This article is in Rooflines – The Shelterforce Blog
Posted in Rooflines by Randy Shaw on June 20, 2017
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“On June 13, San Francisco’s Mayor Ed Lee signed HOME SF into law. The district supervisor-sponsored measure will add 16,000 housing units in the next two decades, 5,000 of which will be affordable.”
“On that night in Berkeley, a large turnout of pro-housing activists stopped the Berkeley City Council’s plans to halt new housing. In response to grassroots pressure, Berkeley Mayor Jesse Arreguin announced before the meeting that the agenda item promoting downzoning was “greatly misunderstood” and that the city ‘cannot put roadblocks in the way of new housing.’”
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“But the tide has turned. People are battling the politics of exclusion. They recognize that while artificially restricting the housing supply is great for profiting those who already own property, it’s not so good for those paying sky-high rents or who have been priced out of the city altogether. As Supervisor Katy Tang stated at the signing ceremony for HOME SF, if San Francisco ‘does not continue to provide affordable housing for our middle income households, they will continue to leave and we will no longer have a middle class.’”
Emphasis added by the Thriving Communities blog editor.
In San Francisco, where housing issues dominated the ballot — or at least the election coverage – Proposition F naturally got the most attention. That was an initiative to restrict Airbnb, which proponents argued is effectively reducing the city’s housing stock via the proliferation of pricey short-term rentals. Prop F inspired a kind of media circus, with Airbnb investing $8 million in a campaign to defeat it, with pro-Prop F forces occupying Airbnb headquarters the day before the election. Voters said no, in any event, 55 percent against. If you want to learn more about Prop F in excruciating detail, click here.
Voters said yes, though, to Proposition A, $310 million in housing bonds for developing and maintaining affordable housing – the first such bonding question to gain approval in San Francisco in nearly two decades, so apparently the affordability crisis there is registering the electorate. They said no, however to Proposition I, a moratorium on market-rate developments in the historically Latino Mission District.
Of course, there’s a school of thought that the housing crisis in San Francisco and everywhere else is mostly a supply and demand problem, and that if development were allowed to flourish without political or regulatory constraints, prices would go down, or at least, not go up so fast. One problem with that argument in a place like San Francisco is that the population isn’t fixed: There are simply too many moneyed people (techies, among them) poised to move in to town to pay the soaring prices that the market can bear when the housing supply grows.
In Maine, voters overwhelmingly approved Question 2, a $15 million bond to underwrite 225 affordable units for older people and to fund repairs for 100 homes of low-income aging. “That’s a drop in the bucket,” said the Portland Press Herald in an editorial, given the “demographic storm” coming to Maine. (Maine officialdom is anguishing about the greying population, same as in Vermont.) Still, it’s better than nothing.
In Summit County, Colo. (home to Breckenridge), voters agreed to maintain a tax that supports workforce and affordable housing. It’s a sales tax of 0.125 percent. Doesn’t sound like much, but again, it’s better than nothing. Perhaps the Vermont townships that host ski areas can come up with something more generous for their workers.
Middle-class financial struggles have occupied the public discourse for some time, but wouldn’t you know, we’re starting to hear more about housing unaffordability as a stresser for this beleaguered population segment.
While long a condition of low-income households, cost burdens are spreading rapidly among moderate-income households. The cost-burdened share of renters with incomes in the $30,000–45,000 range rose 7 percentage points between 2003 and 2013, to 45 percent. The increase for renters earning $45,000–75,000 was almost as large at 6 percentage points, affecting one in five of these households. On average, in the ten highest-cost metros—including Boston, Los Angeles, New York, and San Francisco—three-quarters of renters earning $30,000–45,000 and just under half of those earning $45,000–75,000 had disproportionately high housing costs.”
Granted, much of the news about middle-class housing unaffordability is coming out of the big cities – places where “middle income” is construed to reach far above Vermont standards. For example, Cambridge, Mass., is taking steps to reserve a share of “affordable” housing in a new Kendall Square building for families with incomes in the low six figures! San Francisco is also considering measures that would expand affordable housing eligibility and help out renters in the $100,000 to $140,000 bracket. And Portland, Ore., where the “housing emergency” is apparently wide-ranging, is looking at a form of inclusionary zoning that make apartments available to people making 100 120 percent of the median income (Up to $96,875 for a family of four).
Perhaps it’s a testament to the severity of the housing crisis around the country, and/or to the fragility of the middle-income stratum, that the terms “middle class” and “subsidy” are suddenly being spoken in the same breath.
Here’s the thing: To qualify for most subsidized housing, applicants can’t earn more than 80 percent of the local median income. Where does that leave people who draw an average salary, or perhaps a little more? Perhaps in a place where they can’t readily afford housing but can’t get any help, either. How many such people there are in Vermont is unclear; plenty, no doubt.
(Note: Middle-income earners are not beneficiaries of Burlington’s inclusionary zoning ordinance, which aims to provide affordable rentals for people earning up to 65 percent of the median; and for sale, up to 75 percent.)
For an illustrative display of how housing costs compare to standard incomes, the National Housing Conference’s interactive “Paycheck to Paycheck” shows bar graphs for each of the nation’s metro areas – and just one in Vermont, Burlington/South Burlington. One graph compares salaries to the pay needed to afford a median-priced home; another does the same thing for 1- and 2-BR apartments at HUD’s “fair market rent.”
Below are the charts for 10 occupations that might be considered to be middle class. As you can see, eight of the 10 would be hard pressed to afford purchase of an average home in Burlington:
They do a little better in the rental market, but still, six of 10 can’t comfortably afford a two-bedroom apartment in Burlington:
California sometimes seems like another world, and Vermonters can be forgiven for thinking it has nothing to do with us. But wait: crazy as the housing picture in California is, there are several reasons why we should keep an eye on what’s happening there.
Like it or not, California is a policy trend-setter, and its cutting-edge ideas have a way of filtering through the rest of the country.
Moreover, we’d argue that the housing problems California is facing are quantitatively different from what we have here, but not necessarily qualitatively — that is, affordable and fair housing challenges are pervasive in both states. (Here’s an example of the quantitative: 2-bedroom apartments in San Jose rent for an average of $2,917, which is affordable to someone with an income of $116,000. And you thought Burlington was bad!) Qualitatively, lower-income workers are priced out of the rental market in both states– and remember, Vermont is a low-wage state, which compounds housing unaffordability.
Anyway, here are three California housing ideas worth your notice:
A real estate fee to be used for funding affordable housing development. Assembly Bill 1335 would impose a fee of $75 to $225 on real estate transactions (with some exemptions) to build a fund for affordable housing development. The legislation reportedly has a good range of supporters.
Sue the Suburbs: A novel piece of litigation is in the works after a developer scrapped plans for moderately priced housing in favor of a smaller number of $1 million-plus homes. Click here for a contextual story and here for the website.
Gentrification vaccine: In egregiously expensive San Francisco, the storied Tenderloin District has apparently retained a healthy share of affordable housing in the face of market forces. That’s because nonprofits and housing activists have worked for years to ensure that a substantial share of the district’s housing is subsidized or permanently affordable. For an article that gives their collective efforts a catchy moniker, click here.
This article is in Rooflines – The Shelterforce Blog
