The Burlingame Voice

State Auditor: Housing "requirement" numbers way off

I talked about how the Regional Housing Needs Allocation numbers (RHNA) will mess up cities in the County two and a half months ago.  Little did I know at the time that the whole process of coming up with these numbers is shoddy at best and perhaps fraudulent at worst.  A state auditor, Michael S. Tilden, has said as much as reported here

The Auditor found problems in the HCD methodology that may have inflated RHNA requirements by hundreds of thousands of housing units. The Auditor concludes that “The Department of Housing and Community Development must improve its processes to ensure that communities can adequately plan for housing.”

In his letter to the Governor and legislative leaders, the Auditor also states, “Overall, our audit determined that HCD does not ensure that its needs assessments are accurate and adequately supported. …This insufficient oversight and lack of support for its considerations risks eroding public confidence that HCD is informing local governments of the appropriate amount of housing they will need.”

Unfortunately, the audit reviewed the RHNA plans from only eight counties, which together contain less than eight percent of California’s population. Due to pending lawsuits the audit did not consider the RHNA plans of the two largest planning organizations, the Southern California Association of Governments (SCAG) and the Association of Bay Area Governments (ABAG). These two regions contain almost two-thirds (65.5 percent) of the state’s population. This omission makes it difficult to grasp the scale of the problems created by HCD’s errors.

ABAG is the one we care about here.  They are the ones jamming big numbers down cities' throats and now we learn that the whole process may overestimate housing needs by 200,000 units.  Who knows, maybe it's even more.  But that hasn't stopped our Attorney General from getting into the act as reported by Tom Elias at the Daily Post on April 28th

Cities, especially B'game, should immediately question their allocations from ABAG.  They should also get a read out on the full Tilden report from city staff before anymore giant projects get the green light.  Getting a read out on the "pending lawsuits" noted above and the wisdom of joining one is action item #3.  And as I said here, it's time for a new attorney general with better priorities and an ability to stay in his or her lane.

RHNA: How state law will mess up the County

The Daily Journal did a good job of summarizing the latest turn of the crank on "Regional Housing Needs Allocations" (Rhna) so let's just reiterate the numbers for future reference:

At the heart of state housing laws is the Regional Housing Needs Allocation, or RHNA, which assigns housing growth to jurisdictions in eight-year cycles. While the law is nothing new, the upcoming cycle’s numbers (the sixth cycle in the law’s history) are larger than ever before and nearly three times those for the county’s current cycle.

Cities in San Mateo County will need to plan for a combined 44,800 new homes to be built over the next eight years.  With roughly 269,000 units of housing in the county and 2.8 people per home on average, the new housing could usher in upwards of 131,000 people, more growth than the county’s seen over the last 35 years. Combined with unincorporated land, the county’s total allocation for new homes is more than 47,000.

(Michael Lane, a state policy director with nonprofit public policy organization SPUR) said the big jump is "because of recent state legislation requiring new allocations be based on a more stringent look at housing affordability, job growth and vacancy rates.

“If they do fall behind, SB 35 will kick in. Hopefully that will speed up housing growth and bring some of those cities into compliance,” said Dylan Casey, executive director of the California Renters Legal Advocacy and Education Fund, or CaRLA.  Senate Bill 35, a law that became enforceable at the beginning of the year, removed cities’ abilities to deny projects that contain below-market-rate units if goals are not being met.

So there you have it.  "If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail."  If all you look at is "housing affordability, job growth and vacancy rates" then you come up with these ridiculous demands, backed by multiple state laws, that will further mess up the County.

And in other news today in the SF Chronicle titled "Feds’ Central Valley Project expects to send no water to most California farms this year, little to cities" we are reminded yet again that

After an extraordinarily dry start to the year, the federal government announced Wednesday that most farms in California will likely receive no water from the state’s biggest reservoirs in 2022, the latest fallout from drought and a blow to an agricultural industry already crippled by tight supplies. Cities and towns, meanwhile, will get just a fraction of the water they requested.

Municipal agencies that receive federal water, which include suppliers in the Bay Area, are projected to get just 25% of what they asked for in 2022. This includes Contra Costa Water District and Santa Clara Valley Water District, which serves the city of San Jose. Last year, most urban customers got about half of what they wanted.

While San Mateo County isn't as reliant on the Feds for our water, the steady downward drip from 50% to 25% to whatever in Silicon Valley is completely predictable across the state.  "If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail."  If you are stuck in a big hole, stop digging.

The CA exodus is real, so why do we need SB 10?

There are plenty of people who foolishly believe we can build our way out of the so-called "housing crisis".  Dense development hasn't caused lower housing costs anywhere in the world--in fact, many of the densest locations are also the costliest.  And when the other quality of life components and job prospects are as good as the Bay Area, one would have to be extra foolish to try to out-build the demand and further diminish the quality of life.  But Sacramento has foisted SB 9 and SB 10 on us anyway.  Most of them couldn't get through Econ 101, but that is where we are at.

The Burlingame City Council will discuss what to do about SB 10 tomorrow night.  The Staff Report is super thin on SB 10:

SB 10. California Senate Bill (SB) 10 allows (but does not require) local agencies to adopt an ordinance to allow up to 10 dwelling units on any parcel if the parcel is within a transit-rich area or urban infill site. (Ed:  pretty much all of B'game).

The General Plan Update has already provided a range of multiunit residential and mixed use land use districts with a wide range of residential densities, and the Zoning Ordinance Update underway will provide refined development standards for the corresponding zoning districts.

Staff requests direction from the City Council on whether to pursue zoning allowed by SB 10.  Whereas SB 9-compliant zoning is required, municipalities may choose to adopt (or not adopt) SB 10-compliant zoning.

And the report claims that neither SB 9 or SB 10 will have any fiscal impact!  It might be time to double-check the thinking on that since residential property taxes never cover the cost of providing city services--never mind the costs to the school district that is pretty much out of real estate.

But let's look a little deeper courtesy of last Sunday's Mercury News piece with the sub-head "In an area noted for its booming economy, stunning weather and natural beauty, a majority feel their quality of life is in decline".  The Silicon Valley Leadership Group and the Bay Area News Group commissioned a survey by Embold Research to dig into this and it's not pretty.

In a foreboding breakthrough, for the first time since the poll began posing the question in 2018 a solid majority -- 56% -- said they expect to leave the Bay Area in the next few years...a similar majority said the region is headed in the wrong direction.  In the survey of 1,610 registered voters, 71% said the Bay Area's quality of life has declined in the last five years.

Two problems topped the list of increased concern being "serious or very serious"?  Drought (+41%) and Water Supply (+32%).  I'm glad to know I'm not alone on this.  The cost of housing was still the highest overall at 92% but only up 6%.  What if even half of the half of people that are considering leaving do so?  Even if it is only 10% that would be significant.   B'game has a huge amount of new housing already approved, in design and "in-the-dirt".  Maybe we should see how that all plays out?  I hope the council's direction to staff on SB 10 is a brisk, clear "forgetaboutit" so they can get back to ensuring our public safety, water supply, small business vitality, economic health and quality of life.

Are Neo-racists Attacking Burlingame?

I’m coming around to the idea that there may well be some racists in Burlingame and elsewhere on the Peninsula.  I know it’s hard to believe.  But when you see people judging other people’s motivations, actions or, in the case of city council members, their votes; based on the color of their skin it is hard to avoid the conclusion that they are racists.  This is not the commonly held view of what it is to be a racist.  But when one uses false charges of racism as a cudgel to get one’s way on things that have nothing to do with race one is, well…..a racist.  Let’s call them “neo-racists”.

Cue Daily Journal columnist Mark Simon who felt the need to take the B’game city council and particularly the mayor to task for reacting negatively to a comment at a county Asian Pacific Islander Caucus panel discussion:

One of the panelists, Nicole Fernandez, former chair of the county Democratic Party and now district director for state Sen. Josh Becker, noted that district elections had a significant impact on the election of nonwhites to local city councils. Fernandez eagerly anticipated the implementation of district elections in other cities, including Burlingame, which has begun that process, and which she described as one of the “NIMBYest cities” here in god’s country.

Blending charges of racism and NIMBYism is well…. neo-racist.   Hearing it from a staffer’s mouth for our own state senator (newly elected to replace Jerry Hill) is not a good sign at the start of Becker’s term.  I expect B’game should get an apology from his office for Fernandez' fact-free and neo-racist accusation.  Maybe it’s even time for a new district director that isn’t a neo-racist and doesn’t denigrate whole towns in her boss’ district.

In his Daily Journal column, Mark Simon goes on with this confused bit of rhetoric

Of course, the term NIMBY encompasses much more than housing and a lengthy and vigorous debate can be held on the topic of inclusiveness in Burlingame, or any other city in the county.

Really?  Do tell.  I though NIMBYism was about local development.  Regular readers know that I believe Burlingame, the mid-Peninsula and, in fact, the whole core of the Bay Area are already over-built for our current infrastructure.  Call me a NIMBY, I don’t care.  I haven't exactly been in the majority in town.  I am one although I consider the whole core Bay Area as “my backyard” and so should you.  With more than 1,000 units of housing in B’game approved and in the works over the last couple of years, I would like B’game to take a breather.  Let’s see how this much growth plays out.  There are a bunch of good reasons for a pause if anyone cares to look past the end of their nose.  But why bring race and “inclusiveness” into the discussion unless one is, well…. a neo-racist busy judging whole towns full of people one doesn’t know by their skin colors?

For the Glass House File:  It is easy to toss around the NIMBY label when one lives up in the winding backstreets of Emerald Hills or Farm Hills in Redwood City in a single-family zoned neighborhood on a 9,000 square foot lot like Mark Simon.  “NIMBY” comes easily to your keyboard when you live nowhere near where a spec builder is likely to buy the small house next door and jam in a four-plex or two.  The people on 5,000 square foot lots in Lyon-Hoag, Burlingame Terrace or Burlingame Village near commercial districts and transit feel very differently and it has nothing to do with race. 

Checklist:  How to tell if you are this new strain of NEO-RACIST:

--You think single-family residential zoning is racist.

--You think local parcel taxes to fund local schools are racist.

--You think voting for each of your city council members is racist.

--You think “leafy suburb” is a code word for a racist neighborhood.

--Heck, you think “suburb” is code for a racist neighborhood.

Look in the mirror.  “Crisis nearly of its own making” indeed.

Density Tsunami Approaches

We have known the tsunami of development has been approaching for several years.  The townhouses on Anson Lane have arrived for sale:

Brand new construction in Burlingame. This 3 bedroom, 3.5 bathroom, 2 story townhome style condo is located in the brand new community The Residences @ Anson is built by D.R. Horton, America's builder. Included features, Avalon shaker style cabinets w/satin nickel door pulls, Stainless steel Jenn Air appliances, minus washer, dryer and refrigerator.   $1,903,540.

The massive block of 268 apartments that are part of the same development on Carolan Ave. will be hitting the market soon I imagine.  I have verified with a member of the School Board that the kids in this development are zoned to Roosevelt School.

Further north, the Planning Commission has cleared the first of three big developments.  Per the Daily Journal

The Burlingame Planning Commission unanimously approved the plan to construct at 1766 El Camino Real a development featuring 60 residential units atop 148,000 of office space during a meeting Monday, Aug. 24. The plans will advance onto the Burlingame City Council, which will ultimately determine the fate of the development.  Officials admired the seven-story tower which will also feature a ground-floor lobby and retail center plus underground parking — differing from those who feared the development was incompatible with its surroundings.  

“Will it change the neighborhood here? Yes. That’s the point,” said Loftis, who noted the stretch of north Burlingame has been identified by officials as an area to build additional housing and allow greater density.  He added officials recently approved a general plan update making way for the new uses, making clear the character of the area would change.

And the next two shoes to drop are

To advance the synergy of the emerging area, plans have been filed to build a seven-story tower nearby with 169 units at the corner of El Camino Real and Murchison Drive, and about 1 mile away a proposal was made to build 120 units in a six-story development which includes cultural art space.

That's 349 new units in "North Burlingame".  I'm researching which school(s) these kids will be assigned to when they are all open.  In the meantime, I think we need a better name for this big new neighborhood. Any suggestions, readers?  There is also plans afoot at the Mercy property for a sizable residential development.  That one will be easy to name:  Have Mercy on Us.  That's 630 new units plus the Hower Auto development on Bayswater and whatever gets added at Mercy.  And still, "housing advocates" say it is not enough.........

Keep this view of ECR in mind as it won't look like that much longer.

 

Bay Area Exodus? How Big? How Long?

A lot of the fire, heat and policy-making on the Peninsula lately has  been driven by the belief that we will be adding more of...well, everything.  Except perhaps affordable, local entertainment.  Rent control.  Affordable housing.  Mass transit.  High density.  Subsidized X, Y, Z and back to A.  ADU's.  UBI.  Free lunch.  What if it's all just BeeEss?

You can find polls and surveys to support or contradict any position you choose.  But you can't deny the fact of open market pricing.  Not the engineered, subsidized, hidden-cost stuff like renewable energy.  I'm talking the "walk into a place of business and get a price quote" response.

Here's the "walk-in" price that caught my eye this week.  A friend of a friend is moving to Portland.  I know, I know--really? Now?  He's got remote work status until..... who knows when.  She can transplant her practice anywhere.  All that aside, the cost to rent a truck to move your stuff yourself to Portland today is $2,500.  The price to rent the same truck in Portland to drive to the Bay Area is.......wait for it, $300.  If I gave you my special 20 minute How-to-Negotiate class, I'll bet you could get them to pay you $300 to bring the truck back for them.  It would cover gas, lunch and the Golden Gate bridge toll.

Will the exodus continue?  Yes.  Will it last more than a couple years?  Maybe.  Will it reverse within the next five?  Doubtful.  I'm glad I'm not all-in on a high-density, all-electric$$, bird cage with a minuscule courtyard, 6' x 6' elevators and no balcony that I will need to sell for $650,000 to break even.  The old saying "don't fight the Fed" only applies if you have to get in the ring.

Single-Family Homes Need Single-Family Zoning

The Wall Street Journal and the NY Times are both reporting that people all of sudden want out of dense city living and are on the hunt for single-family homes in the suburbs.  We talked about that and the associated turn away from mass transit here a month ago.  But it's not just the national media reporting generally.  Our very own high-performing realtor, Raziel Ungar, is seeing much the same thing right here in B'game as he wrote this week

It's been an adventurous week in real estate - from what I've seen, things are heating up. Two homes in Burlingame that were well priced, move in ready, and in excellent locations, had five offers each on them and sold multiple hundreds of thousands over asking. I've had more inquiries in the last few weeks from buyers living or renting in San Francisco than I can remember in a concentrated period of time; naturally, many people who may or may not have considered the peninsula, Marin, or the East Bay have placed moving to the suburbs to a home and a yard towards the top of the list. An article in yesterday's New York Times called Coronavirus Escape: To the Suburbs detailed in more detail what I have been experiencing as well.

The Journal's take on the trend is that it's not just buyers.  Renters are feeling the same need

Wall Street’s wager on high-earning suburban renters is paying off, and it is raising its stakes.  Investors are flocking to America’s mega landlords, drawn by signs the companies that emerged from last decade’s foreclosure crisis owning huge pools of rental houses are weathering the economic shutdown far better than feared. Many also expect that the coronavirus pandemic will make suburban single-family homes both more desirable and more difficult to buy for even the relatively well-heeled.

Share prices of the largest home-rental companies, such as Invitation Homes Inc. and American Homes 4 Rent, have outpaced the broader stock market since they and the S&P 500 bottomed in late March. Invitation is up 57% since then and American Homes has gained 36%, compared with the S&P 500’s 31% climb.

Perhaps you also saw the SF Comicle piece about people setting home offices in tents in their backyards to get some more private workspace.  You can only do that if you HAVE a backyard.  So the question is will the city continue to fight to protect single-family zoning, will the state bureaucrats get drawn into more pressing matters than ruining neighborhoods and will the development industry respond?  One of the rare silver-linings of the Covid-19 upheaval is according to Zumper "It seems rents for studios through 2 beds in Burlingame have seen large month-over-month drops between 5-7%".  Anyone care to guess whether or not rents would be coming down now if we had rent control in place?

Green Policies Backfire Against the Coronavirus

I had my next post outlined in my head when I read this piece in today's Wall Street Journal by a couple of podcasters that says the same thing only better:

We really knew there was a crisis when San Francisco, which 13 years ago banned single-use plastic bags in grocery stores, would now prohibit reusable bags as part of its effort to prevent spread of the novel coronavirus.

Plastic-bag bans aren’t the only “green” policy that has been found wanting in the real world of a pandemic. For decades environmentalists have hectored us to get out of our cars and crowd into subways and buses. “From Amsterdam to Tempe, Arizona, more and more cities are finding that eliminating cars from their streets makes people happier and healthier,” Fast Company reported in January, noting with satisfaction that in one Helsinki neighborhood, “none of the new apartments come with parking.”

You can’t have a car-free community without high-density housing, so environmentalists have promoted apartment living and a war on suburban “sprawl.” But now those living in dense apartment buildings risk their lives by walking out the door into common spaces and shared surfaces, even before they reach the crowded, densely populated streets below. Suburban families, by contrast, are often able to maintain community connections even while socially distancing and are more likely to have additional room for their children to roam while out of school.

Environmentalists talk a lot about “externalities,” the unintended consequences of economic decisions. The pandemic is a reminder that policy decisions have externalities too.

Mr. McAleer and Ms. McElhinney host the podcast “The Ann & Phelim Scoop.”

The question is will we learn anything from the COVID-19 onslaught?  Let’s face it, this will not be the last pandemic.  We’ve had H1N1, SARS, MERS, Ebola, Russian Flu, Spanish Flu and the regular flu that mutates every year, so the vaccine manufacturers are half-guessing each year.   More than one person has said to me “Face it, we will look like Manhattan in 20 years.”  Well maybe, but maybe not.  Now is the time to tell Sen. Scott Weiner—the enemy of single-family zoning—and the YIMBYS to take a hike.

NIMBYs and YIMBYs

The Daily Post is digging into the state senate candidates views with some panache -- or is it just cheeky reporting?  I like that they have sent out questionnaires to all five candidates and are writing articles based on the answers.  Jerry Hill's seat is an important one and we need a strong rep for the Peninsula to sit in it.  Here are two recent front page headlines

Stopping Scott Weiner's progressive fascist fantasy called SB50 is a top priority.  Per the Post article, Lieber and Masur "were more accepting of SB50 than the other three, but would have some amendments".  Masur has two "amendments" regarding some grace period for cities and getting rid of the sub-600,000 county population exemption.  The latter should be obvious to anyone.  Why exempt the counties with the cheapest land costs and hence the cheapest cost to build?  Duh.

The other three, Annie Oliva of Millbrae, Michael Brownrigg of dear ole Burlingame and Josh Becker of Menlo Park apparently were less supportive of SB50 in their answers to the Post.  They were also pretty clear in their answers to the last question in the survey, "Simply -- do you identify as a YIMBY or a NIMBY?"  Again, Leiber and Masur owned up to being YIMBY's while the other three walked down the middle line.  So in my view this is a three horse race--the YIMBY's should run in SF since things are working so well up there.

A letter writer from Palo Alto took the Post to task for asking "such a reductive question that encourages lazy, black and white thinking about complex issues".  I can sympathize a little with his concern, but we did get a clear "yes" on the YIMBY question, so we learned which candidates to give a clear "no" on.  Thus the question had some value.  Kudos to the Post for digging in.  We have a couple of months to go before election day, so keep it up! Correction: Just VIsiting caught me confusing the timing of the Council race with the State Senate race.  Primary in March, election next November (see his comments for good insight).

Three Thoughts From Altitude

I had a lovely long stay in Tahoe this past week.  It's as good or better than in the winter even for an avid skier like me.  My wife and I hiked, golfed, friends have a boat that they shared and so one.  It's a great part of California.  As I rolled "down the hill" yesterday, three thoughts came to mind:

1.  Somehow a series of little towns and ski areas manage to put on more live music in a week than we see in B'game in a month or more.  It's sort of embarrassing.  I hear talk of "community" all the time in the Bay Area and yet Tahoe manages to quadruple the quality community time with seemingly little effort and great results.

2.  The livability problems in San Francisco are doing serious, probably permanent harm to its reputation as a world-class city.  The Wall Street Journal is one name-brand news source talking about the problems.  For example, this weekend it noted

The website RealtyHop.com dubs San Francisco “the doo-doo capital of the U.S.” They noted that the city’s poop reports almost tripled between 2011 and 2017.  The problem draws attention because the poop increasingly comes not from dogs but from humans.  There are myriad causes at work, no doubt. But there was no “defecation crisis”—a term usually associated with rural India—in the 1930s, even with unemployment at 25%, vagabonds roaming the country, and shantytowns and “Hoovervilles” springing up everywhere. Today’s homeless and the hobos of the Great Depression are different in many ways. 

In California at least, one is struck by the contrast between the fastidious attention paid to the social duty of scooping up and disposing of dog feces, and the rather more paralyzed and guilty reaction to the plague of human feces. The former is treated as a moral imperative among the enlightened—and the thin plastic bags used as the means to this moral end have so far escaped the fate of plastic straws, well on their way to being outlawed as an environmental outrage. Even social-justice warriors don’t consider it their personal duty, however, to tidy up after their fellow human beings on the streets.

For us locals that is hardly news, but what is news is that elsewhere in California (like Tahoe) long time nearby visitors to EssEff have stopped visiting.  We were paired up with a lovely older woman on the golf course who only waited until the second hole to note that she and her husband used to come to SF every month for 40 years for "dinner and a show" or museums and such.  No more.  One wonders how bad it has to get before the laissez-faire mindset gets whacked on the side of the head?

3.  Who's in charge of infrastructure?  It took three hours to drive from Tahoe City (on the North shore) to Berkeley-- about 190 miles.  That's pretty much the usual time without winter weather.  Then it takes more than an hour to go the last 37 miles to Burlingame on a sunny weekend afternoon with the Giants out of town.  Where are the environmentalists decrying the air pollution of thousands of cars idling in traffic?  Where are the transit officials with new ideas?  Where are the housing advocates smart enough to see the cart might be in front of the horse?  Did all of the urban planner decamp for Boise or Spokane?  Just wondering.