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Storper on Tug-of-War Over Senate Bill 9

A Planetizen article on actions taken by municipalities opposed to Senate Bill 9, the California law allowing property owners to build additional units on lots zoned for single-family housing, cited research by Michael Storper, distinguished professor of urban planning at UCLA Luskin. Four Southern California cities have filed suit against the state, arguing that permitting the subdivision of single-family lots violates the California Constitution by taking away the rights of charter cities to have control over local land-use decisions. Storper issued a declaration in support of the plaintiffs that included a copy of a journal article he co-authored in 2019 that challenged the theoretical underpinnings that led to SB 9, which is intended to provide affordable housing options for Californians. “Blanket changes in zoning are unlikely to increase domestic migration or to improve affordability for lower-income households in prosperous areas,” the authors wrote. “They would, however, increase gentrification within metropolitan areas and would not appreciably decrease income inequality.”


 

Lens on Housing Density Reforms in Los Angeles

Associate Professor Michael Lens wrote an opinion piece for the Los Angeles Times on housing and land use reform in Los Angeles. Lens argues that L.A.’s geographic sprawl can be beneficial in terms of balancing housing density “that works for Californians.” Land use laws that discourage building for density can be reformed to provide alternatives to single-family neighborhoods by re-framing planning for housing around job-rich, medium-density urban hubs. “This does not necessarily mean obliterating the urban forms and communities that have been built in the past century. But without some densification, we’ll keep pushing people and development into the Inland Empire and other outlying areas (which is already happening),” he wrote. The result is “more punishing commutes and, in all likelihood, still expensive housing.” Lens also was quoted in an L.A. Times article about landlords’ objections to a continuing rent freeze, saying the pandemic sent policymakers “reaching for the emergency button,” but now the city should look at policies like expanding housing subsidies rather than extending the freeze.


 

Lens on the Population Exodus in Northern California

Michael Lens, associate professor of urban planning and public policy, spoke to the Los Angeles Times about a stark population decline in California, specifically in cities in Northern California. Factors such as the Bay Area’s tech-rich economy have led to an increase in remote work, resulting in an exodus of employees to less expensive locales. “Hundreds of thousands more people would desire to live in the Bay Area — if not millions — and Southern California if we made it easier to accommodate those people through more housing units and presumably more affordable housing,” Lens said. Many remote areas saw an influx of people, but Lens noted that an increase in housing is mostly needed in major cities. Urban centers can grow more efficiently, he said, adding that moving to places with lower population densities could also lead to longer commutes.


 

Affordable Housing Is Not an Easy Fix, Lens Says

Michael Lens, associate professor of urban planning and public policy, evaluated proposed solutions to the affordable housing crisis, including those put forward by Democratic presidential candidates. Sens. Cory Booker and Kamala Harris have proposed offering tax credits to help tenants pay rent. Opponents argue that such vouchers will not change the number of housing units available and could even spur landlords to raise rents. On KCRW’s Left, Right & Center, Lens said tax credits are just one of a wide variety of tools and interventions needed to address the complex problem. These include stronger tenant protections and more publicly subsidized housing, he said. “This is not a problem that lends itself to an easy fix,” said Lens,  associate faculty director of the UCLA Lewis Center for Regional Policy Studies. The podcast segment featuring Lens begins at the 34-minute mark.


 

Storper on the Roots of Housing Inequality

Michael Storper, distinguished professor of regional and international development in urban planning, co-wrote a paper featured prominently in a CityLab article. Storper and co-author Andrés Rodríguez-Pose of the London School of Economics argue that, while insufficient housing is a part of the problem, the idea that it is the main cause of urban economic problems is based on faulty premises. They find that increasing the housing supply does not lower housing costs. Rather, they find lower-income service workers move out of the city and higher-income “knowledge workers” move in. They write that the affordable housing crisis is “due less to over-regulation of housing markets than to the underlying wage and income inequalities, and a sharp increase in the value of central locations within metro areas, as employment and amenities concentrate in these places.” Storper is also the director of Global Public Affairs at UCLA Luskin.


 

Yaroslavsky Calls SB 50 an Overreach

Director of the Los Angeles Initiative at UCLA and former LA County Supervisor Zev Yaroslavsky spoke to NBC 4 about the implications presented by Senate Bill 50. The bill would allow cities to rezone along transit lines in order to increase the amount of high-density housing in California. Yaroslavsky said this would be an overreach without a middle ground. Many single-family neighborhoods would be rezoned to develop multifamily housing because SB 50 extends to virtually every bus line in L.A. County, he said. As the bill currently stands, it exempts small, affluent cities. “Don’t exempt the affluent cities. Treat everybody the same,” Yaroslavsky said.