Can Santa Cruz County control its housing destiny? Come find out.
Unthinkable even just eight years ago, the question above is now of increasing urgency in Santa Cruz County as state lawmakers, frustrated by lack of local progress in confronting California’s affordable housing crisis, continue to pick away at the ability of cities and counties to say no to new development.
On Wednesday, Lookout will host a sold-out, two-part discussion, which I’ll be moderating, that we hope will get us closer to an answer. If you couldn’t get a ticket to the event at Hotel Paradox, you can join us on our Facebook Live stream from 6 to 8 p.m.
“Housing destiny” is a term of art; it carries multitudes. It could refer to the number and density of new housing units. For some, it’s about the height and feel of new construction. For many, however, a community’s housing destiny is defined by what kinds of people and incomes will be able to afford dignified housing in the future.
Our destiny, by nature, is always ahead of us. Yet, we tend to forget that the reality of our present is the destiny of our past. For decades, cities and counties had control over almost every aspect of new housing development, including the number of new units allowed in a community, density, height, parking and setback requirements. Today, Santa Cruz County is the least affordable housing market in our country (in terms of local wages vs. housing costs), California the least affordable state. We’ve arrived at a destiny that works for fewer and fewer types of people.
Over the last few years, the state legislature has confronted the problem by giving housing developers flexibility that supersedes local control. That has left communities feeling removed from the driver’s seat of their own housing futures.
So, where do we go from here? On Wednesday, that question will be top of mind as I speak with state Sen. Scott Wiener, County Supervisor Manu Koenig and Santa Cruz City Councilmember Sandy Brown for Part 1 of our housing panel. Then, I will have a one-on-one conversation with Sibley Simon, a principal with local development and architecture firm Workbench, the company behind that much-talked-about 16-story housing development proposed for downtown Santa Cruz.
For now, I’d love to hear from you. What questions are on your mind regarding housing development in Santa Cruz County? What would you ask if you were the one hosting the panel?
OF NOTE
The governor’s executive order on encampments: Gov. Gavin Newsom issued an executive order Thursday calling on all state agencies to develop policies to clear homeless encampments in their jurisdictions. Although Newsom encouraged local governments to draft similar policies, he stopped short of requiring any action from cities and counties.
The order follows the June decision by the U.S. Supreme Court to allow governments to criminalize camping and sleeping on public property. Although the executive order represents Newsom’s evolving rhetoric on homelessness, local officials in Santa Cruz County say they don’t expect it to have a direct impact on their approach.
LOOKING AHEAD
The county’s climate series: Santa Cruz County’s Commission on the Environment will kick off a series of community meetings on Wednesday, July 31, about goals in the county’s Climate Action and Adaptation Plan. The first meeting in the series will be held at 5 p.m. at the County Government Building, 701 Ocean St., Santa Cruz.
Summer vacation continues: The Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors, as well as the city councils in Santa Cruz, Watsonville and Scotts Valley are all off this week as summer recess continues.
WEEKLY NEWS DIET
Local: My colleague Hillary Ojeda reports on a battle over ethnic studies curriculum in South County, where a group of community members and teachers have formed a new group to advocate for its inclusion in the Pajaro Valley Unified School District. As Ojeda reports, the group has even launched their own community education program, the Freedom School
Golden State: In Santa Cruz County, the largest demographic gain between 2020 and 2023 was in the 75-79 age range, where White, Asian and Hispanic populations each grew by at least 29%. That’s just some of the interesting information contained in a new San Francisco Chronicle analysis of demographic changes in California’s counties.
National: With Vice President Kamala Harris as the presumptive Democratic nominee, polls show the presidential race has tightened. Yet, polls also show the GOP’s pick, former president Donald Trump, is more popular today than he has been at any point over the last four years. Politico has a new breakdown on what recent polling has to tell us about the rapidly shifting dynamics of the 2024 race.
ONE GREAT READ
Dead Reckoning by Nick Paumgarten for the New Yorker
Did you know Dead & Co. was playing a residency at the Sphere in Las Vegas? Trick question. Everyone knows. The hippies from Haight’s LED-soaked residency has been the live music sensation of the summer, and yet another reason to never believe a band who says they are retiring.
New Yorker writer Nick Paumgarten has, in some ways, become a professional Deadhead. He has appeared in documentaries on the band, written liner notes for album re-releases, and appeared on podcasts and hosted discussion panels. When his editor told him to attend a couple Sphere shows for the magazine, Paumgarten admits he was skeptical. He’s an old-timer, uncomfortable with the many iterations, simulations and simulacrums that have followed Jerry Garcia’s death.
With his punchy flair, Paumgarten tells about the long, strange trip from his introduction to the band more than 40 years ago as a teenager all the way to his seat inside the Sphere as a middle-aged man. Grateful Dead mixed with existentialism and some meditations on aging and impermanence, this story is a perfect example of what makes magazine writing great.
Paumgarten’s piece pairs nicely with the article I recently wrote chronicling the path of the Grateful Dead’s archive from a storage garage in Marin County to its now permanent home at UC Santa Cruz’s McHenry Library.