County supervisors have a very bad habit of looking through the wrong end of a telescope. Or, as Groucho Marx would have put it, “Politics is the art of looking for trouble, finding it everywhere, diagnosing it incorrectly, and applying the wrong remedies.” In no situation has this been truer than in government’s approach to so-called “affordable housing.”
The tag team of the City of Santa Barbara, County Supervisors, and our State Legislature are in the process of destroying the once sacred ambience of Santa Barbara. The one thing I have heard constantly since I was a kid growing up in this region is that the last thing Santa Barbara wanted to become is another Orange County or San Fernando Valley. That is, they didn’t want tall buildings, urban sprawl, high density or beach-side development, or the elimination of open spaces. Now they are getting all those things and more because of state mandates demanding that each community build its “fair share” of housing along with the quest for affordable work-force housing.
The sinister aspect of this no-growth mentality, which also applies to the Santa Ynez Valley, is evident in a quote I heard some 35 years ago which explains our local land-use policies heretofore: “The cost of preserving the high quality of life in Santa Barbara County includes limiting opportunities for others. It limits economic mobility, but that is a legitimate choice!” That statement embodied the marching orders for Santa Barbara County’s Planning and Development Department as confessed by a former department director.
So, what is it? Preserve Santa Barbara or change it forever by high density and high-rise developments that create traffic nightmares, water shortages, and other problems associated with shoe-horning tens of thousands of units (the former Macy’s and Sear’s stores anybody?) that will overburden the resources to serve the same?
I, for one, don’t believe you can make living in Santa Barbara or the valley affordable without some urban sprawl because too many people who don’t need a job (the independently wealthy and the homeless!) want to live here and they are competing with the people who can’t afford to live here, because their job pays too little compared to the cost of housing.
This brings us to a hearing which would have served to humiliate our county supervisors (past and present) and their staff had they not forgotten how to blush many years ago. Supervisor Laura Capps thinks she can make some housing affordable by taking county land and developing it, thereby eliminating the land cost associated with development. In other words, she wants to sacrifice county resources to put a band-aid on our hemorrhaging wound having to do with housing affordability.
What was lost on everybody at the hearing on this subject were some very disturbing details having to do with poverty rates in our county. That is, the main reason housing isn’t affordable is not so much because of the price of housing (outside of Santa Barbara and the SY Valley), as much as it is that the city, county, and state have completely annihilated all the best-paying jobs we once enjoyed. Simply put, the report indicated that a whopping 70% of the workers in this county are either poor or very poor. Moreover, the situation is getting worse; in the past five years, 40% of the workforce has become poorer than they were five years ago. Yet, nobody on the staff or the board mentioned this part of the report.
Here is Finding #1 from Harris and Associates who produced the report indicating that Santa Barbara County experienced a whopping 1% job growth in the last five years along with the following poverty indicators: The full report here.
Hence, the real problem is that government at every level in CA has banned the very jobs that historically paid enough money to enable people to purchase a home. We are talking about manufacturing and industry jobs, including the oil industry. When the consultant’s report outlined major job sectors in the community, these sectors weren’t even mentioned. That is because, in the name of climate change, our state, county, and city have done everything they can to run these jobs out. What that means, of course, for those who were willing to sacrifice the economic mobility of others to preserve their high quality of life is, mission accomplished!
In conclusion, the road to affordable housing is a dead end unless government removes the impediments to high-paying job creation. Moreover, unless you want to live in an urban jungle, we must consider carefully annexing and developing more land in the county to create new communities. After all, less than 10% of the county is developed.
Andy Caldwell, Executive Director, COLAB
On the Effects of NGO’s - Local Housing
Did a study of local NGO’s. In Santa Barbara there’s over 1,400 NGOs taking in a total of about $7B with a B billion/year. Seemed impossible but it was a government report.
Maybe this tsunami of cash explains the endless funding for lefty causes here and nationwide. And explains the hefty employment income of thousands of liberal crusaders as NGO admins.
They all need housing, and at an average of $130k for an NGO administrator, there goes any cheap housing. Working people are now competing with highly paid NGO’s for workforce housing. Those NGO salaries reflect the cost of living, not the cost of producing.. Whereas actual employees of a real business must produce something of value for their employers. Or the organization goes under.
No such problems for the NGO’s. It’s tax free money, free local publicity, and no pesky audits or need to prove worth. They exist solely on the perception of community worth.
This gets to my second point - That is our tax code gives breaks to these NGO’s. So as noted, their properties pay less in taxes, their donors get tax breaks and the direct point is .. they produce nothing of value while taking up valuable office and housing resources.
Conclusion - What could be done? Investigate these high flying NGO’s.
Are they strictly adhering to their 501C3 tax requirements.
Are they actually remaining politically neutral.
Are they paying their CEO’s exorbitant salaries while providing little actual service?
Grand juries can investigate these institutions. And maybe that would free up some housing.
You hit the mark, good article.