On 2/27/14 the stakeholder’s group for our General
Plan’s Housing Element had an open to the public update meeting. What follows
is an expanded and slightly revised version of the remarks I made at that meeting.
It was preliminary to public hearings in April. I urge everyone to read the
relevant documents and to attend the upcoming hearings.
I have read the
entire housing plan and will share my observations as both an Amador County
resident and a professional planner. When I was in planning school they
emphasized that plans should be comprehensive. This one certainly is with what
seems like a page for every dwelling unit in the county. And while it doesn’t
qualify as a specific plan it is also, as stated in the introduction, detailed.
This detail includes statements such as “…households made up of older residents
may require smaller homes than families with children” on page H-9 and “…people
with lower incomes are also more likely to live in apartments or other
multifamily options” on page H-18. Wasting tax revenue to restate the obvious
represents the costly growth of government and is one reason that development
doesn’t seem to pay for itself. The plan documents fees such as the land
development fee of $2,010 to $2,792 to California Fish and Wildlife for a
negative declaration to their ever expanding mandates. Yet the plan’s solution
is more of the same: increased government coupled with a reduction of
government revenues through subsidy programs and creating a redevelopment
agency. The traditional planning concept of zoning abundant land for all
possible future demand and housing types, which some current critics call over-zoning,
is not even considered.
Instead we have,
in reality, a social policy plan with many statements that illustrate the
writers’ agenda. On page H-2 the plan considers the goal of “…provision of
services in proximity to residents…” This is a bias statement in favor of the
town centers and similar concepts that ignores the effect of individual travel
patterns, especially longer commutes, upon shopping and other service provision
decisions. On page H-59 the plan states, “The
intent of local government regulations is… to ensure a decent quality of life
for the community.” Note that this is for “the community”, not the
individual. And while it probably means things like preventing housing
development next to chemical factories, it is a vague statement that can mean
many other things. For some, it can mean church attendance while, for others it
can mean “freedom” from nativity scenes, and removing “In God We Trust” from our
currency.
Page H-82
states, under programs, “Reduce community
opposition to high density affordable housing…” Since when is the role of
democratic government to influence public opinion rather than to implement public
opinion? “…investigate the feasibility of establishing a County-owned
industrial complex, if such a complex is consistent with identified target
industries,” on page H-94. So our county is to now develop and own industrial
land and decides who locates there, based on the criteria of omnipotent “planners”
to employ the existing (frozen?) low income population. Don’t people improve
their situation and also move in and out of the county? Page H-95 states,
“Identify land available for commercial and industrial development.” I feel
absolutely confident that our local realtors would work zealously for
commercial and industrial clients without any government imperative. Apparently
the plan writers don’t agree. Does the free market exist for them? Do I dare
use the s word? Is this socialism?
The plan
proposes, and not surprisingly for a planners’ plan, new powers for the
planning department. They would oversee code enforcement and public transit
among other things. Often the text attempts to rhetorically justify their
agenda by various techniques such as word order and juxtaposition of data. Using
data from the federal Department of Housing and Urban Development’s
Comprehensive Housing Affordability Strategy (CHAS) page H-16 states, “…385
(nearly 40 percent) of large family households in Amador County live in housing
that lacks complete bathroom or kitchen facilities, is considered overcrowded,
or costs more than 30 percent of the family’s monthly income.” This sounds
petty gruesome on first reading. The text laments “incomplete” bathroom or
kitchen facilities, but does not define them. Is having a shower stall, but not
a bathtub, a so-called ¾ bathroom, a severe deprivation? They do, however,
define overcrowding as more than one person per room. So a perfectly
comfortable, but modest two bedroom dwelling unit with an open space
kitchen/dining/living room is overcrowded for a family of four. Are they just
promoting their agenda for a legislated and subsidized standard of living? How
many people are really in such dire circumstances that substantial new
government intervention is justified? And if there are an unfortunate few, why
isn’t the existing social welfare sufficiently helping them? Do we want to
become a welfare county attracting new dependent residents?
They denigrate
the free choice of “overpaying” for the security and freedom of owning one’s
own home. How much of our housing costs are the direct result of California regulations and restrictive land use policies?
What power does the County have over interest rates and other issues decided in
Washington? They also denigrate the free choice of
commuting with their intellectual concept of the jobs/housing balance.
Seemingly ignored is the reality of residential location made by the
compromises within a two paycheck household. But they want to increase housing
costs with the additional burden of design review. Related to this is their
assumption of the town centers with transit oriented development from the yet
unapproved general plan. In Europe people live in towns and farm the land
around them. But in America people live on the land they farm. This
fundamental difference is why many of our ancestors left Europe and represents the difference between
freedom and collectivism.
If someone lives
in means tested low income housing they often become trapped there. Rarely does
someone go from poor to middle class overnight. They move upward in small steps.
If an increase in income cancels one’s housing benefit the bottom line usually
dictates maintaining their lower earned income. (I recently spoke with my
accountant and heard about numerous people afraid of making a little bit more
money and losing a certain means tested benefit). I oppose building a lower
income ghetto in Martell. Wasn’t that parcel bought by the county for future
office consolation and not for housing? Martell should remain a commercial area
and not become our disastrous equivalent of Marin City in Marin County.
The best
solution for housing lower income residents is increasing their income through
economic expansion. The housing element discusses the need for more farm worker
housing. Why not grow grapes on trellises, as they do in Australia, and use far less labor? The trellises
would be made in factories by people at a higher skill level making more money
than farm workers. We are a traditional wood products area. We also have
billions of dollars worth of gold in Amador County. Yet this plan, on page H-85, proposes
housing right on top of the Mother Lode between Sutter Creek and Amador City. Why is this area not zoned as a mineral
resource area?
The unnecessary
controversy over the Newman Ridge project endangers the survival of our freight
rail line, essential for both economic stability and air quality. What amazes
me most about this planning process is that those who claim to be the most
concerned about the ill housed are often those same people opposing the
projects that lift people’s incomes above the poverty level. Is this just
ironic or something more sinister?
Copyright 2014,
Mark L. Bennett
