CAMBRIA, CA - The big news around these parts of California's central coast is the state appeals court ruling that the California Coastal Commission is unconstitutional. The ruling is long overdue. The Coastal Commission, for you non-Californians, is one of those modern administrative agencies that combine bureaucratic ideology of near-Stalinist zeal with corruption of the worst kind. One commissioner, Mark Nathanson, served five years in prison for selling favors. But the Coastal Commission is merely the tip of the bureaucratic iceberg that has been sinking development in California for more than a generation.

The little coastal town of Cambria I call my second home shows how this game works. In 1984, a local bank proposed to build 100,000 square feet of commercial development on its land, including a hotel, shops, restaurants, and badly needed parking. Eighteen years later, after five environmental impact reviews, the bank is finally going to be allowed to build 7,000 square feet

Cambria is aggressively anti-growth. It is, of course, illegal to be openly anti-growth, so the local water authorities slow down the pace of development through the simple expedient of not adding any new capacity, and then saying to building applicants: "Sorry, we don't have enough water; you'll have to wait." And wait. Finally the area has become so short of water that a building moratorium has been enacted.

Then along came Habitat for Humanity, which wants to build one (1) affordable dwelling here in town, where house prices rank with those of San Francisco. It would be the height of embarrassment for the local water lords to say No to Habitat (Jimmy Carter would think ill of the town), so the water lords "discovered" a loophole to allow the Habitat project to go ahead right away. Meanwhile, low-income Hispanics, who provide the bulk of the labor for the retirees and tourist trade, are crowding two or three families into a single house or apartment.

A few miles north, the Hearst family still owns 128 square miles (square miles, not acres) of land along the coast, and has long wanted to conduct some modest development. But they have always been stymied by the regulators. The latest Hearst proposal was to build a hotel and about 400 homes on the land, which would have a net population density of something like the Gobi Desert. All the local self-appointed activist "conservation" groups got into the act and said No, threatened endless lawsuits, and forced the Hearsts to back down. A "compromise" has just been reached.

The Hearsts may build 27 homes on their 128 square miles, none near the beach or in sight of Highway 1, and they must provide public access to 18 miles of previously inaccessible coastline. While several conservation groups now support the proposal, the Sierra Club has not yet "signed off" on the plan, and "Friends of the Ranchland" remains "concerned" about exactly where the 27 homes will be sited, and "whether or not the Hearsts will set aside certain beach areas for themselves."

Imagine: setting aside beach areas for yourself on your own land! Some landowners really have a lot of nerve, don't they? And people still wonder why there is no affordable housing in California.

In the Sacramento scale of values, it is more important to reward a powerful group of supporters rather than make housing, a basic need, more affordable. For those who want to lower the cost of housing, there is a better way.

As a matter of policy, all public projects should be open to bids from all companies, not just unionized companies. The company with the lowest bid, regardless of ethnicity, gender, race or union affiliation, should get the job. The regulatory burden that builders face could also be lightened. These measures would lower costs but provoke reaction from unions and environmentalists who, safely established in suburban homes, do everything in their power to prevent new housing from appearing. Those workers who must live farther from their jobs may soon find another surprise the next time they get a notice from the Department of Motor Vehicles.

The current administration has rung up a huge deficit and wants to get rid of it on the backs of workers. Bay Area politicos, led by San Francisco Assemblywoman Carol Migden, want to turn back the clock to the days when the yearly car tax was truly punitive, not affordable as it is now. Restoring high car taxes, of course, comes billed as a way to soak the rich but will hurt working Californians the most.

Californians will want to remember this strange New Year greeting when it comes time to vote.

Steven Hayward is a senior fellow at the Pacific Research Institute in San Francisco and the author of The Age of Reagan--The Fall of the Old Liberal Order, 1964-1980. He can be reached via email at shayward@pacificresearch.org.