| Consent, Item 6. "Confirming Existence of a Local Emergency." |
Attend in person, 2212 Beach Boulevard, 2nd floor. Or, view on local television or live feed Pacificcoast.TV, (formerly pct26.com). If you miss civic meetings, view on PCT 26 You Tube! The city council meeting begins at 7 p.m., or shortly there following. City council updates and archives are available on the City website.
Fix Pacifica article, City Council meeting, 1/25/16. Interactive City Council Agenda, 1/25/16.
Public Hearings
7. AT&T wireless communications use permits, 11: Vallemar.
8. Appeal AT&T wireless communication, use permit, 1: Vallemar.
Recommendation continue item to City Council meeting, 2/8/16.
Consideration
9. Direction on rent stabilization.
Note photograph from Associated Press/Capital Bay News/Mathias Dillon, 1/23/16, "El Nino batters the West Coast as Pacifica declares state of emergency."
Posted by Kathy Meeh
34 comments:
This meeting was a colossal waste of time. Comrade Keener and his dim-witted devotee Digre, continue to hijack thousands of precious hours and resources to conduct "go nowhere" social engineering seminars while the city washes down the drain.
They are derelict in their primary duty of running the city. The Bay Area wide housing crisis is not going to be solved by a handful of social misfits and faux enviro's whose real motive is to preserve the status quo "I Got Mine" lifestyle they expect everyone else to pay for.
Funny how all the usual phony habitat champions have disappeared now that the endangered specie is human instead of reptilian or amphibious.
Pacifica needs development of revenue generating projects. We need housing, affordable housing, dense housing around traffic nodes and jobs near where we live.
We need common sense leadership that actually puts a stop to this deceptive 30 year sideshow that has crippled our town.
The wall on Beach Blvd. needs a new charge of rip-rap, not hand wringing and scary story telling. A $100,000 worth of rock maintenance every 4-5 years could easily prevent the $10,000,000's of emergency events that will surely follow the loss of property and vital infrastructure. Add to that the risk to human life and safety, huge lawsuits and fines and massive clean-up expenses.
This is unconscionable.
Wake up Pacifica!
I notice the rogue realtors rolled out all the carpet baggers to come out and beg city council to not implement rent control.
Rent Control is a stupid "fix" that doesn't fix anything.
Compassion, yes. Common sense, yes. Intelligent approach, yes. Democracy now, yes.
This is NOT communist China, YET!
@10:38: I notice that the rent control advocates are accusing the "rogue" realtors of being "organized". (Wasn't it those wanting to create a whole new bureacratic agency who had their speeches and everything else coordinated?) But organized rogues? At least try to get your spin room comments to make sense, please.
11:41
Truth and reality don't matter when you're pushing propaganda.
Rent control is a communist grab pure and simple.
Keener is the Commandant.
Oh brother! Plenty of organization and cheesy propaganda on both sides of this issue. Dishonest for either side to claim otherwise. The realtors motivated by money and with resources like SAMCAR facing off against the housing activists who are on a crusade that appears altruistic and humane by comparison. And the argument will be settled by local politicians--a group noted for its instincts for self-preservation above all else. Pity the people who today just want an affordable place to live.
Sue has been on council for how long? She still can't run a meeting. Can we let the speakers talk for only 2 minutes we have lots of speakers tonight? What happens if we vote to run the meeting until 2:30 and we are not finished yet.
139, interesting focus from you. AFFORDABLE AND LOW COST HOUSING is needed in this City. Hence, within infill and empty space area, such housing should be included and built.
Of course, you do support building affordable and low cost housing (adding density is certain areas of this City) for the benefit of "people who 'today' just want an affordable place to live"-- don't you?
Councilmember MaryAnn Nihart expressed this issue quite clearly last night; and, also mentioned that some of same people who advocate for rent control in this City might not also support much needed affordable and low cost housing.
And if you happen to be part of that Gang of No (aka: an entrenched nimby), consider the contradictory nature of your quest to house people, but at the same time not house people.
Or, if you are truly part of a "crusade that appears altruistic and humane" show us something other than your "cheesy propaganda", such as a campaign to achieve a more balanced solution-- rather dumping on Realtors, their professional organization, and landlords who provide a rental service.
Fortunately the vote to draft a rent control ordinance introduced by Councilmember John Keener failed last night, the vote was 4-1 against. (Turns out Councilmember Sue Digre is more rational and willing to find common ground than Councilmember John Keener.)
The gang of no is far better organized.
What has the gang of yes done? Nothing.
Kathy, you give Sue way too much credit. I'm she was just lost in her usual cloud of confusion and hypocrisy when she flipped the vote NO switch.
Keener is a very evil man who is 100% committed to do the bidding of his NIMBY masters.
325, FMV your comment is unnecessarily unfair to Mayor Sue Digre who generally runs a pretty good city council meeting.
From about 10:30 pm, it was estimated from the huge number of speaker cards, followed by council deliberations, the meeting could have run until 2:30 am, or even later.
A council vote is required to extend the meeting after 11:00 pm, City legal advised a "time certain" must be stated and adhered to.
With so many speakers last night, plus the late hour, 2 minutes each would have been appreciated by most participants, and observers. (And for that reason Mayor Digre did mention trying to keep communications as brief as possible.)
I beg to differ with Kathy. Sue ran one of the most slipshod meetings I have ever had the misfortune to attend. She was confused, disorganized (which you can easily observe when you attend these torture session)and completely overmatched by the evolution of this meeting. She needs assistance to run these meetings. I attended last night and those that would be severely impacted by a rent control ordinance presented a valid, rational, well thought out argument against. They were not a cabal or coalition. They were mom and pop property owners watching some of their neighbors accusing them of horrible actions against their tenants. Those that want to point at the Realtors are looking for a scapegoat for their 40 years of no growth policies that have directly caused this housing crisis. It's hard to look in the mirror and accept the fact that you have caused a large part of this problem yourself, no one else.
The people for rent control are the same people who refuse to allow new housing to be built.
517 Spoken with the purpose and authority of a realtor or 'affiliated industry member'. I still think realtors are better than attorneys who advertise on TV and people who sell used cars. Hang on to your lead.
Oh, cut the crap. Sue did fine. It's true that there's definitely a degree of overlap between nimbys and rent control advocates. There are also some rapacious landlords, some of whom may even be realtors. Gasp! But rent control for Pacifica is an ineffective over reaction and 4 of 5 council members saw that. Large scale market rate construction would also be an over reaction. Areas always become more expensive if they are near job centers as we are. Birth of the suburbs and all. Peaks are cyclical, but over decades they and rising wages contribute to a steady climb in average rents. When times are good, people get priced out, but those people would be priced out of new market rate housing in Pacifica, too. Sounds like a windfall for existing landlords. Some of us aren't greedy. And it really sounds like Council should be pursuing builders of affordable or low-income housing, but where's the fun in that? More to the point, where are the votes and big campaign donations in that?
You're not going to hear realtors, etc. say build more houses in Pacifica so we can make more money. Instead, we have them saying build more houses to cure the shortage of affordable housing. Affordable housing is a hot and convenient topic in Pacifica. But, unless those new houses and apts are income restricted affordable housing, the problem is not at all solved. The land will, however, be gone, used for more market rate housing and prices will climb as long as the economy supports it. I support new housing, both market rate and affordable, but let's be honest about it and what each will accomplish. It's not nice to hide behind the (relatively) poor to advance an agenda that fails to help them.
Sue did 2d rent control proposal by Keener.It was defeated.It was good political sense to support the default advisory proposal,in order to show council willingness to facilitate negotiation between renters and landlords.Self policing ,in evictions and rent increases,depends on paternalism,which is obsolete in whatever market can bear environment.
816, big thanks for the clarification. You are correct, what Mayor Sue Digre supported was the follow-up advisory proposal which passed 4-1, but she voted with Councilmember John Keener just prior for Rent Control ordinance which failed 3-2.
(After 4 hours of this City Council meeting, my attention was directed elsewhere which made for a fuzzy 335 comment with regard to the two consecutive votes.)
This was another City Council majority vote where an initial rational approach prevailed.
Thank God, rent control failed here in Pacifica! My husband and I own real estate in San Francisco. We are far from being rich. We scrimped and scraped to buy our place in the City. We are under rent control. Our tenants have demanded this and that while we almost starved to hang onto the place. We were raising two kids during the most difficult years. I can't tell you how many times we had to tell our kids no they couldn't have something, including necessities at times. We did without while our tenants went on fine vacations.
Our rental property always came first over our own house. We took care of our tenants. Our tenants make more money than we do together and both of us have always worked. Our tenants have gone our to nice dinners consistently, vacations, etc.
Our family didn't go on a family vacation for ten years because we invested and didn't have any money because we put our tenants first.
PLEASE, spare me the rent control CRAP. How do you expect the owner to make improvements to the property when they can't raise the rent???
10:50-Do not forget renters pay the mortgage off.All they get is rent receipts.Remember ,"Get Rich in Real Estate with other peoples money."
@7:17PM, I'm in the middle of a book called, "The Rise and Fall of Urban Economies", and it estimates that anti-housing policies and regulations in the Bay Area increase housing prices by 50%. So it's not just a strong job market that's responsible for high housing costs.
@11:46 -- You conveniently ignore the risk of default/unknown future market conditions/potential legal overhead etc that the home owners are responsible for.
The home owner takes on the risk and is entitled to the reward or responsible for the loss. The renter is protected against such market risks in exchange for giving up the entitlement for reward.
Housing is not an investment. Its an essential requirement/service that can be fulfilled for a fee. Like food and water. It is dangerous to consider housing as an investment.
The only reason housing has appreciated as wildly as it did is because of easy and unregulated credit. The price discovery mechanism for housing in SF Bay Area is essentially broken.
I never had anything against realtors and landlords - until I saw them play the role of hardscrabble paupers Monday night! Landlords who only rent single family homes complained that they will have to raise the rent by $1,000 just to survive (even though they would be unaffected by rent control), many complained (just like 10:50 above) "How do you expect the owner to make improvements to the property when they can't raise the rent???", even though the proposal at hand would allow rent increases at 1 1/2 times the rate of inflation, typically 3 to 5 percent a year. Every landlord that spoke implied that they raise the rent far less than that every year, but somehow when that becomes law they will go bankrupt. One wealthy realtor who loves to show off his collection of memorabilia worth over $100,000 complained that he never owned a new car. Give me break! It appears that the next election will be critical.
1:03
You could have read the much shorter book.
The fall of the Pacifica Economy!
Local Libertarian:Housing is definite investment in rent control: Fixed rate mortgage and Prop 13 protection ,along with long term capital gains make it main wealth grower for property owners,plus tax deductions against income.
Landlords without vacations, their kids without shoes. Give me a break! Buying rental property is a choice and we make that choice because it's a solid, long term investment. A time-honored way for the little guy to build wealth. Pop lit aside it's the easy commute to jobs and business in SF or the Peninsula that make it a can't miss investment. Slightly buffed-up LM ranchers renting for $5K monthly. Often to several unrelated adults or multi-gen families. How else can they afford the rent? New normal. No surprises from this council on this issue. Being a landlord in Pacifica is a solid gold choice.
If Council announced they'd sealed a deal for 100 units of income restricted affordable and low-income housing to be built in Pacifica, I'd believe they were genuinely concerned about the shortage of affordable housing. The rest of this is just the eternal dog fight between the pro and anti development groups and their stooges.
@10:13 -- You are not disagreeing with me.
Fixed rate mortgages are unregulated credit that have contributed to the bubble.
Long Term capital gains are another tool to encourage consumption of this credit.
Consider this basic question: Why should a house appreciate in value at all?
If land is scarce the value of land should appreciate based on demand. But the cost of house itself should depreciate. But we know there is enough land in bay area to house at least 10 million people.
Because of the way we have our permit/zoning system, it contributes to inflation of prices of a depreciating asset and land.
Like I said, housing price discovery in SF Bay is broken.
6:31 You said what I was thinking. If these landlords (most of whom would not be affected by rent control) are living on the edge of poverty and having to go without necessities, clearly they are not very good managers of their own investments. Why should we protect them from their own poor judgement?
Guys you are embarrassing yourselves.
Clearly you are not landlords and really have no idea what you're talking about.
Owning property, relying on renters, paying taxes, repairs and insurance can be nerve wracking and is no more of a guarantee of success than owning a hardware store or a hot dog stand. All work people do for a living is honorable and is not without risk.
Stop already.
12:07 PM Thank you for giving me this openning to say if tenants had been better managers of their money then they wouldn't be tenants but owners. In your own words, why should we protect them from their own poor judgement?
I've been a landlord for many years and I know very well what I'm talking about. I own property and I've rented to many tenants at below market prices - it's an excellent strategy for keeping good tenants. I pay taxes, I make repairs to my property and I pay insurance. If you bought and rent property as an investment and can't make ends meet, you're not a very good money manager. Nobody said that being a landlord is a guarantee of high returns on your investment, but it's a helluva lot different than owning a hardware store or a hot dog stand. Seriously, if you can't make a profit from your rental property in this housing market, you shouldn't be in this business.
Like 331 said.
Tinfow thinks she is going to get 8 million dollars to rebuild the Pacifica Pier?
Umm when she finds the missing 4 million.
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