Posted by
Playful Walrus on Monday, September 29, 2008 3:27:01 PM
Former Clinton shill and current Obama shill Tony Villar wants to be sure the more successful among us are forced to help the less successful to live as though they were more successful. Los Angeles Times staff writer Jessica Garrison reports.
Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa on Monday will unveil a $5-billion, five-year plan to build housing for the poor and middle class.
That’s the opening sentence of the story. Why is the mayor of a major city announcing such a plan? Isn’t it the job of developers to create housing?
The blueprint, which calls for thousands of new homes along subway and bus lines, and developments with people of all incomes living together, would, according to the mayor's deputies, alter the look and feel of the city forever.
Ah yes. The attempt at social engineering that places rich people and poor people together. I wrote about that before here.
But the plan, which many City Council members and business and housing groups said they had not yet seen, is being released while the housing market is a shambles, the state is facing a massive budget shortfall and the economy is teetering -- challenges that lead some to wonder whether it is feasible.
If it was feasible, wouldn’t developers do it on their own?
"I know that budgets are tight . . . credit is almost nonexistent," Villaraigosa said Saturday to a room full of community and labor groups pushing for more affordable housing. "But we're going to reject the cynics . . . and build a brighter future for those kids who are in the corner over there."
Ah, there are the key words… “affordable housing”. I wrote enough about that phrase here.
The mayor got a standing ovation at the union hall near downtown Los Angeles, and chants of "Si, se puede" ("Yes, we can") from the dozens of people in matching red T-shirts in his audience.
Maybe if they learned English, they could afford better housing?
Some developers object to a so-called mixed-income provision that would require [subsidized] housing to be included in new housing developments. They say that such a policy -- which labor and housing groups have been pushing for years -- would cast a pall over entrepreneurial efforts.
Exactly.
"It is going to make housing less affordable for everybody," said downtown activist Brady Westwater.
Bingo.
On the other hand, community and labor groups, key players in the city's politics, are lobbying hard for the so-called mixed-income plan.
Of course they are. They are socialists who want other people to pay for their lifestyle.
Los Angeles was designated the least affordable metropolitan area in the country last year, according to the Business Council report, because so many people pay so much of their incomes for housing.
Well how can that be? We’ve had rent control for many years? If that really worked, shouldn’t housing in the area cost less?
The city also has the largest homeless population in the nation.
I’m sure that has nothing to do with the climate.
In addition, although private developers have built many high-end apartment units and condos over the last few years, there has not been a similar increase for households earning less than $75,000 per year.
So what’s next? Forcing Rolls Royce to put out cheaper models? When someone upgrades to new, more expensive housing, that means they are no longer living where they used to – and that will most likely make the vacated residence more affordable… especially if a lot of high-end units are built. It’s called… the market.
Under the mayor's plan, the city would pledge $200 million a year for five years from various sources, including the city's Housing Authority, its affordable housing trust fund and its Community Redevelopment Agency, to build affordable housing.
Doesn’t anyone else see the contradiction in calling something that costs $200 million per year “affordable”? And that's just the city's amount.