OT: Californa SB 350

[Leorocky]

The state Department of Finance projects that California will grow from about 39 million people now to more than 51 million by 2060. Though the state’s growth rate is relatively slow, the Public Policy Institute of California said in a brief in February that as the population expands, California will shoulder “increased demand in all areas of infrastructure and public services – including education, transportation, corrections, housing, water, health and welfare.”

But concern about growth runs counter to demographers’ greater worry: Not that California is growing too fast, but that its population is growing too slowly.
“It’s totally the wrong question,” said Dowell Myers, a University of Southern California demography professor. “Without immigrants, California would be dead as a doornail. We don’t have enough children right now as it is to replace the workforce and the tax base … when Californians retire.”

Myers attributes fear of population growth to a mindset formed in the 1980s, when population grew rapidly. He said “a lot of people’s attitudes about immigration … stem from that period” and are now “behind the times.”

http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article25672837.html

[bearishgurl]

[quote=The-Shoveler][quote=bearishgurl]Oh, and people CAN drive less, Shoveler. Uhhh, it’s very simple. They can move closer to work! Novel suggestion if I do say so myself! No one … and I mean NO ONE is “trapped” in exurban hell. Everybody has choices in life and can vote with their feet if they don’t like the length of their daily commute.[/quote]

Easier said than done, What it your spouse works close and you just got laid off and your next job is 45-50 miles the other direction?

Happens all the time.[/quote]

I’m sure it does, Shoveler. The solutions I see are that the spouse should have taken a lesser-paying job closer to home, should keep looking for a good closer job while still working far way or the family could sell and move 20-25 miles so they are living between both employers. However, I don’t feel moving is a good option unless the spouse with the far-away job has passed his/her probationary period and feels secure in their new position.

I really feel that if your sample worker-bee couple had purchased a home in a more central location where there might be hundreds of available FT job openings within a ~15 mile radius at any given time, they wouldn’t have likely run into this problem during the years they resided in their home and BOTH of the parents would have had more time with the kid(s) (if there are kid(s)).

The above paragraph and the reason you cite above for long daily commutes to work is the main reason why subdivisions in “exurban hell” are more transient, Shoveler. And the homeowners who live there are more financially vulnerable than those in more established areas, causing housing distress and neighborhood (financial) volatility. During a “RE bust,” these areas are the first to fall in value and the last to rise in value during a recovery. Not only that, they fall the furthest in value (50% or more) compared to the entire region they are situated in. This phenomenon is due to the prevalent type of buyer who chooses to purchase in these areas being entirely dependent on a steady W-2 income for a living, imho.

[The-Shoveler]

What happens if there is no lower paid spouse?

Both are highly paid professionals?

The above is very common these days.

Easier said than done.

[bearishgurl]

[quote=The-Shoveler]You realize Ventura, Westlake, Irvine and Newberry park used to be exurb’s right?[/quote]

Yes, I get all that. Some of that occurred when the rest of these counties’ open space had not yet been set aside. But when there is no more land for subdivisions, there is no more land, period. Game over. Billionare developers would not have packed up and left SoCal if there was anything here left for them.

The areas you mention above were mostly developed between the ’60’s thru ’90’s (mostly ’80’s). Irvine (in the OC) was developed up through about 10-15 years ago.

[bearishgurl]

[quote=The-Shoveler]What happens if there is no lower paid spouse?

Both are highly paid professionals?

The above is very common these days.

Easier said than done.[/quote]

If they are both “highly-paid professionals” than the one who can get a state license and hang their own shingle locally should (if they want to remain in their current home for the long haul).

[bearishgurl]

Commuting over one hour each way to work 4-5 days per week for a parent (especially BOTH parents in a family) is a horrible way to raise a family unless that family has reliable local relatives available at all hours to pick up/drop off their kids or care for them themselves.

This is just my opinion which is based upon the many available housing alternatives out there for families with children.

[The-Shoveler]

LOL So no large scale development is happening now or in the future in Socal?

[bearishgurl]

[quote=The-Shoveler]LOL So no large scale development is happening now or in the future in Socal?[/quote]

Shoveler, why don’t you post some link(s) where this is happening. How big will the subdivision be and how long ago was the land purchased for subdivision purposes? WHO originally purchased the land and why has it not been heretofore developed?

[The-Shoveler]

This is one example but there are many smaller (but still fairly large housing and planned communities) happening all along the I-15 corridor in IE and San Diego county.

http://www.latimes.com/business/realestate/la-fi-property-report-ontario-20141106-story.html

They all start out as bedroom communities then they evolve into Cities, just they way it has been for 75 or more years now.

Here is another in SD

http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/2015/jan/26/development-north-county-merriam-newland/

[bearishgurl]

[quote=Leorocky]The state Department of Finance projects that California will grow from about 39 million people now to more than 51 million by 2060. Though the state’s growth rate is relatively slow, the Public Policy Institute of California said in a brief in February that as the population expands, California will shoulder “increased demand in all areas of infrastructure and public services – including education, transportation, corrections, housing, water, health and welfare.”

But concern about growth runs counter to demographers’ greater worry: Not that California is growing too fast, but that its population is growing too slowly.
“It’s totally the wrong question,” said Dowell Myers, a University of Southern California demography professor. “Without immigrants, California would be dead as a doornail. We don’t have enough children right now as it is to replace the workforce and the tax base … when Californians retire.”

Myers attributes fear of population growth to a mindset formed in the 1980s, when population grew rapidly. He said “a lot of people’s attitudes about immigration … stem from that period” and are now “behind the times.”

http://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article25672837.html%5B/quote%5D

Leorocky, more immigrants or no, everyone has to live somewhere. If living units are capped in a jurisdiction and its occupancy is near 100%, then the newcomer will have to shop for housing in the next city over. Take San Mateo (SM Co), for example. It has and is surrounded by thousands of high-paying jobs but the amount of its living units have been capped for more than 35 years. If a new employee of a nearby company cannot find housing in San Mateo due to “no vacancy,” they will have to shop for housing in the next town over. And on and on until they find suitable housing for themselves. San Mateo has PLENTY of vacant land but it was all dedicated to open space in the 1930’s through early ’60’s. This is the case in most CA jurisdictions, especially in the most desirable coastal areas to live and there is nothing anyone here (or any “forecasting think tank” or “bureaucrat”) can do about this. Gubment officials can “forecast” a future CA “population explosion” of 12M more people all they want but the reality will be quite different, IMO. From the article, the Governor is essentially saying it is up to cities and counties how they want to (upzone?) to accomodate increases in population. I doubt too many cities are going to attempt to upzone their residential areas wholesale simply because they can’t afford to hire and pay the extra city/county personnel that a big increase in population will need. I could see a city/county giving lip service to scattered low-rise live and work lofts over commercial buildings, just to say, “Look what we did. We’re promoting `density!'” But they’re not going to utilize their (now bare bones) personnel constantly preparing for and appearing in public hearings fighting private property owners and neighbors for years over proposed density projects. It’s not going to happen because the prospective “developers” will just get tired of throwing money away on “environmental testing and mitigation” and go somewhere else in search of building permits.

If CA companies can’t find enough employees in the state in the year 2060 (in spite of well over a hundred CA universities churning out graduates twice yearly as well as attempting to recruit from out of state), then some CA companies might move somewhere else. Do we care?

CA “retirees” will retire in place or elsewhere in the state. A small portion will leave the state to retire but this will even be a smaller portion of current homeowners. That doesn’t necessarily mean more houses will be on the market in established areas. If it costs a retiree next to nothing to hang onto the home they had while they were working, they will, and rent it out for monthly income. This is especially prevalent in the SF bay area, where retirees have the highest net worth in the state (in the aggregate). Meaning they don’t have to sell the old family homestead to buy their retirement home. The more rural areas many CA retirees have and will retire to are not attractive to a worker-bee trying to raise a family, due to lack of good jobs and isolation from major freeways. So those areas are off the table and do not add to the state’s population as their new inhabitants have simply traded residency in one county for another. There are ALWAYS rental vacancies available in CA’s small towns but often very few listings available for sale at any given time (depending on town).

Props 13, 58 and 193 has and will see to it that the state could eventually become home to mostly longtime resident-retirees and their children (who may or may not need a FT job to exist). This will be the “homeowner class” and new immigrants (if they’re still coming) will be the “renter” and “new homebuyer” classes.

That’s how I envision CA’s future and I don’t feel it is entirely bad.

[no_such_reality]

You realize it takes close to an hour to cross Irvine at rush hour? That the 405 and 5 southbound traffic out of southbay and east LA is heavier than the traffic going into LA?

A job in downtown LA will take me about an hour to commute to. A job in the UCI/Newport area will take close to the same. One iis easily less than half the distance of the other.

Apparently the trivial solution is to sell my hell suburban place and move to Corona del Mar or Westside. Although coworkers from the west side have told me plenty of horror stories about taking an hour to get five miles. CDM is great, takes a half an hour to get out of it though so hopefully I work in about a three mile radius.

But let’s not let the reality of 18 million people wanting lives intrude on our anti development rants.

[The-Shoveler]

Most of the people living in the high end flats in Downtown L.A. have to commute out to the Suburbs of WestLake, Newberry park, Simi-Valley or Valencia LOL.

Yea that’s working,

[poorgradstudent]

It seems like an ambitious plan.

I would LOVE to take mass transit to work. If I could hop a train somewhere around where the I-15 and 56 meet and zip over to the Sorrento Valley station, just blocks from my work, I’d be loving life.

Unfortunately our mass transit system sucks and if another zealot talks to me about biking I’ll remind them of humid, rainy days like today.

[bearishgurl]

[quote=no_such_reality]You realize it takes close to an hour to cross Irvine at rush hour? That the 405 and 5 southbound traffic out of southbay and east LA is heavier than the traffic going into LA?

A job in downtown LA will take me about an hour to commute to. A job in the UCI/Newport area will take close to the same. One iis easily less than half the distance of the other.

Apparently the trivial solution is to sell my hell suburban place and move to Corona del Mar or Westside. Although coworkers from the west side have told me plenty of horror stories about taking an hour to get five miles. CDM is great, takes a half an hour to get out of it though so hopefully I work in about a three mile radius.

But let’s not let the reality of 18 million people wanting lives intrude on our anti development rants.[/quote]

Well, I’ve been busy on and off reading over (and investigating) Shoveler’s links of new development and proposed new development in the Southland and my first reaction was, “OMG, delusion reigns!”

I agree with everything you’re saying, NSR. On Friday afternoon, June 30, it took me 5.5 hours to go 166 miles across the southland to get home. That’s a record for me. I totally agree about the gridlock in the OC, both in the east and west side. This is all the more reason that a LA/OC worker bee shouldn’t be freeway dependent if at all possible. Or have multiple alternate routes scoped out. It also helps to live less than 15 miles from work (<=8 is much more doable on a daily basis. I'm not the only one opposed to any more growth. Most CA city/county officials (the ones that cast their votes on zoning, permit requests and proposed subdivision development) have learned their lessons the hard way and are now opposed to new subdivision development as well. Every single extra police and fire personnel that has to be hired for new, exurban police/fire stations has to be paid for periodic overtime and budgeted for pension contributions. Mello-Roos bonds only cover the cost of building the public infrastructure itself. It does NOT cover the compensation of the humans who will be stationed inside it. These extra salaries and pension contributions caused massive layoffs in all city/county depts in recent years when their property tax proceeds dwindled. This was just 1-3 years after hiring hundreds of new workers in jurisdictions where too many subdivision permits were approved during the "boom times." This happened in Chula Vista and many other cities in CA and heavily contributed to the City of San Bernardino's BK filing. Cities/counties must be assured of being able to pay new employees going forward to adequately staff services for the proposed new population before they will commit to new (outlying) subdivision permits (assuming there is any land left for subdivisions).

[bearishgurl]

I just looked over the bill and feel that if it passes the way it is written, the State Bureau of Automotive Repair is going to make it harder and harder for older-vehicle owners to continue to get their vehicles registered every year, in spite of being meticulously maintained. I could see the BAR increasing the “smog check” to every year on vehicles older than ~20 years and putting those vehicles through other “tests” which have nothing to do with emissions. This will cause low-wage workers who typically drive older vehicles they purchased for cash to go into debt to buy a newer vehicle and will cause retired people on limited incomes who drive older vehicles (there are a LOT of these people) to donate them or junk them when they can no longer register them and begin using public transportation. The BAR is already very intrusive as to the condition of older vehicles with its use of a biennial “directed vehicle program” (into STAR stations). I can only imagine what will come next if this bill is passed as written.

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