The Henry George Program

Derek Sagehorn is the author of East Bay for Everyone's 2021 paper California Housing Corporation: The Case for a Public Developer, and is here to take about the overall case for a public houser as a way to create a more robust, equitable, and efficient housing industry, as well as new legislation taking up the issue: Alex Lee's AB2053 (californiasocialhousing.org). We also get into some talk about UC Berkeley's CEQA woes: how can we make environmental law work better?

California nearly toppled minimum parking laws last year, and will likely try again (bless the name of Shoup); some weird discourse arose around why this is a bad thing... because of value capture?!!? (???) Enter Michael Manville of UCLA Luskin who spoke out against this analysis; he's here to talking about the nuts and bolts of value capture paradigms and parking policy, what happens when we create planning that we don't really intend to use, and much more; how can we undo the knots of our parking nightmare?

"It's a Wonderful Life" (1946, Frank Capra) is a Christmas classic, but also offers a great deal of insight into 20th century urban issues, the ideology of self-improvement through homeownership, lines of credit, and ex-urban sprawl. Do we live in George Bailey's world today, and what does this mean for us?

Josh Albrektson of South Pasadena talks about his work fighting against illegality in his city's housing element, and how PlaceWorks is a contractor at the heart of a massive scheme to underbuild housing and make many rich. We also dig into the nuts-and-bolts of HCD's process, legislation to keep it on rails, and how people can keep our Housing Elements honest.

Gene Slater's new book is the secret history of Realtors, their role in create modern housing markets and politics, and importantly, their role for incubating racial segregation in our cities.How did Realtors manage to create a backlash against Fair Housing built around "freedom", establishing a California constitutional amendment, and laying the future of the modern right-wing?

Paul Williams has new article on public housing out, talking about the various potential space we have to explore the benefits of public ownership, with an emphasis on the bureaucratic apparatus we wield to achieve it; we talk about what this means for the future of economic justice in cities, and effective governance.

Darrell Owens is back to talk about the 2021 legislative wins (SB8, SB9, SB10) and losses (AB1401); and also to discuss the debut article on his new Substack ; what do we talk about when we talk about vacancies?

Patrick Condon, Vancouver-based urban design professor, published Sick City in the last year, which invited a good deal of controversy; though the book was all about overcrowding, inequality, and georgist theories of land rents, it was most rapturously praised by Livable California and various homeowner NIMBYs. Why? And can we agree with all the book's conclusions?

Rohin Ghosh was a high-schooler in Palo Alto just a few months ago, but has already had years of involvement in renter and houseless campaigns throughout the Peninsula, and is here to talk about what's it's like for teens in this crazy environment, as well as his perspective on the landscape of non-profits throughout the Peninsula, based on his work. Also talk about how cities are reflecting to RHNA allocations, tenant organizing in Palo Alto, and more

While moratoria expires federally, California has one more go-round of "eviction protections"; landlords get paid out 100%, but where exactly are tenants today? Shanti Singh of Tenants Together is back to talk about how Sacramento crafts tenant bills; also talk about how SF CLT's is held up by dismal city institutions.