I grew up in Houston, famous for its lack of zoning. In most cities, that's an unthinkable heresy. Blue-state types naturally embrace zoning as part of the cradle-to-grave involvement of government in virtually every aspect of life that otherwise might be guided by free choices between buyers and sellers, a/k/a vicious dog-eat-dog capitalism or, to troglodytes like myself, the free market.
All-powerful zoning predictable screws up market to the point that people are shocked to discover that housing prices are insane and there are an inexplicable number of homeless people whom society has failed to provide with attractive housing options. California is the poster child for this kind of thing. Having noticed that mandatory zoning has led to an unreasonable fraction of developable land's being set aside for single-family homes, today's activists have executed an abrupt about-face and announced that single-family zoning must be replaced by multi-family zoning in order to redress past inequities. One might think this kind of change might be pursued locally by changing the standards of the zoning committees, but why trust them to do that when you can ask the state government to make it mandatory for all cities? So they'll change from mandatory single-family to mandatory multi-family: anything but let the market adjust to what buyers and sellers want to do with their land. How would they know what's good for them?
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When you'd go to the airbase on the military side of Baghdad International (BIAP), there was a sign near the parking area. As you walked into the air base, it read, "No hats beyond this point." And on the other side, as you left, it said, "Hats mandatory beyond this point." I always think of that sign in cases like this.
I saw this, and my first reaction was that it's a full frontal assault on the "American Dream" by the left. They are constantly trying to come up with new ways to use the levers of power to ostensibly do some 'good' to 'progress' further to the left.
My second thought was that all the people I know around here in my deep, deep blue neighborhood will never go for it. They signal left happily, but they actually live their lives basically as classical liberals, and I'm pretty sure they'll see this as an intrusion into their lives that they didn't approve of. Funny how they don't mind when it's intrusion into the lives of others...
I can tell you, if this passes, no matter that it would increase work opportunities for me, I'm out of here, family ties or no.
Oh, yeah. Try putting section 8 housing in any single-family-housing community and you'll find out quickly who's really interested in mandating housing for the poor. This is going to be almost as much fun as finding out which blue-model cities are eager to accept busloads of illegal immigrants.
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