<story><title>Berkeley may get rid of single-family zoning</title><url>https://www.berkeleyside.com/2021/02/17/berkeley-may-get-rid-of-single-family-zoning-as-a-way-to-correct-the-arc-of-its-ugly-housing-history</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>1MoreThing</author><text>&amp;gt; neighborhoods or people to try to protect, to the detriment of everyone else wanting to live there&lt;p&gt;Wait, you have a problem with a city government trying to serve the people who actually live in a neighborhood rather than potential new residents?&lt;p&gt;That&amp;#x27;s the whole point of a city government. To serve the people living in the city.</text></item><item><author>supernova87a</author><text>Yes, but this is still only one of about 10 other factors that prevent the region or city from having enough housing, or affordable housing (and I don&amp;#x27;t mean in the public government-run housing sense).&lt;p&gt;Maybe Berkeley should also try to address the other unending issues that they keep up to prevent any meaningful change, if they really mean it:&lt;p&gt;-- Endless and convoluted environmental + city approvals processes that corrupt any transparent application for development and favor those who have money to navigate it&lt;p&gt;-- Picking and choosing special interest &amp;#x2F; special case neighborhoods or people to try to protect, to the detriment of everyone else wanting to live there&lt;p&gt;-- Rent control&lt;p&gt;-- The extremely backwards property tax policies that favor existing landowners over anyone new, young, poor (though this admittedly is California&amp;#x27;s problem, not just one city or county) and make everything else attempted bandaids -- and misguided bandaids, at that -- to fix the system.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>davidw</author><text>Did you read the origins of their zoning code? &amp;quot;Protecting&amp;quot; the city by attempting to limit Black people to certain areas. Not a great look.&lt;p&gt;A lot of zoning code is based on similar ideas, even if most people are not dumb enough to say the quiet part out loud these days.&lt;p&gt;You do still hear it on occasion: Bend, Oregon, where I live, passed a similar change a few years back, which was then superseded by Oregon&amp;#x27;s HB 2001, which effectively eliminates exclusionary zoning in our cities. At the local hearing for the Bend rule, there was a woman who was really upset that &amp;quot;renters&amp;quot; might be able to live in her neighborhood. They&amp;#x27;re dirty, messy, and &amp;quot;don&amp;#x27;t care about where they live&amp;quot;, according to her testimony.&lt;p&gt;It&amp;#x27;s economic segregation, plain and simple.</text></comment>
<story><title>Berkeley may get rid of single-family zoning</title><url>https://www.berkeleyside.com/2021/02/17/berkeley-may-get-rid-of-single-family-zoning-as-a-way-to-correct-the-arc-of-its-ugly-housing-history</url></story><parent_chain><item><author>1MoreThing</author><text>&amp;gt; neighborhoods or people to try to protect, to the detriment of everyone else wanting to live there&lt;p&gt;Wait, you have a problem with a city government trying to serve the people who actually live in a neighborhood rather than potential new residents?&lt;p&gt;That&amp;#x27;s the whole point of a city government. To serve the people living in the city.</text></item><item><author>supernova87a</author><text>Yes, but this is still only one of about 10 other factors that prevent the region or city from having enough housing, or affordable housing (and I don&amp;#x27;t mean in the public government-run housing sense).&lt;p&gt;Maybe Berkeley should also try to address the other unending issues that they keep up to prevent any meaningful change, if they really mean it:&lt;p&gt;-- Endless and convoluted environmental + city approvals processes that corrupt any transparent application for development and favor those who have money to navigate it&lt;p&gt;-- Picking and choosing special interest &amp;#x2F; special case neighborhoods or people to try to protect, to the detriment of everyone else wanting to live there&lt;p&gt;-- Rent control&lt;p&gt;-- The extremely backwards property tax policies that favor existing landowners over anyone new, young, poor (though this admittedly is California&amp;#x27;s problem, not just one city or county) and make everything else attempted bandaids -- and misguided bandaids, at that -- to fix the system.</text></item></parent_chain><comment><author>LargeWu</author><text>This is the underlying energy behind NIMBY.&lt;p&gt;Cities have many stakeholders. Residents, sure. But also businesses, workers, the homeless, the environment.&lt;p&gt;And there are tons of tradeoffs. Maybe by rezoning and not mandating single family homes, the increased population density will improve access to transit and services. It&amp;#x27;s not necessarily as cut and dried as &amp;quot;Rezoning is negatively perceived by current residents, therefore don&amp;#x27;t do it&amp;quot;.</text></comment>