San Diego County had enough positive attributes during ALL of its history to attract “newcomers” without having to “lure” them with a constant supply of new construction to choose from. If they want to be here bad enough, they will find a place to live. If they don’t, or don’t want to live in what SD County has to offer, then they won’t move here. It’s their choice. These are the housing conditions in the SF Bay coastal counties and other, more rural but pristine CA counties as well and none of them are going to go BK or lose their population solely because their leaders were good stewards of their environment and thus created a great place to live for their residents. As it should be.[/quote]
It’s not the housing that lured them, it’s the weather, the job prospects, and the image of California that lured them…and all the people before them since the indigenous people of what we now call California. I’m sure the indigenous people would have loved to keep you (and me and everyone else here) out, too, but that’s not how it works, (un)fortunately.
As a native Southern Californian, I have also seen all the overbuilding and the decimation of once-beautiful scenery. The neighborhood in which I grew up was once surrounded by orange groves, corn fields, and strawberry fields that we could play hide-and-seek in at night…not to mention the glorious views from the mountaintops which we would have to hike to because there were no roads. Now, it’s all developed: those hills that were free for us locals to use are now gated developments with expensive homes — they’ll call security the second you step out of your car up there; and those agricultural fields and groves are now condos, hotels, and high-rise offices. I don’t like it, but accept it as a condition of living in such a desirable place.
I also know that while it might be nice for my descendants to inherit property worth a gazillion dollars, this gain would come at the expense of all the families who would have to pay the exorbitant prices that would exist without new development…and I’m just not cool with that.
You say that the newcomers can just move out to the desert or some other far-flung place with cheaper housing and lower-density development, but it goes both ways. People who don’t like all the density and new developments can move to fly-over country to live on a farm, if space is what they’re looking for. Nobody should expect someone else to pay through the nose so that existing homeowners can enjoy ever-rising housing prices and a nice view of the hills over there. That is nobody else’s duty or obligation, not the government’s nor the families who are just looking for a home in which to live and raise their children.
And Mello-Roos taxes are a boon to the old-time land owners and developers. The land owners get to sell to the developers at an inflated price because the cost of infrastructure development isn’t deducted from the price of the land. The developers also get to sell homes for more than they otherwise would because the cost of the homes aren’t discounted as much as they would be if the cost of the infrastructure were factored into the total price (the “how much a month” club never seems to care much about total price). The benefits of MR are shared between these two parties, and the hapless and hopeless new buyers continue to overpay because financing these costs over decades “makes it more affordable.” 🙁
