our in -depth concern that the progress we need in homes can eventually stop in the Senate.”

McGuire’s service did not respond to a request for an interview before publishing this story.

After the cause, Wiener downplayed the idea that there were irreparable divisions within the cause.

“You have two chairs that have only different perspectives and this is normal and, you know, I appreciate that we were able to go through this process very respectfully,” he said. “We are all grown up.”

As for McGuire: “I will weigh when I have to weigh,” Vinner said.

McGuire is called by the legislature in the next year, the expiry date that can limit its influence.

Increasingly, the public philosophical cleavage within the democratic Caucut was obvious in both hearing commissions. Wiener is a fruitful legislator of housing whose views are aligned with the broader movement “yes in my backyard”, which sees the crisis of accessibility of homes in California as a product of a common shortage of housing. For this group that includes Robert Rivas Mounting spokesman And the chairman of the Buffy Wix budget, which facilitates the construction of more homes more cheaper, fast and dense, is the North Star policy. Wicks said so much to a recent legislative hearing.

“” I am like a trick pony, “she said during a debate about Rental Control Bill throughout the CountryS “We need to facilitate the construction of more homes in California, and that was really my only focus since I was here.”

Wahab and Durazo are a different faction of the Democratic Party. They both emphasize that they are not against the new housing construction and that they share the view that the state is facing a severe shortage of housing. But they are more shy -sized to private development, which tends to be a by -product of the proposed legislation of the movement of the Iimbi and believe in state legislation, which encourages him to come with conditions.

The Wiener bill will allow residential developers to build towers for apartments, apartments and mixed use on or near a train, metro and light railway stations, ferry terminals and at the intersection of highly used bus lines, no matter what the local zoning or construction rules determine. This will also remove barriers to transit agencies who want to do the same on their own land.

“If we leave decisions about what to build on the developers of market rates that do not have a broader public interest in our mind, this is the wrong way,” Durazo said. “As long as I want to help members continue their legislation, sometimes bills contradict our basic values ​​and changes will not cope with it.”

“We are aligned with the bigger part of the problems,” Wiener said in response. “In this, unfortunately, we are deeply not aligned and I do not believe that the construction of more dwellings near public transport, the home of each variety, is contrary to our basic values.”

The bill does not require private developers to separate a share of low -income units. Last week Wahab called the lack of an explicit requirement for homes at affordable pricesdear deal“For the housing industry. Some homes and anti -generation activists at affordable prices have proven to be that expanding private development opportunities will come to the expense of affordable housing opportunities and turbo displacement.

Most of the studies that have considered the issue found that new homes at market rates decrease neighborhood Rents and has a tendency toward Shift pressure.

Wiener stressed that apartments and apartments are inherently more accessible than the homes of a family and that the bill would not prevent other state and local accessibility requirements to which developers can be subjected to. In the hearing of the Committee, Wiener today said it “examined the possibility” to include a minimal accessibility requirement.

The bill also opposes many local authorities and neighborhood groups that resent the usurpation of the state of their authorities for the use of land and opponents of dense development. The Ditto State Council for Construction and Construction Transactions, an umbrella group representing many united construction workers who regularly oppose home bills with no strict labor standards and some defenders of environmental justice.

Another Winner Bill, Senate Bill 607that would facilitate urban multi -family housing projects to avoid an environmental review – a A priority of many assembly Democrats – Also survived, despite Durazo’s vote.

Both bills are now planned to go to the Senate Budget Committee.

This latest legislative Kerfuffle can be a sign of upcoming things. This year, the Democrats of the Assembly presented a huge package of home bills aimed at accelerating development. Although some are mirror technically, others can encourage the same dem of Dem with a demo that burst over Wiener’s account.

“(SB 79) can foretell strict sleds for some of the assembly bills,” Micheli said.

This article was Originally Published on CalMatters and was reissued under Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Noderivatives License.