Housing
Lee Ohanian – Why Californians Are Fleeing the State
Our guest this week is Hoover Institution senior fellow and UCLA professor Dr. Lee Ohanian.
Read latest from Free Cities Center
Coercion-free planning can lead to glorious results
Central planning, no matter if the target is an economy or a community, has generally had historically disastrous results. When the government plots and schemes the future, people are ultimately doomed to lower living standards at best, and misery, all too often. Yet central planning can work – but only …
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San Diego offers pragmatic model to restore downtown life
According to Neighborhood Scout, a data-driven organization that provides detailed insights into local crime rates at a far more granular level than national statistics, San Diego has 4 violent crimes and 19.3 property crimes per 1,000 residents. In contrast, Los Angeles has 8.4 violent crimes and 24.6 property crimes per …
Private cities bypass ossified governments. Will California follow?
Private cities bypass ossified governments. Will California follow? By Thibault Serlet California’s public discourse about urbanism has become extremely pessimistic. A glimpse into some of the large-scale private cities – generally known as Special Economic Zones, or SEZs – popping up in developing countries might offer us some well-needed hope. …
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New cities offer unpredictable but exciting urban future
Although it was thoroughly lost amid his travails as the most prosecuted ex-president in American history, on March 4, in a video released on his campaign website, Donald Trump proposed a national contest for urban developers to submit designs for new “Freedom Cities,” with 10 winning designs to be allocated federal land …
True conservatives should welcome state rollback of housing restrictions
‘Local control’ still is government control
At the state level, the concurrent Republican values of “local control” and “limited government” can compete and even conflict. Republicans have long stood against unfunded state mandates on local government and onerous red tape on the private sector, as well we should. However, we should welcome state intervention to reduce …
Read about debate over SB 9 and 10
Misguided fear and loathing over relaxed zoning rules
SB 9 essentially eliminated single-family-only zoning by allowing property owners – on a “by right” basis that avoids subjective local reviews – to subdivide their single-family properties and build additional units on the land provided it meets all the pre-existing local setback and land-use conditions. It would allow up to …
Anti-camping ordinances or Housing First programs?
It’s no surprise to any resident that, for more than a decade, a disproportionate share of the homeless population has been living in California, and that number continues to grow. We see it every day: on the way to work, dropping our kids off at school, enjoying a nice dinner …
How Eminent Domain Obliterated the Character of Cities
No city can possibly express its character – the many urban quirks and idiosyncrasies, as well as the strangely appealing grittiness and shining luxury that often coexist side-by-side – when government planners use the bulldozer to “improve” cities. Writing about the “wave of urban renewal that swept the world in …
Previewing Gov. Newsom’s Political Roadshow State of the State
The Associated Press reports that “Newsom plans to fulfill his constitutional requirement by sending a letter to the State Legislature” instead of delivering the usual speech at the State Capitol. Part of me felt a little nostalgic by the news. I’ve had the chance to work on both sides of …
